Dive Brief:
- All Washington state school districts will be required to adopt inclusive curriculum and materials that document “the histories, contributions, and perspectives of historically marginalized groups” including LGBTQ+ people under a newly enacted law.
- Gov. Jay Inslee’s signing of the law on March 18 makes Washington the seventh state to explicitly mandate LGBTQ+ representation in state curricular standards, according to the Movement Advancement Project, a nonprofit think tank that tracks LGBTQ+ curriculum laws.
- The Washington State School Directors’ Association will work with the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction to develop the required changes to courses, as well as to design, select and adopt instructional materials. The state’s deadline is June 1, 2025, while districts have until Oct. 1, 2025, to update their policies to reflect the new state standards.
Dive Insight:
Washington’s mandate to include LGBTQ+ history in curriculum statewide comes as other states are adopting or enforcing bans on discussing LGBTQ+ related topics in classrooms.
The tally of states taking opposing actions is now evenly split, with seven having passed laws censoring mentions of LGBTQ+ people or issues in classroom lessons and seven requiring inclusive curriculum, according to MAP.
Those calling for inclusive materials include California, Colorado, Illinois, Oregon, Nevada, New Jersey and Washington. States with bans — often dubbed by critics as “Don’t Say Gay” laws — are Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Iowa, Indiana, Kentucky and North Carolina.
Five of those states require schools to notify parents in advance of any LGBTQ+ instruction. In some cases, parents are given the option to opt their child out of such lessons, while in others the law may require parents to opt their child in, according to MAP.
Meanwhile, 28 states and Washington, D.C., do not have any LGBTQ+ related curricular laws.
The partisan divide over the issue was made clear in November when Democratic and Republican state attorneys general were split over a lawsuit challenging a Maryland school district’s decision to take away parents’ ability to opt out of LGBTQ+ inclusive curriculum.
Almost 20 Democratic attorneys general argued in a brief that prohibiting parents from opting out does not violate the Constitution or state laws. However, 23 Republican attorneys general filed a separate brief stating that the district board’s decision violated parents’ rights to raise their children as protected under the First Amendment.
The remaining states either require their state education department to create a LGBTQ+ inclusive curriculum model but schools don’t have to use it or these other states have laws that restrict how schools can discuss topics like “homosexuality” in specific classes.
Meanwhile, backlash against curriculum restrictions has come in at least one state with a ban.
Earlier this month, Florida’s LGBTQ+ curriculum restrictions were loosened in a settlement reached by parents, students, teachers and state education leaders.
The settlement clarifies that LGBTQ+ issues may be referenced in literature, classroom discussion, academic work and teachers’ lessons in some cases. Additionally, the settlement states that instruction cannot claim heterosexuality is superior over other sexualities or gender identities. LGBTQ+ references and topics in schools are also protected in cases involving bullying prevention, extracurriculars, library books and guest lecturers under the Florida settlement.
Civil rights advocates previously called out the state’s “Don’t Say Gay'' policy as having a chilling effect on classroom speech and infringing on the rights of LGBTQ+ students. Conservative proponents of these measures, however, often point to parental rights and protecting children from sexually explicit content to justify efforts to limit LGBTQ+ topics and books in school.
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