Introduction

The radical education establishment, which includes foundations, bureaucrats, and accreditors, uses licensure requirements as a central tool to gain power over America’s classrooms. These licensure requirements force teachers and education administrators to undergo extensive training in education school pedagogy, and little in subject matter content. The radical establishment, disconnected from real-world classrooms, uses the requirements to restrict entry to progressive ideologues and careerists who can mouth politically correct buzzwords such as equity and social justice. They also generally reduce the supply of teachers and education administrators and waste the time and money of would-be teachers by requiring them to learn a hollow curriculum rather than subject matter content knowledge or directly applicable knowledge of cognitive psychology and statistics.

The Education Licensure Core Curriculum Act reforms teacher licensure requirements by creating a core curriculum of courses that teacher applicants must have taken before they can apply for a teaching license. The Act creates different core requirements for four different classes of teacher licensure: Kindergarten Through Grade Six Requirements (which require broad interdisciplinary knowledge); Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics Requirements, Grade 7 – 12; Humanities Requirements, Grade 7 – 12; and Social Studies Requirements, Grade 7 – 12. Each of these teacher licensure requirements require teacher applicants to have taken eight subject-matter courses. The Kindergarten Through Grade Six Requirements require broad interdisciplinary knowledge, while the three Grade 7 – 12 teacher licensure requirements require deeper knowledge in, respectively, the STEM disciplines, the humanities, and the social sciences.

These requirements do not directly challenge the role of education schools and their allies to distort teacher training. They do, however, ensure that teachers will have a large minimum of solid content knowledge to prepare them for their classrooms. Filling teacher licensure requirements with solid content knowledge also will exert pressure on education schools to reduce the amount of useless, counterproductive, and/or politicized education school pedagogy they impose on their students. Perhaps as importantly, creating an Education Licensure Core Curriculum will improve the accountability of teacher preparation programs to policymakers and the public. Policymakers and the public will be able to oversee a limited number of carefully defined teacher preparation courses and hold colleges and universities accountable for how well they are taught.

Our Act will not solve every aspect of teacher education. It does not solve the problem of politicized and softened undergraduate courses in subject matter disciplines, especially those in the humanities and the social sciences. But creating an Education Licensure Core Curriculum will help delimit the arena of future curricular reform needed to improve teacher preparation, and make clear what needs to be done. We recommend this model Act, therefore, as a necessary part of education licensure reform—but not a final one.

Model Legislative Text

Section A [“Kindergarten Through Grade Six Requirements”]

1. The State Board of Education shall develop and adopt a teacher licensure core curriculum policy for an individual applying for a {State} teaching license for kindergarten through grade six (K-6).
2. An individual applying for a {State} teaching license for kindergarten through grade six (K-6) shall be granted a {State}teaching license for kindergarten through grade six (K-6) only if he or she has completed a core curriculum that includes twenty-four (24) semester credit hours, which shall include the following introductory courses:
   1. Calculus, Statistics, or Mathematical Logic;
   2. Introduction to Biology;
   3. United States History I from 1607 through 1877, which shall include without limitation the historical development of the United States's republican form of government from 1607 through 1877;
   4. United States Government, which shall include:
      1. Documents relating to the founding of the United States; and
      2. The basic principles of the United States’s republican form of government;
   5. Introduction to Economics;
   6. United States Literature I from 1607 through 1877;
   7. Western History I from 3000 BC through 1450; and
   8. Western History II from 1450 to the present day.
3. The courses required under subsection (b) of this section shall not:
   1. Include experiential learning;
   2. Be exclusively or primarily devoted to subgroups of Americans or other nationalities categorized by race, sex, class, gender identity, or gender expression;
   3. Require an enrolled student to engage in activism as a condition of passing the course; or
   4. Require an enrolled student to affirm or assent to discriminatory concepts as a condition of passing the course.

Section B [“Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics Requirements, Grade 7 - 12”]

1. The State Board of Education shall develop and adopt a teacher licensure core curriculum policy for an individual applying for a {State} teaching license in science, technology, engineering, or mathematics for grades seven through twelve (7-12).
2. An individual applying for a {State} teaching license in science, technology, engineering, or mathematics for grades seven through twelve (7-12) shall be granted a {State}teaching license in science, technology, engineering, or mathematics for grades seven through twelve (7-12) only if he or she has completed a core curriculum that includes twenty-four (24) semester credit hours, which shall include the following introductory courses:
   1. Calculus I;
   2. Introduction to Statistics;
   3. Introduction to Biology;
   4. Introduction to Chemistry;
   5. Introduction to Physics;
   6. Introduction to Engineering;
   7. Introduction to Geology; and
   8. Introduction to Astronomy.
3. The courses required under subsection (b) of this section shall not:
   1. Include experiential learning;
   2. Be exclusively or primarily devoted to subgroups of Americans or other nationalities categorized by race, sex, class, gender identity, or gender expression;
   3. Require an enrolled student to engage in activism as a condition of passing the course; or
   4. Require an enrolled student to affirm or assent to discriminatory concepts as a condition of passing the course.
4. The courses required under subsection (b) of this section are exempt from any administrative policy that affects course content, including without limitation learning outcomes, curricular themes, and areas of knowledge, except an administrative policy that is explicitly authorized by law.

