Pawan Kumar
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In 2021, conservative states all over the country passed laws that made it harder to talk about race in schools. However, one very Republican state, Arkansas, never got a similar bill out of the legislature.
Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who had just been sworn in, used her executive power to change that on her first day in office.
On Tuesday, soon after he was sworn in as president, Sanders signed an executive order requiring a review of state education rules and policies to see if any “promote teaching that would indoctrinate students with ideologies, such as CRT,” or critical race theory. She told them to get rid of any teaching they found.
Critical race theory is an academic idea that looks at what happens when racism is built into the laws and institutions of the United States. Conservatives now use the term to describe any policy or lesson that deals with racism that is built into the system.
Sanders’s order also said that teachers couldn’t say certain things about race, like that one race is better or worse than another by nature.
Attacks on CRT in Arkansas begins. 🤦🏻♂️ https://t.co/q1yhIwI69X
— Diego (@DiegoYTejas) January 11, 2023
She said, “As long as I’m governor, our schools will teach our kids the skills they need to get ahead in the modern world, not a left-wing political agenda.”
Sarah Huckabee Sanders sworn in as Arkansas governor
Before he ran for office, Sanders was President Donald Trump’s press secretary. This made him well-known all over the country. Trump worked from the White House to make conservatives more against teaching about race. As a result, many states passed laws that limit what teachers can say.
But such legislation died in Arkansas. Lawmakers did pass a law that limits how much race and gender can be talked about in training for state employees. This includes the idea that the United States is inherently racist or sexist. It wasn’t true for schools. Gov. Asa Hutchison, who was a Republican at the time, didn’t sign the bill into law.
Hutchinson said in a statement at the time that the bill wasn’t needed because it didn’t solve any problems.
But conservatives have kept pushing the issue because they think it is important to GOP base voters, if not to the public as a whole. Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) of Florida has passed a number of similar laws as he gets ready to run for president.
Schools are changing because of the rise of “culture war” laws. This is how.
This week, Sanders also asked the legislature to pass laws that would help students who want to go to non-public schools by giving them money. She has asked for pay raises for teachers, better reading skills for students, and other changes to education.
In response, the state Democratic Party said it would back things like higher pay for teachers but not other parts of her education plan.
In a statement, the party said, “Arkansas Democrats stand with our teachers and know that they are too busy grading papers, buying their own supplies, and making lesson plans to indoctrinate anyone.”
