signalmankenneth
Verified User
WTF! Oklahoma schools should be required to teach about the 1921 Tulsa Massacre, not 2020 election conspiracy theories/falsehoods?!!
Oklahoma's public school history teachers will soon be required to teach the disproved conspiracy theory that the Democratic Party stole the 2020 presidential election from President Donald Trump.
The Republican-led state's new high school history curriculum says students must learn how to dissect the results of the 2020 election, including learning about alleged mail-in voter fraud, "an unforeseen record number of voters" and "security risks of mail-in balloting."
Advancing Trump's debunked claims about his 2020 presidential election loss on young people is one of many changes made by State Superintendent of Education Ryan Walters, including requiring bibles in every classroom. The new curriculum also removed a prior proposal for lessons about George Floyd's murder and Black Lives Matter, and teaches as fact the hotly contested theory that COVID-19 emerged from a lab leak.
"These reforms will reset our classrooms back to educating our children without liberal indoctrination," Walters, a former history teacher, wrote in a post on X on April 29. "We’re proud to defend these standards, and we will continue to stand up for honest, pro-America education in every classroom."
The new curriculum was drafted by a review committee that includes Kevin Roberts, president of the Heritage Foundation, a Washington D.C.-based conservative think tank that created the blueprint for a second Trump term, known as Project 2025 and conservative talk show host Dennis Prager.
Parents, teachers, Democrats, and even some Republicans in staunchly conservative Oklahoma, oppose the new social studies lessons.
"Many of the late additions include historically inaccurate content and do not align with the inclusive, evidence-based approach that is essential to high-quality social studies instruction," wrote Heather Goodenough, the president of the Council for Social Studies, in a public statement.
The Oklahoma Department of Education and Walters' office did responded to an inquiry from USA TODAY.
Students must be able to "identify discrepancies in 2020 elections results by looking at graphs and other information, including the sudden halting of ballot-counting in select cities in key battleground states, the security risks of mail-in balloting, sudden batch dumps, an unforeseen record number of voters, and the unprecedented contradiction of ‘bellwether county’ trends," the new standard reads.
Teachers must adjust their current curriculum to teach the lessons.
The right-wing myth that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from Trump, sometimes called the "Big Lie," emerged from Trump's efforts to overturn his defeat.
The allegations have been disproven through numerous audits and recounts in several states, court dismissals of lawsuits filed by Trump and his supporters, forensic audits of voting machines and partisan reviews.
"The November 3rd election was the most secure in American history," said the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency in a November 2020 statement. "There is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes or was in any way compromised."
Some Republican lawmakers have also pushed back on claims of widespread fraud.
"Nothing before us proves illegality anywhere near the massive scale, the massive scale that would have tipped the entire election," said Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the GOP leader in the Senate at the time.
Fact check: How we know the 2020 election results were legitimate, not 'rigged' as Donald Trump claims
Trump's bogus claims of a stolen election incited his supporters' violent insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
Trump continued to make false statements about the 2020 election throughout Biden's term, such as wrongly asserting in 2022 that a Pennsylvania court ruling in a case about that year's midterm elections held that the 2020 election was "Rigged." In the second 2024 presidential debate, Trump incorrectly asserted that none of the more than 60 cases he lost in court over the 2020 election were decided on the merits. In fact, 30 were.
The accusations of electoral fraud have become very widely accepted by Republican voters although they're rejected by many Republican legal experts and GOP-appointed judges.
About one-third of Americans still believed the election was stolen from Trump in Sept. 2023 and a majority of the believers are Republican, according to a survey of about 2,500 adults from the nonprofit, nonpartisan organization Public Religion Research Institute.
She said the move shows "the power of a state to transform its education through curriculum" and applauded Walters for "leading the way."
https://www.yahoo.com/news/oklahoma-require-schools-teach-trumps-090608911.html
Oklahoma's public school history teachers will soon be required to teach the disproved conspiracy theory that the Democratic Party stole the 2020 presidential election from President Donald Trump.
