SAY WHAT?

Texas Board of Education Gets Proposal to Call Slavery ‘Involuntary Relocation’

The education board asked the group of educators who proposed the term to “carefully examine the language.”

Months after some teachers in Texas were told to present “both sides” of the Holocaust, the State Board of Education has received a proposal to rename slavery “involuntary relocation.” The board is in the midst of mulling proposals for its once-a-decade update to the social studies curriculum. The latest update will bring the curriculum in line with Texas’ new decree that subject matter should not make students “feel discomfort.” Nine educators in a working group advising the board suggested revising the second-grade curriculum to “compare journeys to America, including voluntary Irish immigration and involuntary relocation of African people during colonial times,” the Texas Tribune reported. The proposal caught the eye of a Democrat on the board, who expressed concerns. The board says it sent the proposal back to the group and told them to “carefully examine the language used to describe events, specifically the term ‘involuntary relocation.’”