Colorado students skip school to support revisionist history course

In an act of protest, students and teachers in Jefferson County, Colo., are skipping school.

Students claim they are walking out due to their school board’s planned review of the proposed new AP History curriculum. For the past week, large groups of students at a majority of the district’s 17 high schools have left school, waving flags, banners, and protest signs.

“My mom is very proud of me, that I'm standing up for what I believe,” 16-year-old Vanessa Ridge said.

The new version of AP History deviates radically from its predecessor, omitting key historical figures and events such as Benjamin Franklin, Martin Luther King and D-Day. Instead, it emphasizes oppression, conflict, and America’s more divisive events, effectively sanitizing the record of many of America’s most foundational moments, trends, and notable citizens.

The Jefferson County School Board, in a standard motion that follows its own policies as well as the Colorado constitution, voted last week to establish a committee to review the new curriculum. School boards across the nation routinely review new curricula and vote to approve or reject based on local expectations, the district’s standards, and state requirements. The review committee will include teacher and parent input and is a transparent, familiar process.

But this review is part of a larger groundswell of opposition to the course, which critics say leaves out important parts of America's past.

The College Board, which produces AP curricula, supports the protests and claims the new course more closely matches what’s being taught at the university level. In a statement released Friday, the College Board said social order must sometimes be disrupted for the common good.

Today’s planned walkout could be especially painful for Colorado schools. Oct. 1 is the official “count day,” when districts take attendance counts that will determine their level of state funding.

But the students are not acting alone. In fact, they appear to be following the lead of their teachers, who have staged several “sickouts” over the past week, forcing closures at both Golden High School and Jefferson High School. The teachers claim they are protesting the AP curriculum review as well.

Ken Witt, head of the Jefferson County Board of Education, said teachers are upset over a newly adopted compensation plan and are promoting the unrest both with their colleagues and the students as a pretext for union demands.

“It’s never OK to use kids as pawns,” Witt said, adding that students are being misinformed about the curriculum changes.

The Jefferson County school board’s new policy links teacher pay raises to effectiveness. The plan provides raises for 99 percent of the teachers in the district—2.43 percent for teachers rated “effective,” and 4.25 percent for those rated “highly effective.” The remaining 1 percent—66 teachers—were rated less than effective and will not see a raise. If the board had maintained a more traditional step-based compensation model, 10 percent or 450 teachers would receive no raise at all.

The board also voted to cover an increase in retirement costs for its employees and had already raised the budgeted amount available for total compensation from $11.7 million to more than $18 million in a vote last spring.

The Jefferson County protests could influence more than just the schools’ history curriculum. Candidates in both the state's gubernatorial and Senate races have pounced on the issue, with Democrats supporting the students and Republicans questioning the teachers’ motives.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.