Ethnic studies case: District’s funds ordered cut
Emily Gersema
The Tucson Citizen
1/6/2012
The Arizona Department of Education imposed severe financial penalties on Tucson Unified School District on Friday for violating a new state law by refusing to revamp or end its controversial Mexican-American studies curriculum.
In a move aimed at forcing one of the state’s largest school districts to comply with the law banning racially divisive ethnic-studies classes, Arizona schools chief John Huppenthal said he is cutting state funding by 10 percent and making it retroactive to August, leaving the district facing an immediate funding loss of $4.9million.
The Tucson district and the state have been at odds for years over the ethnic-studies courses. The district says that they address segregation complaints filed in the 1970s, but state officials contend that they promote reverse racism.
Last year, the state put into effect the ethnic-studies law, which bans classes that promote the overthrow of the U.S. government, encourage resentment toward a race or class of people, are designed solely for students of a certain ethnic background and advocate ethnic solidarity instead of the treatment of students as individuals.
Last week, state Administrative Law Judge Lewis Kowal upheld Huppenthal’s declaration, made last summer, that the Tucson district had violated the statute…
The article continues at The Tucson Citizen
Article and video H/T The Blaze
