The state of Arkansas is the latest to have a widescale freakout over the Advanced Placement African American Studies class, following Florida’s shunning of the course earlier this year — even after its publisher, the College Board, revised the class under pressure (which the College Board insisted it hadn’t, but Oh Come On).
On August 11, shortly before the start of fall classes, the Arkansas Department of Education suddenly informed high schools that students taking the class couldn’t count it toward graduation credits, and that, unlike other AP classes, the state wouldn’t cover the $90 cost per student either.
Arkansas Education Secretary Jacob Oliva and his department offered a whole bunch of reasons for the sudden change, suggesting the class might not meet state requirements since it’s still in its pilot phase before a nationwide rollout next year, and claiming that the department had been in error last year when the pilot was offered for credit. But scariest of all, the course might run afoul of a new Arkansas law against “indoctrination” and teaching “critical race theory.”
Secretary Oliva, may we offer you some advice, just as a practical matter? You have to know that all those stupid laws restricting education will eventually be found unconstitutional, so why not throw in the towel now and save a lot of trouble and legal fees? No? Well, don’t say we didn’t tell you.
In the latest stupid turn in the story, Oliva wrote Monday to the administrations of six Arkansas schools that said they plan to use the AP class as an elective anyway, demanding that they submit all course materials to the Education Department for review, and that the schools pinkie swear the classes will not violate the dumb unconstitutional law.
In particular, Oliva frets that there are CRT WORSHIP WORDS infecting the AP class, which the schools must not speak!
Given some of the themes included in the pilot, including ‘intersections of identity’ and ‘resistance and resilience,’ the Department is concerned the pilot may not comply with Arkansas law, which does not permit teaching that would indoctrinate students with ideologies, such as Critical Race Theory (CRT) [Bold added — Dok Zoom]
To make sure the high school students aren’t corrupted, indoctrinated, intersected, or Critically Theorized, Oliva ordered the schools to “submit all materials, including but not limited to the syllabus, textbooks, teacher resources, student resources, rubrics, and training materials,” to the Central Scrutinizer by September 8. Generously, Oliva didn’t order the teachers planning to use the course to turn over their phones, tablets, laptops or two years of their phone contacts. Not yet.
It’s worth noting that one of the six high schools planning to use the AP course is actually in the course, too: Little Rock Central High, where in 1957 nine brave students finally integrated Arkansas schools well after Brown v. Board of Education — but only under the protection of federal troops, after then-Gov. Orval Faubus called out the state National Guard to block access to the school. (The course includes the 1958 poem “Little Rock” by Nicolás Guillén, about the desegregation crisis, as well as Charles Mingus’s jazz piece, “Fables of Faubus.”)
Not surprisingly, several surviving members of the Little Rock Nine are good and pissed at what Arkansas is up to — again.
Elizabeth Eckford, the subject of that famous (and still copyright protected) photo showing a white teenager screaming at her as she stoically braved the mob, told NBC News, “I think the attempts to erase history is working for the Republican Party. They have some boogeymen that are really popular with their supporters.”
Terrence Roberts, now 81, recalled how a white student waved a baseball bat at him and taunted him, calling him the N-word and saying, “If you weren’t so small … ” before backing off. Roberts said “I’m thinking, ‘Wow, salvation by stature.'”
He said he suspects that some of the opposition to teaching accurate history is simply a refusal to acknowledge the facts:
At some commemorations of the Little Rock Nine, he said, there have been people who don’t want old photographs of angry crowds shown. Roberts suspects that those who once harangued them as children don’t want the evidence displayed.
Well of course not, because America is, by Arkansas law, not a place where there’s any such thing as systemic racism.
Still, Roberts said he’s encouraged that Central High and other schools are teaching the AP class anyway:
“I know there are voices pushing back,” he said. “The question is, will they be successful?”
At least Gov. Sarahuckle Bee-Sander, whose first act on becoming governor was to sign an executive order banning "critical race theory,” had some very inspiring words about history and which memory hole it should be dispatched to. On Fox News, Bee-Sander explained that
We’ve got to get back to the basics of teaching math, of teaching reading, writing and American history. And we cannot perpetuate a lie to our students and push this propaganda leftist agenda teaching our kids to hate America and hate one another.
So we guess everything’s fine now. And we can wonder what sorts of jazz classics may yet be written about the current Arkansas governor.
[Arkansas Times / KUAR Radio / The Griot / NBC News]
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Can't have students learning about African Americans' "resilience and resistance," since that would suggest there was some kind of racist system they had to endure and overcome.
Hmm ... you know, that song's pretty suspicious, too!
Earlier comments had mentioned the strained, and ultimately unsuccessful reconciliation/friendship between Elizabeth Eckford and Hazel Bryan Massery, the girl photographed screaming at her. Here's a very good book excerpt on that, starring Oprah being really kind of a jerk.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/elizabeth-and-hazel-excerpt-how-oprah-dissed-a-civil-rights-icon