Section C [“Humanities Requirements, Grade 7 - 12”]

1. The State Board of Education shall develop and adopt a teacher licensure core curriculum policy for an individual applying for a {State} teaching license in humanities for grades seven through twelve (7-12).
2. An individual applying for a {State} teaching license in humanities for grades seven through twelve (7-12) shall be granted a {State}teaching license humanities for grades seven through twelve (7-12) only if he or she has completed a core curriculum that includes twenty-four (24) semester credit hours, which shall include the following introductory courses:
   1. British Literature I from 500 to 1700;
   2. British Literature II from 1700 to the present day;
   3. United States Literature I from 1607 to 1877;
   4. United States Literature II from 1877 to the present day;
   5. Western Humanities I from 3000 BC through 1450;
   6. Western Humanities II from 1450 to the present day;
   7. Classical Rhetoric and American Oratory; and
   8. Western Art and Architecture.
3. The courses required under subsection (b) of this section shall not:
   1. Include experiential learning;
   2. Be exclusively or primarily devoted to subgroups of Americans or other nationalities categorized by race, sex, class, gender identity, or gender expression;
   3. Require an enrolled student to engage in activism as a condition of passing the course; or
   4. Require an enrolled student to affirm or assent to discriminatory concepts as a condition of passing the course.
4. The courses required under subsection (b) of this section are exempt from any administrative policy that affects course content, including without limitation learning outcomes, curricular themes, and areas of knowledge, except an administrative policy that is explicitly authorized by law.

Section D [“Social Studies Requirements, Grade 7 - 12”]

1. The State Board of Education shall develop and adopt a teacher licensure core curriculum policy for an individual applying for a {State} teaching license in social studies for grades seven through twelve (7-12).
2. An individual applying for a {State} teaching license in social studies for grades seven through twelve (7-12) shall be granted a {State}teaching license in social studies for grades seven through twelve (7-12) only if he or she has completed a core curriculum that includes twenty-four (24) semester credit hours, which shall include the following introductory courses:
   1. United States History I from 1607 through 1877, which shall include without limitation the historical development of the United States's republican form of government from 1607 through 1877;
   2. United States History II from 1877 to the present day, which shall include without limitation the historical development of the United States's republican form of government since 1877;
   3. Western History from 3000 BC through 1450;
   4. Western History from 1450 through present day;
   5. Western Political Philosophy I from 3000 BC through 1450;
   6. Western Political Philosophy II from 1450 to the present day;
   7. United States Government, which shall include:
      1. Documents relating to the founding of the United States; and
      2. The basic principles of the United States's republican form of government; and
   8. Introduction to Economics.
3. The courses required under subsection (b) of this section shall not:
   1. Include experiential learning;
   2. Be exclusively or primarily devoted to subgroups of Americans or other nationalities categorized by race, sex, class, gender identity, or gender expression;
   3. Require an enrolled student to engage in activism as a condition of passing the course; or
   4. Require an enrolled student to affirm or assent to discriminatory concepts as a condition of passing the course.
4. The courses required under subsection (b) of this section are exempt from any administrative policy that affects course content, including without limitation learning outcomes, curricular themes, and areas of knowledge, except an administrative policy that is explicitly authorized by law.

Section D [“Definitions”] 

As used in this Act:

• “Discriminatory concepts” means the concepts that: (a) one race or sex is inherently superior to another race or sex; (b) an individual, by virtue of his or her race or sex, is inherently racist, sexist, or oppressive, whether consciously or unconsciously; (c) an individual should be discriminated against or receive adverse treatment solely or partly because of the individual’s race; (d) members of one race cannot and should not attempt to treat others without respect to race; (e) an individual’s moral standing or worth is necessarily determined by his or her race or sex; (f) an individual, by virtue of his or her race or sex, bears responsibility for actions committed in the past by other members of the same race or sex; (g) any individual should feel discomfort, guilt, anguish, or any other form of psychological distress on account of his or her race or sex; (h) meritocracy or traits such as a hard work ethic are racist or sexist, or were created by a members of a particular race to oppress members of another race; (i) that the advent of slavery in the territory that is now the United States constituted the true founding of the United States; or (j) that, with respect to their relationship to American values, slavery and racism are anything other than deviations from, betrayals of, or failures to live up to, the authentic founding principles of the United States, which include liberty and equality.
• “Activism” means activity outside the classroom aimed at achieving a political or a social goal.

Section E [“Severability”] 

If any provision of this chapter, or the application of any provision to any person or circumstance, is held to be invalid, the remainder of this chapter and the application of its provisions to any other person or circumstance shall not be affected thereby.