DEBATE AND OTHER FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Utahns understand that CRT is a graduate-level theoretical lens that would not be appropriate for K12 schools, but many feel that some elements have been or could be introduced to students. We created a board rule (R277-328) that prohibits:1) Promotion that one race is inherently inferior or superior to another. 2) Promotion that a person’s race determines his or her character, values, morals, etc. 3) Promotion that a current student/person bears responsibility for the actions of others throughout history. 4) That a person can be discriminated against for his or her race. Our students need to know that a person’s race doesn’t dictate moral conscience. They also need to know that the country was not founded and designed to promote slavery. It was founded and designed to allow, for the first time in our history, the governed to have a say in the government. This was monumental. That is not to say that the abhorrence of slavery didn’t happen, nor should it be omitted. Students should be taught accurate history, but slavery shouldn’t be taught as the predominant factor for the design of the United States of America. Some wrongly stated that our Board created a “loophole at the end allowing teachers to slide CRT into the class.” There was no such thing. There was an opportunity for the local board to have a public and transparent meeting if, for example, a parent didn’t want the civil war or WWII taught because the first prohibited concept is inherent to both of those. It was a safety net that children wouldn’t grow up with big learning gaps if the Rule was misinterpreted or used inappropriately.  We have recently completely aligned 328 with HB427 and HB261 which delineate even more protections from CRT and helps teachers understand their responsibilities with anti-discrimination laws.

Common Core was adopted in Utah (and most states) 14 years ago in math and English. We revise our standards in these areas every 5-7 years, so it can look different from what it was 14 years ago or even five years ago, but there will always be elements that are the same. Every time we revise the standards, we have opened them up to massive amounts of public input electronically and held input gathering sessions in person for community members, so I feel comfortable in saying that we currently have Utah standards even if there is some crossover. Parents want students to know certain basic concepts that all students should know whether they were in Common Core or not. I would invite all to visit our math and English standards at the USBE website and share with us which standards they feel are valuable for students and which they feel need to be added, removed, or revised.

Personally, I am happy to see the regular review process at work.  Many are not satisfied with Math standards in Utah.  Some have recommended adoption of the California Math Standards.  Others are pushing for the Massachussetts Mathematics Standards.  Hundreds across the state are pleased with the results in recent years.  We were, after all, the only state in the nation to not drop in math proficiency scores after the pandemic.  But the current Utah mathematics standards review committee has recommended a greater balance between the current standards and curriculum and a return to a pre-Common Core approach to teaching and learning in Math.  I have great faith in the power of many strong Utah minds to make the appropriate adjustments so that our students will thrive in mathematical preparation for life.

Recently the DOE hinted at tying instructional requirements to CARES funding dollars in a draft application, and many states, including Utah, fought back (wisely.) The DOE pulled it out of the potential application, so there would remain no tie from federal funding to Utah standards. Federal funds continue to support special education and Title programs. Some say, “But we did have to make a plan for elementary and secondary recovery dollars.” This is true. However, the states have autonomy over their own respective plan designs, leaving us in the driver seat.

We all need to actively share your concern for data privacy.  Luckily, Utah has some of the strongest data privacy laws in the country.  The legislature does require data to follow a student as they transfer from school to school in what they call an “educational backpack”.  At the same time, there are much stricter provisions for protecting student data, both in house and with education partners, in place than are required for adults in the state. One of our top priorities at USBE is protecting student data and that protection is required at the local level as well. At USBE we have an office dedicated to carefully consider every decision regarding data privacy and protection.  We are all over this area.  We spend a huge amount of money protecting our children and Utah’s families. When our legislature proposed a million dollars annually spent on student data protections a handful of years ago, Representative Christensen said in committee meeting, “We are killing a fly with a cannon.” I believe at the local and state levels if you’re going to kill a fly with a cannon, student safety and data protections are important places to do it.

Should they? That’s debatable. Do they? Yes. No school, church, business, or any organization that I know of operates in a vacuum.  Does that equate to innovation? Not necessarily. Sometimes it equates to tradition. For example, almost every school partners with a yearbook company. That promotes tradition. Our hundreds of Career and Technical Education courses rely on such partnerships.  National accreditation requires industry input to keep academic standards relevant and on the cutting edge. We are seeing districts, charters, and private schools increasingly use secondary instruction providers to target specific needs. Our rural schools partner with other institutions electronically to increase the number of electives or advanced classes offered when no teacher can be found in the more remote area.  If the partner increases opportunity for students as compared to past opportunity, then the partnerships could be considered innovative. Like any other decision that is made.  Partners need to be chosen carefully.  And partnerships must be evaluated regularly and either continued or rescinded based on the educational value for local students. 

