By Wilson H.B. No. 64
74R991 KKA-D
A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
1-1 AN ACT
1-2 relating to human rights instruction in public school classes.
1-3 BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
1-4 SECTION 1. Sections 21.101(a)-(c), Education Code, are
1-5 amended to read as follows:
1-6 (a) Each school district that offers prekindergarten through
1-7 grade 12 shall offer a well-balanced curriculum that includes:
1-8 (1) English language arts;
1-9 (2) other languages, to the extent possible;
1-10 (3) mathematics;
1-11 (4) science;
1-12 (5) health;
1-13 (6) physical education;
1-14 (7) fine arts;
1-15 (8) social studies;
1-16 (9) economics, with emphasis on the free enterprise
1-17 system and its benefits;
1-18 (10) business education;
1-19 (11) vocational education; <and>
1-20 (12) Texas and United States history as individual
1-21 subjects and in reading courses; and
1-22 (13) human rights issues, with particular attention to
1-23 the study of the inhumanity of genocide, slavery, and the
1-24 Holocaust.
2-1 (b) The State Board of Education by rule shall designate
2-2 subjects comprising a well-balanced curriculum to be offered by a
2-3 school district that does not offer prekindergarten through grade
2-4 12. The rules must require that a school district that offers
2-5 grade six or above offer instruction in human rights issues, with
2-6 particular attention to the study of the inhumanity of genocide,
2-7 slavery, and the Holocaust.
2-8 (c) The State Board of Education by rule shall designate the
2-9 essential elements of each subject listed in Subsection (a) <of
2-10 this section> and shall require each district to provide
2-11 instruction in those elements at appropriate grade levels. The
2-12 rules must require that each district offer instruction in human
2-13 rights issues at the sixth grade level or above. In order to be
2-14 accredited, a district must provide instruction in those essential
2-15 elements as specified by the state board.
2-16 SECTION 2. This Act applies beginning with the 1996-1997
2-17 school year. The State Board of Education shall adopt rules for
2-18 the implementation of this Act not later than January 1, 1996.
2-19 SECTION 3. The importance of this legislation and the
2-20 crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
2-21 emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
2-22 constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
2-23 days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended.