State settles lawsuit over ethnic studies curriculum, to remove two disputed chants
California education officials have agreed to remove a Mayan-based chant and another spiritual invocation from the state’s nonbinding 800-page model ethnic studies curriculum in an out-of-court settlement.
The nonprofit Californians for Equal Rights Foundation, which opposes affirmative action and what it defines as critical race theory, sued in September. It claimed the unity chants violated the First Amendment ban on promoting religion. It called the settlement “a significant triumph for freedom and equality” in a statement.
The foundation referred to the unity chants as prayers, while the curriculum referred to them as class “energizers.” Emphasizing that the curriculum is voluntary, the California Department of Education and the State Board of Education said in a statement that it would delete them “out of an abundance of caution and in order to avoid prolonged and costly litigation.” However, the state agreed to pay $100,000 of the plaintiffs’ legal expenses; it also will send a letter to school districts informing them of the deletions.
The curriculum includes several unity chants (go here to read the text in the curriculum, starting on page 5). The two that will be removed are the In Lak Ech Affirmation, which focuses on the Nahui Ollin (pages 9-12), and the Ashé Affirmation, whose origin is Nigerian (page 14). The lawsuit said classes in San Diego Unified and Salinas Union High School District also used the chants.
Correction: The multicultural Unity Clap (page 6), which also includes the Mayan phrase In Lak Ech – “you are the other me” – as shown in this video, led by R. Tolteka Cuauhtin, an author of the first draft of the curriculum, was not removed. An earlier version of the article confused the two passages.
In the settlement, the Californians for Equal Rights Foundation agreed not to sue again over the current model curriculum, even though it disagrees with much of its content. It will continue to monitor individual districts’ ethnic studies curriculums to see that they comply with state law and the Legislature’s intent, said Wenyuan Wu, executive director of the foundation.