By Wilson                                              H.B. No. 154

      75R1938 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 28.002(a), (b), and (d), Education Code,

 1-5     are amended to read as follows:

 1-6           (a)  Each school district that offers kindergarten through

 1-7     grade 12 shall offer, as a required curriculum:

 1-8                 (1)  a foundation curriculum that includes:

 1-9                       (A)  English language arts;

1-10                       (B)  mathematics;

1-11                       (C)  science; and

1-12                       (D)  social studies, consisting of Texas, United

1-13     States, and world history, government, and geography; and

1-14                 (2)  an enrichment curriculum that includes:

1-15                       (A)  to the extent possible, languages other than

1-16     English;

1-17                       (B)  health;

1-18                       (C)  physical education;

1-19                       (D)  fine arts;

1-20                       (E)  economics, with emphasis on the free

1-21     enterprise system and its benefits;

1-22                       (F)  career and technology education; [and]

1-23                       (G)  technology applications; and

1-24                       (H)  human rights issues, with particular

 2-1     attention to the study of the inhumanity of genocide, slavery, and

 2-2     the Holocaust.

 2-3           (b)  The State Board of Education by rule shall designate

 2-4     subjects constituting a well-balanced curriculum to be offered by a

 2-5     school district that does not offer kindergarten through grade 12.

 2-6     The rules must require that a school district that offers grade six

 2-7     or above offer instruction in human rights issues, with particular

 2-8     attention to the study of the inhumanity of genocide, slavery, and

 2-9     the Holocaust.

2-10           (d)  The State Board of Education, after consulting with

2-11     educators, parents, business and industry representatives, and

2-12     employers, shall by rule identify the essential knowledge and

2-13     skills of each subject of the enrichment curriculum that all

2-14     students should be able to demonstrate.  Each district shall use

2-15     the essential knowledge and skills identified by the board as

2-16     guidelines in providing instruction in the enrichment curriculum.

2-17     The board by rule shall require each district to offer instruction

2-18     in human rights issues at the sixth grade level or above.

2-19           SECTION 2.  This Act applies beginning with the 1998-1999

2-20     school year.  The State Board of Education shall adopt rules for

2-21     the implementation of this Act not later than January 1, 1998.

2-22           SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the

2-23     crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an

2-24     emergency and an imperative public necessity that the

2-25     constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several

2-26     days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,

2-27     and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its

 3-1     passage, and it is so enacted.