Virginia Delegate David Englin Proposes Legislation To Fix School Textbooks

After one textbook's inaccuracies garnered significant media attention in October, Virginia Delegate David Englin (D-Alexandria) is proposing legislation to get school primers properly proofed.

The Washington Post reported that Englin's bill would hold publishers accountable and require them to prove review of textbooks by subject-area specialists. He said the state of public education is at stake.

"As a legislator and a parent, I was shocked and appalled to learn that Virginia social studies textbooks had such egregious factual inaccuracies. As parents, the bare minimum we expect from textbooks is that the facts are correct."

"Our Virginia: Past and Present," published by Five Ponds Press, was released during the fall to thousands of Virginian students. Although vetted by textbook review committees, it included a variety of errors, from wrong dates to misspellings.

One section of the textbook tells students that thousands of African Americans fought as confederate soldiers during the Civil War, a statistic that is not validated by mainstream historians.

Carol Sheriff, a professor at William & Mary, told CNN that the mistakes weren't just inaccurate, but irresponsible.

"It is the equivalent of holocaust denial being taught in public schools but worse. It's also equivalent to saying the Jews helped the Holocaust."

WATCH:

Comments

[Ty LaRue]

11:27 AM on 01/08/2011

Being a former 4th grade teacher in the state of Virginia I find this very interesting. Do the fourth graders of V.A. still take the history S.O.L?

[hagagaga]

12:21 PM on 01/07/2011

I live in Northern Virginia. Dr. James Loewen, the author of Lies My Teacher Told Me, spoke to the IB History of the Americas students at my high school, including myself, a few weeks ago. This is pretty much what his book was about, but in a more general sense, so he spent a significant portion of his speech discussing this, with a passing comparison to Texas.

Distorting history to glorify treason that was motivated solely by the desire to continue slavery is incredibly bad.

[Ivar]

06:03 PM on 01/05/2011

Good for Virgina. At least the are not like Texas.

[Turukano]

06:14 AM on 01/05/2011

By the way, all the Confederate soldiers captured by Union troops were white men. If there were "thousands" of black soldiers in the Confederate armies, why were none of them among the approximately 215,000 soldiers captured by the U. S. forces?

[MikeyJaii]

11:25 PM on 01/04/2011

Who the heck even writes them? And proof reads? Who allow them to get published...?

[OverseasVet]

03:54 AM on 01/05/2011

Texas teabaggers.

[Eyeheartfreedumb]

05:27 PM on 01/05/2011

It's a raquet (sp?) I read about a long time ago. I hadn't heard about the Virginia one, but this is big business and they want to appeal to as many geographic areas as possible (so they don't have to print as many versions, cause that costs money). Some areas (Texas actually is one of them) have a lot of sway due to the number of books that can be sold to their districts so you might read a "fact" that has more to do with regional bias in that area. Unfortunately they don't re-write the book for Wisconsin (not a specific example) and so what was accepted knowledge in Texas (despite not being true) gets repeated in a textbook in Wisconsin (and why would a 14 year old question the "facts" in a book whose sole reason for existance is to pass on "facts"- - why would it not be correct?).
If/when you have kids, go to your local school board meeting (a few years before they start school) and ask about the textbooks. Check them for facts. Speak up. Our kids can go to school to learn, or they can go and become less smart. I don't want to waste my kid's time just because I was too lazy to ask about his books.

[ShinjiIkari]

08:08 PM on 01/04/2011

Human nature is such that, sadly, people work against their own best interests. Some Jews collaborated with Nazis (Google "kapos"), just as some black slaves were ordered to work for the Confederacy, and political conservatives voted for the Baggerz. Slaves and kapos, however, were subject to being killed for refusing to obey orders.

Most importantly, this craven cooperation should NEVER be taken as an apology for white supremacy. Call it what it is--an extension of slavery--but never never never stop working for fundamental human rights and the equality of all people.

[Eyeheartfreedumb]

05:28 PM on 01/05/2011

Yes, some blacks were lured into fighting for the south under the guise that they'd be set free after the war, but it didn't happen on the scale that the textbook reports.
Other than that, you are correct.

[salesdude]

07:09 PM on 01/04/2011

[Crispus-Attucks]

Southern revisionist ideology spouted with cherry picked passages [written by those who in the past, including black men, who may or may not have had an agenda] does NOT lend credence to some people who want to believe that ENSLAVED blacks fought WILLINGLY for the confederates. Enough said...

