Amended in Assembly April 27, 2016

California Legislature—2015–16 Regular Session

Assembly Bill No. 2864

Introduced by Assembly Member Chau

February 19, 2016

An act to amend Section 51226.3 of the Education Code, relating to pupil instruction.

LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL’S DIGEST

AB 2864, as amended, Chau. Pupil instruction: Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882: begin delete Geary Act of 1892. end delete begin insert Chinese Americans’ contributions to end insert begin insert establishment of end insert begin insert transcontinental railroad. end insert

Existing law requires the State Department of Education to incorporate materials relating to civil rights, human rights violations, genocide, slavery, and the Holocaust into publications that provide examples of curriculum resources for teacher use, consistent with the subject frameworks on history and social science and other requirements. Under existing law, the Legislature encourages the incorporation of survivor, rescuer, liberator, and witness oral testimony into the teaching of human rights, genocide, and the Holocaust. Existing law establishes the Instructional Quality Commission and requires the commission to, among other things, recommend curriculum frameworks to the State Board of Education.

This bill would encourage all state and local professional development activities to provide teachers with content background and resources to assist them in teaching about the Chinese Exclusion Act of begin delete 1882, the Geary Act of 1892, and other specified laws relating to the discrimination against, and mistreatment of, Chinese and other minority groups. end delete begin insert 1882 and the contributions of Chinese Americans to the establishment of the transcontinental railroad. end insert The bill would require those begin delete laws end delete begin insert topics end insert be considered begin delete in the next cycle in which end delete begin insert for inclusion, as prov end insert begin insert ided, when the s end insert begin insert tate board revises and adopts end insert the history-social science curriculum framework begin delete and its accompanying instructional materials are adopted. end delete begin insert on or after January 1, 2017. end insert

Vote: majority. Appropriation: no. Fiscal committee: yes. State-mandated local program: no.

The people of the State of California do enact as follows:

SECTION 1.  

Section 51226.3 of the Education Code is
amended to read:

51226.3.  

(a) (1) The department shall incorporate into
publications that provide examples of curriculum resources for
teacher use those materials developed by publishers of nonfiction,
trade books, and primary sources, or other public or private
organizations, that are age appropriate and consistent with the
subject frameworks on history and social science that deal with
civil rights, human rights violations, genocide, slavery, and the
Holocaust.

(2) The Legislature encourages the department to incorporate
into publications that provide examples of curriculum resources
for teacher use those materials developed by publishers of
nonfiction, trade books, and primary sources, or other public or
private organizations, that are age appropriate and consistent with
the subject frameworks on history and social science that deal with
the Armenian, Cambodian, Darfur, and Rwandan genocides.

(b) (1) The Legislature encourages the incorporation of survivor,
rescuer, liberator, and witness oral testimony into the teaching of
human rights, the Holocaust, and genocide, including, but not
limited to, the Armenian, Cambodian, Darfur, and Rwandan
genocides.

(2) As used in this subdivision, “oral testimony” means the
firsthand accounts of significant historical events presented in a
format that includes, but is not limited to, in-person testimony,
video, or a multimedia option, such as a DVD or an online video.

(c) The Legislature encourages all state and local professional
development activities to provide teachers with content background
and resources to assist them in teaching about civil rights, human
rights violations, genocide, slavery, the Armenian Genocide, and
the Holocaust.

(d) The Legislature encourages all state and local professional
development activities to provide teachers with content background
and resources to assist them in teaching about the Great Irish
Famine of 1845-50.

(e) The Great Irish Famine of 1845-50 shall be considered in
the next cycle in which the history-social science curriculum
framework and its accompanying instructional materials are
adopted.

(f) (1) The Legislature encourages all state and local
professional development activities to provide teachers with content
background and resources to assist them in teaching about the
Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 begin delete as the first major law to single out
and forbid a specific ethnic group, the Chinese, from immigrating
to, and becoming naturalized citizens of, the United States, and
the Geary Act of 1892, which extended the prohibitions of the
Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 and imposed new and onerous
requirements on Chinese immigrants. end delete begin insert and the contributions of
Chinese Americans to the establishment of the transcontinental
railroad. end insert

begin delete

(2) The Legislature encourages all state and local professional
development activities to provide teachers with content background
and resources to assist them in teaching about additional laws that
were enacted to perpetuate the discrimination against, and unequal
treatment of, Chinese and other minority groups, including
numerous antimiscegenation laws that prohibited marriage between
white women and men of minority background or ancestry; the
Alien Land Law of 1913, which prohibited “aliens ineligible for
citizenship” from owning land or property; the Cable Act of 1922,
which terminated the United States citizenship of any woman who
married an alien ineligible for United States citizenship; and the
Immigration Act of 1924, which limited the number of immigrants
who could be admitted from any country and prohibited the
immigration of all Asians.

(3) The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, the Geary Act of 1892,
and the other laws identified in paragraph (2) shall be considered
in the next cycle in which the history-social science curriculum
framework and its accompanying instructional materials are
adopted.

end delete begin insert

(2) When the state board revises and adopts the curriculum
framework for history-social science on or after January 1, 2017,
the state board shall consider providing for the inclusion, in that
curriculum framework, evaluation criteria, and accompanying
instructional materials, of instruction on the Chinese Exclusion
Act of 1882 and the contributions of Chinese Americans to the
establishment of the transcontinental railroad.

end insert

(g) When the history-social science curriculum framework is
revised as required by law, the Instructional Quality Commission
shall consider including the Armenian, Cambodian, Darfur, and
Rwandan genocides in the recommended history-social science
curriculum framework.

(h) The Model Curriculum for Human Rights and Genocide
adopted by the state board, pursuant to Section 51226, shall be
made available to schools in grades 7 to 12, inclusive, as soon as
funding is available for this purpose. In addition, the department
shall make the curriculum available on its Internet Web site.

(i) For purposes of this article, “Armenian Genocide” means
the torture, starvation, and murder of 1,500,000 Armenians, which
included death marches into the Syrian desert, by the rulers of the
Ottoman Turkish Empire and the exile of more than 500,000
innocent people during the period from 1915 to 1923, inclusive.

(j) When the state board revises and adopts the curriculum
framework for history-social science on or after January 1, 2016,
the state board shall consider providing for the inclusion, in that
curriculum framework, evaluation criteria, and accompanying
instructional materials, of instruction on the unconstitutional
deportation to Mexico during the Great Depression of citizens and
lawful permanent residents of the United States.

(k) As used in subdivisions (b) and (c), “human rights” and
“human rights violations” include the unconstitutional deportation
to Mexico during the Great Depression of citizens and lawful
permanent residents of the United States.