On June 7, TUSD’s Deputy Superintendent Maria Menconi notified staff and District officials that the District’s Multicultural courses, which she described as “a highly debated area of study,” were found lacking by the Arizona Department of Education, echoing the District’s own advisor’s concerns. According to Menconi, the ADE “indicated that alignment with both State Standards in History and Social Studies and to the Common Core Standards needed strengthening.”
Menconi recommended having “History and Literature instructors who have taught more “traditional” course versions review ADE’s Feedback concerning Standard alignment” in a scramble to get the cases ready for review.
Today, the Multicultural director, Auggie Romero, will be meeting with instructors to get the classes ready for State and the Board approval. The urgency for the repair work stems from the fact that Cholla High School has already started enrolling students in the classes despite the fact that they had never received Board approval.
As late as April 29, Dr. Francisco Rios, of the Woodring College of Education at Western Washington University, contacted Romero with concerns about the classes’ lack of standards. Rio, who is acting as an advisor to Romero on the development of the classes wrote of the version he was asked to review, “there’s nothing in the common core section.” Rios also encouraged Romero to give “greater depth to how the state standards might be enhanced via a critical, multicultural orientation.”
Critical Race Theory is the foundation of the courses Romero developed. Critical Race Pedagogy espouses the principals of Paolo Freirer, a Marxist who was a leading advocate of critical pedagogy, which holds that education is a political act that cannot be divorced from pedagogy. In his book, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, which is currently on of the most frequently required reading assignments in colleges of education across the country, Freirer argued that the dominant culture of or oppressors used the media to silence the oppressed.
Many educators say that there is a fine line some would say non-existent line…between critical race pedagogy and indoctrination. In Third World countries, where the ruling party engages in indoctrination from an early age, the schools generally employ some form of critical race pedagogy.
Rios also encouraged Romero to have students compare “the news media in particular as a source of uncovering dominant ideologies and alternative ideologies: For example, how does Fox news cover an event (and what ideologies are evident) in comparison to Democracy Now or Free Speech Radio,” he wrote.
When asked in 2011, if the TUSD Governing Board supported Critical Race Theory as an acceptable foundation for K-12 classes, both Dr. Mark Stegeman and Michael Hicks rejected the pedagogy. Adelita Grijalva refused to address the issue.
Since that time, there has been no public discussion on whether Critical Pedagogy is reflected or accepted by the community. Still, the District has proceeded with the development of the classes and as one educator put it, “they cut and pasted the State Standards and Core Curriculum Standards in as bookends to their radical curriculum.” According to district sources, superintendent Pedicone is committed to cramming through the courses before his exit from the district in July.
The desegregation plaintiff representatives question how the district came to develop multicultural courses along with Mexican-American and African-American “culturally relevant” courses, which have no other intent than to segregate students by race. They question how the district can enroll students in classes for which there is no approved curriculum. They also question what sort of educator would offer classes to students that they themselves had not reviewed. They intend to take their concerns to the federal judge overseeing the district’s desegregation case.
Yet, without a curriculum, and while the ink was still wet on Hawley’s plan, Cholla High School staff did just that. They began enrolling students in earnest. In an email dated March 1, 2013, Francisco Moraga contacted Romero and advised him that they had already enrolled over 90 students in the classes and asked for “any suggestions to improve recruitment of these classes.”
Morega wrote; “Please e-mail me the curriculum for the Culturally Relevant classes in English and Social Studies. We have provided our students with the preliminary description of these classes, which were sent from your office, during the informational visits to the classroom and paper registration. We will register students electronically during the week of March 11. We will continue to provide information and maintain documentation of student’s preferences as these classes are not available through the district course catalog.”
In his advice to the Court, Special Master Willis Hawley wrote, “It is important to note that Section V.D.6.a.ii does not reinstate the former MAS courses or program as these were previously constituted and is limited to the design and implementation of “culturally relevant courses…designed to reflect the history, experiences, and culture of African American and Mexican American communities”. Hawley specifically states, “… the USP does not call for the reinstitution of MAS courses as they were offered..”
Hawley also acknowledged that the classes might resegregate students; “while it may be that students who enroll in these culturally relevant courses will be predominantly from one racial/ethnic group, the courses will be open to all students.”
So, Pedicone allowed Romero to create resegregating classes.
Last week, after the ADE shared their concerns, Menconi recommended spending more district funds to “engage the curricular services of WestEd to work with our teams, as we edit and improve the courses for another ADE review.”
“Once these steps are completed and the ADE has had another opportunity to give their feedback, we would release the completed courses for public review and ultimately Governing Board approval,’ wrote Menconi, “At this time, I am not clear on whether or not the Parties to TUSD’s Court Order, and Special Master Willis Hawley would require further review and comment time.”
Members of the community and some desegregation plaintiff representatives are asking how we got so far along in the process before seeking their input.
Under state law the Governing Board must approve all courses offered to students. The failure to meet this legal requirement in the last experience with MAS ultimately led to the debacle TUSD experienced in 2011. It is all but certain that the current Board will approve the courses with as little public review and discussion as possible.
| Cholla High School class/enrollment on 3/01/2013 | ||
| Class | Grade | Students |
| English African-American Perspective | 11 | 9 |
| English Mexican-American Perspective | 11 | 17 |
| English African-American Perspective | 12 | 9 |
| English Mexican-American Perspective | 12 | 3 |
| American History Mexican-American Perspective | 31 | |
| American History African-American Perspective | 15 | |
| American Government Mexican-American Perspective | 9 | |
| American Government African-American Perspective | 1 |