Changes to the English Curriculum: What Comes Next?

This year, the BVN English curriculum underwent several changes — but is this really all we need to change?

By Charitha Lakkireddy | Opinion

Before 2020, there were about 90 approved novels in Blue Valley’s English curriculum, and 11 were written by people of color. Of the 12 new novels approved to be added to the BV curriculum spring 2020, seven of them are written by people of color. Blue Valley has retired “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee, “Of Mice and Men” and both “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” and “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer” by Mark Twain from the curriculum. The retirement of books was decided by the Blue Valley School District diversity committee as a response to recent events this summer. The addition of books comes after years of teachers’ campaigns for new novels to be added.

This is a great thing to do, but this can’t be the only thing that’s done. Racism is an issue everywhere. No place in the world is exempt, BVN included. There are a few improvements we are trying to make now, including featuring more authors of color in the English curriculum and more honest history of the people of color in history courses. There’s nothing wrong with this. It’s an excellent first step — as long as it isn’t the final step. These changes would help give different perspectives, which help others understand the lived experiences of people of color in America. This is important, but it’s not the end-all, be-all solution to the long list of problems pertaining to race in this country.

The hope that simply reading more books about the minority experience will evoke a culture of anti-racism is hoping for too much. I’ve been in those classes and I’ve read those books with non-Black students who mouthed the N-word when it came up in the text, who said it casually in conversation, for whom the book was just a book, a read-aloud that killed class time and ate into their free time. We are allowing for these situations to happen because we don’t truly talk about what we read. We talk about how unfortunate it is that this character experienced discrimination and the cause of their distress. We don’t discuss the root of these issues — the system that allows them to happen.

We talk about racism with blinders on. Yes, racism is an issue, and it’s good we can settle that, but we need to take the blinders off and look with our peripheral vision. We need to connect the issues presented in the book with the present, what we can do to combat them, and give students the space to share personal experiences and ask questions retaining to the text and life. When we fail to talk candidly about race, we also fail to speak to the true experiences of people of color. Instead of seeing all aspects of the lives of the character, we focus on the ugly — the downfalls and hardships — not the beauty.

The 90 books in the ELA curriculum prove we read a lot about white people of European descent. We read about their hardships, but also about their wins, their happiest moments and their successes. We fail to do the same for text about people of color, and by only reading about their struggles and hardships, their identity, in the eyes of readers, is reduced to a single view — that they only experience struggle and hardship.

While we sympathize with and learn to better ourselves from the pain of their past, it’s just as necessary for us to celebrate their successes. This is where the value in representation in curriculum lies. A student seeing a version of themselves in a book is great, connecting to a character is what makes a book good, but only seeing those characters be hurt won’t have the positive effect some might hope for. Education about oppression and racism is essential, but there is great importance in the beauty and the culture of minority groups that is just as necessary to teach.

Classroom discussions recently have been integrated only around the discrimination and hardships people of color experience. If this is the only exposure to the narratives of people of color that many white students get, this is the sole image that will live in their minds. There will be a direct association of people of color to struggle and hardship exclusively, because that is the reality pushed in the classroom — instead of a true discussion of antiracism, an effort that not just believes in equality of the races, but actively rejects supremacy of any one group over another. Reading texts from different perspectives shows students that, yes, people of color have struggles, but they’re also high achieving individuals. They’re all citizens of society. They are not just victims. They’re people who are capable of doing amazing things.

Racism is a systemic issue and we need to address that. Efforts like reading more about people of color, mourning their loss, and celebrating their success are all worthy of our time and appreciation. However, they are only worthy if we use them to propel new conversations about race and the disparities within white people and people of color in this country. Our classrooms are shaping the minds of future doctors, government officials, lawyers, and teachers. We are the ones who are going to save lives, make laws, and shape the minds of their future. We have to learn now and have these conversations now before we enter into a field and continue to uphold the systemic racism some have failed to acknowledge thus far. Talking about it to the future is the only way to save the future.

At BVN, we try, but we aren’t trying hard enough. We occupy ourselves with minute tasks in the name of political correctness and pat ourselves on the back for a job well done. While our efforts now are not pointless, they could easily be more pointed. Discussions about racism don’t have to be justified, they should just happen. They shouldn’t need an assigned reading book as a precursor, but if that’s what it takes to candidly talk about race and prejudice in our society and in our school, so be it. If the first step is better books about the experiences of people of color in the curriculum, the second should be talking about more than just the book. FRESHMAN: Starr Carter was used to being two versions of herself. Who she was at her rich, white prep school was the opposite of who she was at home, in her mostly black neighborhood. When these two worlds collide, after her friend is shot by a police officer, she must find the best parts of both worlds and use her voice for what’s right.