Senate Bill No. 1380

Introduced by Senator Wyland

February 21, 2014

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

LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL’S DIGEST

SB 1380, as introduced, Wyland. Pupil instruction: Operation Desert Storm and the War on Terror.

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 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 also require the incorporation of materials related to the Operation Desert Storm and international conflicts related to the War on Terror into those publications, and would require the commission to consider Operation Desert Storm, international conflicts related to the War on Terror, and the Armenian Genocide for inclusion in the history-social science curriculum framework when the history-social science curriculum framework is revised as required by law. The bill would also specify that the Legislature encourages the incorporation of survivor, rescuer, liberator, and witness oral testimony into the teaching of human rights, Operation Desert Storm, international conflicts related to the War on Terror, the Holocaust, and genocide, including the Armenian, Cambodian, Darfur, and Rwandan genocides. The bill would define oral testimony to mean firsthand accounts of significant historical events presented in a specified format.

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)  The begin delete State Department of Education end delete begin insert department end insert
shall begin delete incorporate, end delete begin insert incorporate end insert into publications that provide
examples of curriculum resources for teacher begin delete use, end delete begin insert use end insert 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, begin delete and end delete the Holocaust begin insert , Operation Desert
Storm, and international conflicts related to the War on Terror end insert .

(b)  begin insert (1) end insert begin insert   end insert The Legislature encourages the incorporation of survivor,
rescuer, liberator, and witness begin insert oral end insert testimony into the teaching of
human rights, begin insert Operation Desert Storm, international conflicts
related to the War on Terror, the Holocaust, and end insert genocide,
begin insert including, but not limited to, the Armenian, Cambodian, Darfur, end insert
and begin delete the Holocaust. end delete begin insert Rwandan genocides. end insert

begin insert

(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.

end insert

(c) The Legislature encourages all state and local professional
development activities to provide teachers with content background
and resources to assist in teaching about civil rights, human rights
violations, genocide, slavery, begin delete and end delete the Holocaust begin insert , Operation Desert
Storm, and international conflicts associated with War on Terror end insert .

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

(e)  begin delete The end delete begin insert When the history-social science curriculum framework
is revised as required by law, the Instructional Quality Commission
shall consider including the end insert begin insert end insert Great Irish Famine of begin delete 1845-50 end delete begin delete shall
be considered end delete begin insert 1845-1850, the Armenian Genocide, Operation
Desert Storm, and international conflicts associated with the War
on Terror end insert in the begin delete next cycle in which the history/social end delete
begin insert history-social end insert science curriculum begin delete framework and its accompanying
instructional materials are adopted. end delete begin insert framework. end insert

(f) The Model Curriculum for Human Rights and Genocide
adopted by the begin delete State Board of Education, end delete begin insert state board, end insert 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 begin delete State Department of Education end delete begin insert department end insert shall make
the curriculum available on its begin insert Internet end insert Web site.