By: Jennifer Dekel

September 24th, Washington D.C. - Politically correct standards in our children's schools, textbooks, and testing methods lead to ill-founded biases, censorship, and misconstrued information, according to Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn).

"In history books it is now common to read about pre-Columbian civilizations in the Americas and their contributions to culture, while ignoring or dismissing some of their backward practices, such as the Aztec practice of human sacrifice," Sen. Alexander said. "At the same time, the accomplishments of European civilization are downplayed to the extent that some textbooks are more likely to tell about a university in Timbuktu than Oxford or Cambridge."

Sen. Alexander sits on the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. According to Sen. Alexander, as well as all other witnesses from across the nation present at the committee's hearing on intellectual diversity, textbooks today are subject to the will of their respective publishing companies, and must pass specific bias and sensitivity tests, resulting in highly watered-down, and supposedly innocuous contents.

Dr. Sheldon Stern, former chief historian at the John F. Kennedy Memorial Library in Boston, recently authored a study of U.S. history standards of all the states that have them. The study was the first of this kind done by a historian. Only six states earned A's, while 23 received F's, the study found.

Sandra Stotsky, the Former Senior Associate Commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Education, said "the most serious problems we face" with respect to school curriculums, are the school curriculum materials and consultants provided by "professional development" centers in schools of education and non-profit organizations that are "ideologically driven." Such centers and organizations often have strong contacts with school personnel as well as much influence on the content of school curriculums, Stotsky said.

"One Massachusetts-based but nationally active organization is promoting a moral equivalence between Nazi Germany and the U.S. in its workshops and materials on the American eugenics movement, implying that the U.S. is responsible for Hitler's racial policies, and ultimately, the Holocaust," according to Stotsky. Other organizations such as those with similar ideologies exhibit much influence over school districts and partner up with them when applying for state and federal grants.

Publishers also edit out of textbooks terms considered politically incorrect, including "founding fathers" and "brotherhood," due to their sexist implications, and the word "American" for its suggested "geographical chauvinism." Ironically, textbook reviewers have used this sensitivity standard against books by African-Americans. A New Jersey bias review committee this past summer rejected a short story written by African-American writer Langston Hughes because he used the terms "Negro" and "colored person."

Other words and topics excluded from textbooks due to the claim that they are too "controversial" for children include creatures such as rats and snakes, and concepts such as evolution, dinosaurs, fossils, fantasy, witches, Halloween, religion, poverty, earthquakes, and fires. Diane Ravitch, a research professor at New York University and author of the book The Language Police, explained that many argue that such words refer to unpleasant topics that may upset children, and thus must be banned.

Ravitch said there is no research that has been conducted to demonstrate such a theory. Instead, she suggested, "the likelier explanation is that these issues upset grown-ups. There are various groups that consider these topics highly controversial, and they don't want children to be exposed to them." Ravitch commented that as a result of strong group pressure against these terms, many intimidated publishers have complied to ban them from the textbooks they produce.

Gilbert Sewall, the director of the American Textbook Council in New York, explained that the reason for such extensive censorship of school textbooks is largely a result of the consolidation of educational publishing companies that have no interest in supporting accurate academia. Rather, these companies cater to the demands of politically charged pressure groups that each maintain their own personal sensitivities, which they regard to be holier than historical fact and scholarly truth.

Ravitch explained that such pressure groups "do not come from one end of the political spectrum. They are right-wing, left-wing, and every other kind of wing."

At the same time, Stotsky stated that the problem with textbooks in today's schools applies particularly to that of history textbooks, which are used by many educators in order to "create hostility to the U.S. in particular, and to Western values in general, and to eliminate a national identity for Americans." Although academic standards have been placed upon history textbooks and teaching methods, they are often criticized with such phrases as "euro centric," as was said in 1997 after Massachusetts approved a set of statewide history standards known as the Education Reform Act.

Stotsky said it is highly difficult to implement such standards, because many schools do not have enough money to buy highly accurate and academically sound textbooks. Also, many teachers lack adequate knowledge themselves concerning U.S. and world history, and must rely upon inadequate textbooks and curriculums.

The consequences of censored and biased textbooks as well as inadequate and often ill-based curriculums are abundant. Stotsky commented that a desire of pressure groups and textbook publishers to influence Americans to see themselves as "'global' or 'world' citizens, with a cross-national racial, ethnic, or gender identity as their primary identity," correlates with a recent resolution proposed by the Boston City Council concerning the alteration of Columbus Day to that of "World Citizens Day," in order that the city may display its respect for its immigrants and a diverse population.

According to Robert Hagopian, a history teacher at Scotts Valley Middle School, California, watered-down and picture-filled textbooks lead children inevitably to feel that they are learning from a format resembling that of a tabloid, television episode, and/or the back of a cereal box. Hagopian also explained that such commonly used textbooks avoided controversy and "were far from simple in format," causing children to be discouraged from independent thinking. Moreover, Hagopian worries that the textbooks are essentially lacking "morality" while neglecting to expose actual history and emphasize American values endorsed by our Founding Fathers.

Despite the disappointment and cynicism with regards to education expressed at the hearing, Sen. Alexander and the witnesses also told of the steps taken to reform children's education across the nation.

Hagopian expressed his pleasure with the efforts taken over the past decade to improve education by the federal government, his own state government, and other groups. He mentioned with great satisfaction the growing interest on the part of academics in pre-collegiate history instruction, events sponsored by the National Council for History Education, as well as Teaching Grants in American History colloquia, and the continuous educational benefits extracted from the History Channel and PBS broadcasts.

Similarly, Stotsky expressed much hope in Massachusetts' Education Reform Act, approved in 1997. The standards proposed by the Act call for teachers to emphasize American History in the early grades, present a balanced view of the Puritans and the development of institutions in the Colonial period, offer strong standards on the Framers of the Constitution and on our Founding Fathers, and clarify the roots of Western Civilization.

Sewall, while focusing more on improving the status of publishers, pushed for publishers to produce "cheaper books that are more text-centered, simpler in design, and more honest in content." Ravitch, on the other hand, refrained from blaming publishers for inadequate textbooks, and instead assigned the blame upon the individual states that choose the textbooks they will pay for.