[Crispus-Attucks]

07:18 PM on 01/04/2011

The facts are the facts -- free men of color voluntarily fought for the confederacy, period. I provided credible quotes from established historians and academics and you failed to provide any evidence to the contrary. I stand uncorrected and politely encourage you to research the topic more thoroughly. I encourage David Englin to follow suit, too.

[yumitori]

12:44 AM on 01/05/2011

Like the 'fact' that they fought under the command of Stonewall Jackson in 1865?

[hagagaga]

12:17 PM on 01/07/2011

Like the fact that the official policy of the CSA was to deny enlistment to blacks, and that was only considered flexible in the waning days when they needed all the help that they could in order to have even a slight chance of getting away with their treason?

[Crispus-Attucks]

05:12 PM on 01/04/2011

What a terrible distortion of history! Englin is profoundly misguided in his attempt to mislead our children.

Walter Williams, who himself is black, completely dismantled so-called "mainstream historians" in his November column entitled "Virginia's Black Confederates." In it, he exposed the outright lie pushed by the Washington Post and people like Englin who are dead wrong -- blacks did serve in the confederate army, period. You can read the entire piece here:

http://townhall.com/columnists/WalterEWilliams/2010/11/03/virginias_black_confederates/page/full/

Here is an excerpt that proves the point:

>> In April 1861, a Petersburg, Va., newspaper proposed "three cheers for the patriotic free Negroes of Lynchburg" after 70 blacks offered "to act in whatever capacity may be assigned to them" in defense of Virginia. Ex-slave Frederick Douglass observed, "There are at the present moment, many colored men in the Confederate Army doing duty not only as cooks, servants and laborers, but as real soldiers, having muskets on their shoulders and bullets in their pockets, ready to shoot down ... and do all that soldiers may do to destroy the Federal government."

In 1866, Horace Greeley wrote:

>> "For more than two years, Negroes had been extensively employed in belligerent operations by the Confederacy. They had been embodied and drilled as rebel soldiers and had paraded with white troops at a time when this would not have been tolerated in the armies of the Union."

[Turukano]

06:18 AM on 01/05/2011

By the way, all the Confederate soldiers captured by Union troops were white men. If there were "thousands" of black soldiers in the Confederate armies, why were none of them among the approximately 215,000 soldiers captured by the U. S. forces?

[SeeDaddy]

01:35 PM on 01/05/2011

70 does not equal thousands.

[Eyeheartfreedumb]

05:32 PM on 01/05/2011

Exactly. It's not like Howard Zinn didn't talk about blacks in the confederate army 30 years ago...
but they were lured with promises of freedom after the war, which pretty much turned out to be a mass lie. Shocking.

[Martha T]

05:01 PM on 01/04/2011

It's about time!

[Crispus-Attucks]

05:51 PM on 01/04/2011

Blacks did serve in the confederat­e army. It's documented by Frederick Douglass, Horace Greeley, and black historian Charles Wesley, who wrote about it in the "Journal of Negro History" in 1919. The "fix" is in alright but it's not in favor of historical accuracy.

[Martha T]

06:00 PM on 01/04/2011

the current past time of the NEOCONs is if they can't do anything right, then REWRITE history to reflect ther wants, needs and desires..too bad it isn't working

[BraineyRubble]

11:32 PM on 01/04/2011

Where is the link?

You don't have one, because its not a legitimate source. It's someone's blog, just like this textbook's "author."

[judiNJ]

04:23 PM on 01/04/2011

Interesting. The "adoption states" charge publishers for errors. Prentice Hall (now Pearson Education) ended up paying $60,000 plus for errors in one of their Social Study text books
back in the 1990s. Having worked in the text book industry since the early 70s, I can not believe
this title made it through any kind of VA board of education examination. However, I have never heard of Five Ponds Press and can only believe it is some small editorial development house and had no fact checking done.

[salesdude]

03:30 PM on 01/04/2011

I guess believing and spreading these lies that somehow the people responsible for genocide and the worst crimes in history were somehow [willingly] helped to perpetuate that evil by the victims of those acts makes you feel better about yourself then so be it. Your not converting anyone here to your twisted beliefs regardless of your bogus links.

[salesdude]

03:43 PM on 01/04/2011

I know 6 million reason why you are wrong.