Elite female athletes like Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova, and Nancy Hogshead-Makar believe that transgender women competing with biological women threatens women's sports. Caitlin Jenner, famous transgender athlete agrees, and I agree, but I also understand the complexities of the issue, and so do both our governor and our legislators. While the legislature overrode Governor Cox’s veto, President Adams made it clear that there are quandaries with the override when he said that they anticipate a lawsuit and assigned 500,000.00 from the Attorney General’s budget to create indemnification for schools and the Utah High School Athletic Association.  When the lawsuit transpires, a commission will be enacted that will then study the issue to find solutions that will provide opportunities for transgender students and biological female students to participate in legal and reasonable ways for all parties to be protected. I don’t know what these will be but may include such things as differentiated competitive categories. Or- perhaps it will include a requirement for double races spaced reasonably apart. Or- it could possibly include a requirement for USHE (Utah System of Higher Education) to determine scholarship recipients based on percentages of transgender and biologically female students, to create fair opportunities for all.  No matter how the commission moves forward, the legislature designed it to include input from multiple groups to find long-term solutions considering opportunity, competitive fairness, and safety for all. 

Of course!!  We want all students and faculty to feel safe and comfortable in their environment.  In new schools today, we are building private stalls in bathrooms and locker rooms at high expense, but students will have privacy.

This is not true. Some teachers were asking for preferred pronouns on their initial info sheets. Our USBE State Superintendent, Syd Dickson, sent an email to every local superintendent and charter director counseling against the practice and explaining to them that the practice violates the state parental rights code.  There was a Gender Identity Guidance Document that the Standards and Assessment Committee was researching and drafting that included all state and federal laws, but it did not pass out of committee and was never heard nor voted on by the full board. It received 20,000 pieces of public input dispersed almost equally in favor and against it. In addition, the attorneys of six large districts asked USBE to allow them to work through issues at the local level, and one Rural district passed a public resolution requesting the same. The GID is no longer on the committee agenda and policy will be addressed at the local level.

No. It is against the law in Utah. Additionally, the areas of human reproduction that are taught in health classes include abstinence and must be opted IN by the parent. 

I do not support transformational SEL principles, but I do support SEL principles that help all children access learning better. For example, things like Wellness Rooms in school where the lights are a little less bright and students can go to regroup if they are struggling emotionally because a parent went into the hospital, they had an altercation with a friend, or any number of disturbances that beset children emotionally.  If there is SEL curriculum to be used across the board, I like the process that Washington District followed when they went to the publisher, explained their community standards and asked for anything contrary to be removed. The company did so, and the district brought the remainder of the materials back and made them all available to parents. Parents vetted the materials and wanted them for their kids. This is an excellent process if an actual SEL curriculum is going to be used.  SEL programs sometimes refer to “in the box” curriculums that may put teachers in the uncomfortable role of attempting to be counselors, or set students up in circles to talk about their problems. We've even heard about specific "programs" that paint parents as barriers to success. What our districts should be selecting is a SEL program that helps our students acquire social and emotional skills to help them be successful in life.  In this past legislative session, the legislature passed SB 159 and, believe it or not, it's asking teachers to be trained in helping our students acquire social skills such as "accepting consequences and respecting boundaries", or emotional regulation skills such as "accepting criticism; disagreeing appropriately; and following instructions."  Our school districts must seek parent and community input and select a "program" that does not focus on the negative but gives our students the durable skills they need to interact successfully in a tough world.

The short answer is no. An IEP is required under Federal law for students with disabilities. Competency Based Education is an idea that allows students more flexibility in how and when they show mastery of skills. Instead of teachers “teaching to the middle,” in 1980s factory style, they may allow them to progress at their own rate in key core areas. When teachers work with ability groups in math and reading, so that even students who have already mastered the content still have a year of growth, it is an example of competency-based education regardless of whether or not they use instructional technology. Mt. Timpanogos High School is a great example for competency based education.  The Catalyst Center in Davis School District is another outstanding Personalized Competency Based Program.  As an educator for 43 years at BYU, I continually began where the student was.  It was simply good teaching to focus on motivating every student from wherever they currently were in understanding, skills, and mastery of the knowledge base to help them make maximum progress as they moved forward.

If districts, charters, and private schools use secondary providers for instruction or third-party vendors for instructional materials, they should only engage in contracts where they have complete control to make adjustments to match their community standards and Utah State Law and Board Rule, which has the effect of law.  This mitigates any political bias that may or may not exist. If they can’t be guaranteed control in what students are exposed to, then they shouldn’t engage in outsourcing.

