A professional organization for English teachers published updated standards last week that emphasize the role teachers play in combating systemic racism and promoting anti-racism.
The National Council of Teachers of English announced the update last week, the first time since 2012 that the organization’s “Standards for the Initial Preparation of Teachers of English Language Arts” for high school and junior high school have been updated.
The standards say teachers should “apply and demonstrate knowledge of learners and learning to foster inclusive learning environments that support coherent, relevant, standards-aligned, differentiated, and antiracist/antibias instruction.”
CRITICAL RACE THEORY PERVASIVE IN VIRGINIA TEACHER TRAINING MATERIALS, CONTRARY TO DEMOCRATIC CLAIMS
Anti-racism and anti-bias are terms often associated with critical race theory, an academic theory that posits that American cultural practices and institutions are systemically racist and oppress racial minorities, especially black people. Rooting out systemic racism requires anti-racist practices, according to critical race theorists.
Critical race theory in education has been a matter of intense public debate recently, with conservative activists saying that its presence in K-12 schools is promoting racial division. Liberals insist that the theory is not taught in public schools, despite numerous examples of teacher training materials offering guidelines on how to incorporate elements of the theory into the K-12 classroom.
The inclusion of anti-racist language in the standards “shifted the term social justice to antiracist/antibias based on expert advice,” according to the council’s press release announcing the standards.
The standards are created for “teacher prep programs for the purpose of preparing future teachers,” NCTE spokeswoman Stacey Finkel told the Washington Examiner.
Finkel also included in the press release a comment by the council’s president, Alfredo Celedon Lujan, that “Our field deals directly with the human condition through shaping the literate lives of our learners and is uniquely positioned to act on the complexities we collectively face.”
“Bigotry, discrimination, oppression, divisiveness, and racism are part of the world in which future teachers of English are working,” Lujan said. “These new standards seek to support educators as they prepare to go into the classroom.”
The executive director of the NCTE, Emily Kirkpatrick, told EdWeek that “A lot of change is afoot [in English/language arts education], and we want to use the standards as an active means to communicate what NCTE believes is essential to possess coming into teaching grades 7-12.”
“The guiding light is that the demands on students and the demands from society have changed the landscape significantly.” Kirkpatrick said.
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The council will be hosting its annual convention later this week, centered on the theme “Equity, Justice, and antiracist teaching.”