The Republican-led state's new high school history curriculum says students must learn how to dissect the results of the 2020 election, including learning about alleged mail-in voter fraud, "an unforeseen record number of voters" and "security risks of mail-in balloting."
Advancing Trump's debunked claims about his 2020 presidential election loss on young people is one of many changes made by State Superintendent of Education Ryan Walters, including requiring bibles in every classroom. The new curriculum also removed a prior proposal for lessons about George Floyd's murder and Black Lives Matter, and teaches as fact the hotly contested theory that COVID-19 emerged from a lab leak.
"These reforms will reset our classrooms back to educating our children without liberal indoctrination," Walters, a former history teacher, wrote in a post on X on April 29. "We’re proud to defend these standards, and we will continue to stand up for honest, pro-America education in every classroom."
The new curriculum was drafted by a review committee that includes Kevin Roberts, president of the Heritage Foundation, a Washington D.C.-based conservative think tank that created the blueprint for a second Trump term, known as Project 2025 and conservative talk show host Dennis Prager.
Parents, teachers, Democrats, and even some Republicans in staunchly conservative Oklahoma, oppose the new social studies lessons.
"Many of the late additions include historically inaccurate content and do not align with the inclusive, evidence-based approach that is essential to high-quality social studies instruction," wrote Heather Goodenough, the president of the Council for Social Studies, in a public statement.
The Oklahoma Department of Education and Walters' office did responded to an inquiry from USA TODAY.
What is Oklahoma's new social studies standard?
Oklahoma's new history standards will start in the 2025-2026 school year.Students must be able to "identify discrepancies in 2020 elections results by looking at graphs and other information, including the sudden halting of ballot-counting in select cities in key battleground states, the security risks of mail-in balloting, sudden batch dumps, an unforeseen record number of voters, and the unprecedented contradiction of ‘bellwether county’ trends," the new standard reads.
Teachers must adjust their current curriculum to teach the lessons.
Why is it so controversial?
Former Democratic President Joe Biden won the 2020 presidential election with 306 electoral votes and a 7 million-vote margin in the popular vote.The right-wing myth that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from Trump, sometimes called the "Big Lie," emerged from Trump's efforts to overturn his defeat.
The allegations have been disproven through numerous audits and recounts in several states, court dismissals of lawsuits filed by Trump and his supporters, forensic audits of voting machines and partisan reviews.
"The November 3rd election was the most secure in American history," said the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency in a November 2020 statement. "There is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes or was in any way compromised."
Some Republican lawmakers have also pushed back on claims of widespread fraud.
"Nothing before us proves illegality anywhere near the massive scale, the massive scale that would have tipped the entire election," said Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the GOP leader in the Senate at the time.
Fact check: How we know the 2020 election results were legitimate, not 'rigged' as Donald Trump claims
Trump's bogus claims of a stolen election incited his supporters' violent insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
Trump continued to make false statements about the 2020 election throughout Biden's term, such as wrongly asserting in 2022 that a Pennsylvania court ruling in a case about that year's midterm elections held that the 2020 election was "Rigged." In the second 2024 presidential debate, Trump incorrectly asserted that none of the more than 60 cases he lost in court over the 2020 election were decided on the merits. In fact, 30 were.
The accusations of electoral fraud have become very widely accepted by Republican voters although they're rejected by many Republican legal experts and GOP-appointed judges.
About one-third of Americans still believed the election was stolen from Trump in Sept. 2023 and a majority of the believers are Republican, according to a survey of about 2,500 adults from the nonprofit, nonpartisan organization Public Religion Research Institute.
What are people saying about it?
Oklahoma's new social studies standards are welcomed by Sarah Parshall Perry, vice president and legal fellow at the conservative nonprofit organization Defending Education.She said the move shows "the power of a state to transform its education through curriculum" and applauded Walters for "leading the way."
https://www.yahoo.com/news/oklahoma-require-schools-teach-trumps-090608911.html
