Support for San Mateo Union High School District’s ethnic studies program

The state just recently made ethnic studies a requirement for graduation in 2021 and adopted its model curriculum last year but San Mateo Union High School District has been offering the course and revising it for years. Administrators now meet quarterly to participate in professional development and annually to revise its ethnic studies program.

“We are proud of where our program and our classes are now,” said Dr. Samia Shoman, manager of English Learners and Academic Programs, who also oversees the ethnic studies program. “We know when we gather for our ethnic studies collaboration in April, that we’ll do what we do in every spring and interrogate how we can do better. But for now, we’re happy to share what we are doing now in our classes.”

In its most recent iteration, ethnic studies is taught at two levels in the district. A semesterlong introductory course is required for ninth graders and a yearlong course is available for upper grades to take voluntarily.

Ten key tenets, including using a sacred, decolonial, healing, intergenerational and community and culturally responsive approach, are used to help guide students through four units focused on understanding ethnic studies, race, racism and ethnicity, gender, sexuality, sexism and transformation and change. While independently developed from the state’s model curriculum — and an earlier iteration called liberated ethnic studies — course objectives mirror those in the state document.

The program has served as a model for other districts looking to understand how to implement the state requirement, said Dr. Gwenn Lei, coordinator of reading and language arts for the County Office of Education. When districts have reached out to her for guidance on ethnic studies, she said she directs them to San Mateo Union.

But not all have been fans of the program. The district’s conversation around its ethnic studies program was largely spurred on by an advocacy group, Alliance for Constructive Ethnic Studies. In February, more than 800 emailed letters of concern were sent to district leadership accusing it of teaching students what to think rather than how to critically assess societal issues.

Instead, the group advocates for a constructive ethnic studies model they say highlights the achievements of marginalized groups rather than teaching an oppressor-oppressed model. The approach would still teach students to discuss racism and discrimination while equipping them to analyze issues from a variety of viewpoints.

By Wednesday’s meeting, Trustee Teri Chavez said the district had received more than 1,200 emails, many duplicates expressing similar concerns while about 50 were unique, she estimated. The emails, she said, came from people who were not against ethnic studies as a whole but who had genuine concerns that deserved to be heard.

Chavez, a person of Jewish and Mexican descent, said she’s a strong supporter of ethnic studies and has had two mixed-race daughters go through the classes without sharing a complaint. But she also agreed with a public speaker who asked to hear from students who may not have had favorable experiences of the program.

“We shouldn’t discount anybody’s own personal feelings because it’s important to unpack,” Chavez said.

Concerns

Trustee Jennifer Jacobson also highlighted some of the criticisms within the emails and cited a column included in the emails by former state Superintendent Bill Honig, which warned that ethnic studies should be inclusive instead of “liberated.”

Honig, in his piece published on EdSource, an online education news site, said the liberated model is a politically motivated approach to ethnic studies that pins groups against each other and paints nonwhites as victims and white people as oppressors.

“What people don’t want is ideology transmitted to children without counterpoint or opportunity for them to have real critical thinking,” Jacobson said. “They’re worried children are taught what to think rather than how to think. I think those concerned need to be addressed to a greater degree.”

Similar concerns were shared by public speakers during Wednesday’s study session. Others accused the district of preaching socialism, antisemitism and victimhood.

Pushing back

Educators, trustees and students defended the program with board Vice President Ligia Andrade Zúñiga calling the criticism misinformation and noting Superintendent Randall Booker has already responded to many of the emails with clarifying facts.

“We need to be careful with misinformation and what information we’re internalizing because it’s wrong and now we’re bringing it here to this study session and someone who doesn’t know will bring it here and think it’s truth,” Andrade Zúñiga said.

Candace Thomas, a social studies teacher at Hillsdale High School, said she was offended by assertions that the district was teaching victimization and said teachers cannot teach about ethnic studies without using words like oppression. The words, she said, help give students the vocabulary to discuss hard topics.

Some concepts, like the four eyes of oppression, which is one facing criticism, also help students understand the layers to issues like oppression and separate the personal from issues, said Jerrica Keane, a history and ethnic studies teacher at Aragon High School, and Alexandra Dove, a history teacher at Mills High School.

Dove and Perri Devon-Sand, also a history teacher at Hillsdale High School and both Jewish, also disputed accusations that the curriculum is antisemitic, noting they frequently discuss their Jewish identities in class and encourage their students, including Jewish students, to do the same when connecting with the topics discussed in class.

While the Holocaust is not taught as part of the ethnic studies program, Devon-Sand noted students get those lessons as part of world history. And Dove said the issue regularly comes up in class and questioned why the accusation was being made when students have never expressed to teachers that they felt antisemitism in class was an issue.

“It’s deeply upsetting to see my identity, my family’s lived experiences being used in a way to demonize the work that I believe so deeply in,” Dove said, adding that she understands Jewish people are one of the most targeted religious groups in the country despite being only 6% of the population. “It is very hard to be a Jewish person in America right now but this is not the class that is making it worse. This is that class that is making it better.”

San Mateo High School freshman Sayuri Hughes, echoed the shared outrage, saying she was angry people would attack something so personal to her. She and her classmates stand strongly against antisemitism and the district’s teaching about minorities did not take away from those atrocities, she argued, adding that insinuations to the contrary were “unacceptable” and “nasty.”

“I found myself in this class. My friends found themselves in this class. It doesn’t matter if we are Black, white, Jewish, Mexican, we had so many people support us in these classes,” Hughes said. “I’m a child, I am 14. I should not have to be telling a group of adults that learning about racism and the minority and just social identities is a good thing.”

The conversation isn’t over for the district though, Booker said, who praised the at-times heated discussion as important and necessary. Heeding suggestions from Jacobson and staff, Booker said district leaders should continue to talk about curriculum across the board and where ethnic studies as a program is heading.

He also noted the board will go through its contract with Acosta Education Partners — a professional development agency specializing in ethnic studies — as it does with all its contracts. That contract is set to expire soon.

“I’m all about talking about it. I think it’s good and it’s a way to celebrate it and it’s a way to educate the community as to what we do,” Booker said. “If people have questions, great. Let’s talk, let’s clarify, let’s iterate. But we can’t do that until we communicate what it is we’re doing.”