I don’t see it as creating activists for political issues.  I see it as an opportunity for children to think outside the box with a hands-on experience.  I see it more as inviting students to be aware of real-world challenges in their current world.  This type of project would be an ideal time to involve parents in the choice of what issues to highlight.  Sue and I have appreciated help from the village in teaching our children responsibility in our community, stewardship over our environment, and as they matured, their growing understanding of cause and effect.  Experiences with recycling, community clean-up, and respect for our world have influenced our children in positive ways.  One board member shared the opportunity of teaching her Cub Scouts about being good stewards over their environment.  They decided to go pick up trash in their high school parking lot after lunch and filled three large garbage bags.  Now as high school seniors ready to graduate, those Cub Scouts have thought twice about putting their lunch-time garbage in the appropriate receptacle rather than on the ground in the parking lot.

Teacher collaboration in Professional Learning Communities was formally implemented in Nebo School District while I was on the Nebo board.  It seems students would benefit when teachers evaluate learning gains and gaps and share their expertise with one another about how to extend progress for students who have already mastered the current level content; and how to close the gap for those still striving to grasp content knowledge and skills.  What is lost is one more hour each week that could be spent in instruction with students and/or individual lesson prep for teachers.  So, they have to weigh these two things at the local level to determine the return on the investment.  Our Nebo teachers considered that question and have embraced Professional Learning Communities as a key component of student success.

We need to ask a few questions.  What is the purpose of standardized testing?  What do we want to achieve through the test?  What information do we want to gather?  Standardized tests are optional for parents and are clearly not the only measure for learning, but they do help provide a bird’s-eye view. About 25% of Utah students participate in university concurrent enrollment and advanced placement. Utah’s most recent AP scores show our students performing in the TOP FIVE states in the nation. Reading scores have been called out as being low in our Utah specific state-wide tests.   For these tests, a cut score was chosen by a stakeholder committees that is actually above grade level to meet the legislature’s requirement for a strenuous goal, so, while we definitely have room for improvement, it helps to know that the data is not actually based on grade level, but rather, on how many are reading above grade level.

The ethnic studies core standards and curriculum requirements (53E-4-204.1.) are all about local control and allow LEAs to select curriculum and instructional materials that support ethnic studies with a bit of guidance on minimum criteria that should be included in the curriculum. The timeline for this has just been extended in HB 82 to the end of 2025. The 2022 SB 244 bill required ethnic studies to be incorporated into k-12 core standards while also allowing LEAs to offer an ethnic studies course if they choose.  No ethnic studies standards are in place at this time, but we have identified ethnic studies connections in ~20% of the current K-12 core standards across content areas. The Utah Ethnic Studies Commission is in the process of discussing what recommendations to USBE regarding ethnic studies may look like, so it opted to extend the timeline for LEAs during this past legislative session.

Utah law states that public education’s mission is to assure Utah the best educated citizenry in the world and each individual the training to succeed in a global society by providing students with: (a) learning and occupational skills; (b) character development; (c) literacy and numeracy; (d) high quality instruction; (e) curriculum based on high standards and relevance; and (f) effective assessment to inform high quality instruction and accountability.  Utah code envisions an educated citizenry that encompasses the following foundational principles: (a) citizen participation in civic and political affairs; (b) economic prosperity for the state by graduating students who are college and career ready; (c)strong moral and social values; and (d) loyalty and commitment to constitutional government. I concur with Utah Code’s vision for public education.

On social media some wrongly state that USBE board members support pornography in schools. Of all the false accusations being lobbed at me and the USBE, this is the most offensive. It is ridiculous that I even have to state that I do not support pornography in schools. It is against the law. To address concerns, USBE passed a Board Rule requiring each district and charter to create a policy that outlines how a book can be challenged to be removed from the library, but also one outlining the criteria and process to put a book in the library in the first place. Materials online and in text form should be age-appropriate and legal. We also created a model policy including a provision for communication to patrons and also one to have communication between similar-grade schools in a multi-school district/charter system, so if a book is challenged at one Jr. High, the other committees are made aware of the committee’s determination. The legislature, in 2023, added something like this to code where schools would need to remove a title if it is removed in two other LEAs.  This week we have scheduled a special session of the Standards and Assessment Committee to dive deeper into the creation of a Guidance Document for LEAs and Charters across the state that thoroughly connects every part of the sensitive materials documents to Utah Code and Board rule.