People who are enslaved and facing the GENOCIDE of their race don't willingly do anything. You also know that! You also know that NO one fights against anyone who is trying to liberate them to keep themselves in bondage or hasten their own death either. Your posts and phoney links are just absurd. It may wash among your friends but it doesn't stand the smell test anywhere else...PER­IOD

[IronSky99]

04:03 PM on 01/04/2011

really, thats odd, because im native american and still live on a rez, most historians agree that we have suffered and are still suffering from a long term genocide, yet I along with many others in my community have willingly joined and fought for America since the revolutionary war, why would we do this willingly if we were being killed via genocide, we did it willingy because we love America more than most others, because this is our country for thousands of years before we allowed the settlers to form a new country, we signed treaties and willingly agrreed to live in peace with them and support them in times of need, like now. We do not hate whitey like they tried to teach us recently, we respect and support the great government they formed, and we hate to see this great country slowly get ruined by betrayers , backstabbers, and complainers who want everything handed to them and wont fight to build or fix this once great and proud and powerful nation. I for one as a native american will willingly fight for and defend it, as I once did in the us military.

[IronSky99]

02:39 PM on 01/04/2011

See , 65,000 blacks fought for the confederacy willingly, thery werent forced, quit censoring american history and dont be afraid of it, just let the people know the truth and they can sort it out, blacks shouldnt be ashamed that they fought for the south, some even owned slaves, its no big deal, deal with it. http://www.37thtexas.org/html/BlkHist.html

[fjg]

03:12 PM on 01/04/2011

Your link is hilarious--unintentionally. Are you a graduate of Glenn Beck U?

[salesdude]

03:18 PM on 01/04/2011

Men who are ENSLAVED don't willingly do anything. You know that! You also know that NO one fights against anyone who is trying to liberate them to keep themselves in bondage either. Your post and phoney link is just absurd. It may wash among your friends but it doesn't stand the smell test anywhere else...PERIOD

[IronSky99]

03:26 PM on 01/04/2011

not all blacks in the confederacy were slaves either, many earned their freedom, and many free slaves owned slaves, and many free slaves willingly fought and wanted to keep slavery

[dmessy]

12:56 PM on 01/04/2011

Who is responsible for the latest recession - The GOP -- through George Bush, or the Democrats -- through the spending of the Congress and the policies they put in place. At HuffPro it was George Bush, at Townhall its Democrats.History is always subject to some amount of interpretation - if not outright distortion. Ultimately it will be up to parents to teach their children about civics and to develop a point of view. We can keep going back and forth about what Texas did or didn't do. But ultimately as a parent you have the ability to instill certain values into your children. If you don't leave it only to the school to fill your child's head -- then you have plenty of room to either agree or disgaree with what's in the text books.

[Economike]

01:00 PM on 01/04/2011

It was a group effort by both parties. Clinton's administration was responsible for dismantling Glass - Steagall. Bush further de-regulated things, and the spiral has continued downward for all but the wealthiest.

[dmessy]

04:13 PM on 01/04/2011

My point -- if you are willing to consider that fault may lie with both parties - then you're more likely to take a factual base to it and realize it's as much the interaction of parties as the party platform itself. Before you can get there, however, you have to be willing to see that a particular point of view may be wrong or biased. I don't see a lot of that at HuffPost.

[ScapeGoat]

01:06 PM on 01/04/2011

and the parents, of course, will give a totally unbiased history. right.

[dmessy]

04:10 PM on 01/04/2011

It's amazing how you can take an unbaised poitn of view and make it into one. As a parent I do have the ultimate influence on a child. If I don't like what the school teaches I have the option of making my own imprint. Whether books are left-leaning or right-leaning is going to be an on-going process. Because one persons facts are not anothers. As a parent you are raised with certain beliefs and to the extent that those beliefs bais the "facts" -- well that something that both sides have to live with. I have no problem presenting both sides of the example above and working through the rational of both. Over time my children will form their own opinions. I want my children to reason through facts as best they can, take a stand, and have that come from a rational line of thinking. It's not about being on the left or the right.

[imayes]

12:46 PM on 01/04/2011

It's the year 2011. Why are we still using textbooks? They are dated and inaccurate as we continue to find and learn more about the history on which they are based. School kids can get more accurate and complete information using their cell phones than they can get from a textbook.

[judiNJ]

04:26 PM on 01/04/2011

It doesn't matter what kind of delivery system you use, print, web, cell phone.... you still need correct editorial development. You can't do that by checking out Google.

[imayes]

10:39 PM on 01/04/2011

Obviously. But textbooks are still dated. I did not mention Google. In fact, my kids actually check their grades, take tests and get their assignments online, so to me it makes sense to get the rest of the material the same way instead of lugging a 10 bound textbook of dated information.

[Economike]

11:54 AM on 01/04/2011

College - Obsolete?