2021 NC Social Studies Standards

Recently, there has been much commentary in the national media regarding critical race theory (CRT), including how it is defined and how, if adopted, it would change the way history is taught in schools. My purpose for this week’s column is to try to address some of these concerns.

First, it is important to understand that the Constitution of the United States grants the authority over public schools and what students are required to learn to the states. Learning standards for all subjects is not under local control (local board of education). It is a state decision. North Carolina has been teaching the same social studies standards since they were adopted in 2010.

The new standards for social studies were developed by the NC Department of Public Instruction while following the standards review schedule required by NC law. They were adopted by the NC State Board of Education this past spring after five iterations and two votes. NCDPI also provides resources for teachers to better understand the revisions to the standards, and these were just approved and released this July. One such resource document is the “American History Crosswalk” document.

The crosswalk compares the 2010 standards to the 2021 standards by grade level and subject, Kindergarten through 12th grade, and is a great way to better understand the changes. This document can be found at the following link: https://www.dpi.nc.gov/media/11796/open. Close review will show that critical race theory is not mentioned anywhere in the NC standards, but there have been some changes that ask teachers to be more specific about teaching events in history from the perspective of race, gender, and discrimination.

Second, based on recent political activity, it seems clear that the adoption of these standards may still be subject to a further delay or change. There have been bills both in the NC House (NCHB 324) and the NC Senate in recent weeks that, while not specifically referencing the new social studies standards or critical race theory, seem to be aimed at modifying how social studies is taught.

Also, NC State Superintendent of Public Instruction Catherine Truitt(R) has expressed her opinion that these new standards do not make clear the facts that we want students to learn and are too conceptual. She has asked for permission to develop more specific standards and present them to the NC State Board of Education this August, and the board has granted that request.

If you want your voice to be heard regarding these new standards, the proper contact would be your state representatives: Governor Roy Cooper, State Superintendent Catherine Truitt, Senator Kevin Corbin, and Representative Karl Gillespie. All have contact numbers and email addresses easily found online.

Last, once the standards are adopted at the state level, it is up to the local teachers and principals to develop curriculum and lesson plans that teach our students the state standards (CCSBOE Policy 3100 Curriculum Development). This part of the process is under local control. In the past two years, Clay County Schools has adopted a new curriculum in K-8 Reading, K-8 Math, K-5 Phonics, K-5 Handwriting, K-12 Social/Emotional Learning, and 9-12 Math.

All these curricula have been shared in our boardroom and advertised for public review for at least a month before being approved by our board for use. This follows CCSBOE Policy 3210: Parental Inspection of and Objection to Instructional Materials. The Clay County Schools will always work as hard as we can to develop local curriculum that meets the state requirements for continued state funding while also meeting the needs of our local community and parents.

This will always be a transparent process, and anyone is welcome at any time to make an appointment with our principals to visit a classroom and observe what we are teaching. Our social studies teachers will be designing new curricula and lesson plans for these standards over this year with the intention of sharing them for public review and feedback in the spring. In the meantime, we will continue to use our current curriculum. If you have further questions, please contact me at our central office and I would be happy to address them.

On behalf of our CCS team and the Clay County Board of Education, thank you for all that you do to support our students at home and at school. These are challenging times, but we will get through them together as a community.