The Family Foundation of Virginia: Cultural Competency" Licensure Requirement Status and 2022 History and Social Science SOLs
Since January of this year, The Family Foundation of Virginia has attempted to track the “cultural competency” licensure requirement for teachers, where they also discovered the revising of the History and Social Science SOLs which brought to light some concerning details about the embedding of CRT into the entire curriculum come late 2022 and ready for implementation by 2023-24 school year. There are enough committees, subcommittees, commissions, and workgroups to make your head spin with names you can’t say three times fast and a ton of moving pieces. That said, they did their best to provide their discoveries out as cleanly as possible in the form of a color-coded timeline. It’s a lot of information. Everything referenced is linked.
This new licensure requirement impacts several elements so you will notice mention of regulatory action, guidance documents, and the guidelines for teacher evaluation.
If you notice that there seem to be missing pieces or things don’t add up, it is because there appears to be more happening behind the scenes. The Family Foundation of Virginia has been following every meeting and advisory committee since the start of the year and still feel as if they may be missing a few things.
The Family Foundation of Virginia has provided a color guide for quick reference:
- Green: SOL revision
- Pinkish: “Cultural Competency” licensure and/or the African American History Endorsement Licensure requirement.
- Blue: African American History
- Yellow: important. January 6th, 2021 – the Culturally Relevant & Inclusive Education Practices Advisory Committee (created thanks to 2020 legislation. See Va Code section 22.1-208.02) held their first meeting to discuss revising the History and Social Science SOL’s It’s from this meeting that I obtained the Commission on African American Education in the Commonwealth Proposed Technical Edits (found in Appendix D of the AAHEC final report, attached below) which History and Social Sciences Coordinator, Christonya Brown presented to the group. It’s these “technical edits” that are riddled with CRT. Even after watching this meeting and presentation more than once, it’s still not abundantly clear how comprehensively VDOE will be using these recommendations in their revising process. Only time will tell. There is currently no draft of the revisions available to the public. All of their correspondence is subject to FOIA. If we wanted to learn more that is one avenue.January 28th, 2021 – the Virginia Board of Education met. An information item on their agenda was the “Timeline for History and Social Science SOL Review and Revision Process” (attached as Item T). The expected date of the first review for proposed revisions is July 2022, the final review will be November 2022. (bearing they actually stick to their proposed timeline)January 29th – 2021 – Superintendent Lane released a memo (see attached) Review of History and Social Science Standards of Learning: Seeking Input from School Community. He stated that the revisions are anticipated to be complete by November 2022. He also requested input from school division staff and other stakeholders to review and comment on the current standards. Comments were received Jan 29-Mar 1st.March 18, 2021 – The VA Board of Education met and reviewed the final proposed revisions to the Guidelines for Uniform Performance Standards and Evaluation Criteria for Teachers. This includes adding Standard 6 – Culturally Responsive Teaching and Equitable Practices. See attachment “Item H” and Guidelines as named above.April 12, 2021 – the Advisory Board on Teacher Education and Licensure (ABTEL) met and approved the Interim Guidelines for the African American History Requirement for Individuals Seeking an Initial License or License Renewal with an Endorsement in History and Social Science. According to this meeting, ABTEL was planning to ask the board to waive the first review and send it directly to the Virginia Townhall for a 30 day public comment period. However, that did not occur at the following Board Meeting.April 22, 2021 – The Board of Education met. First Review of the Interim Guidelines for the African American History Requirement for Individuals Seeking an Initial License or License Renewal with an Endorsement in History and Social Sciences and the cultural competency requirement were both deferred until the June Board meeting.June 17, 2021 – The Board of Education met. A presentation was given regarding the regulatory process for both cultural competency and African American history endorsement requirements which were both under first review. (see PowerPoint and agenda items attached). Along with the final review of the implementation timeline for the Guidelines for Uniform Performance Standards and Evaluation Criteria for Teachers. Item H (seen below) and its attachments are regarding language that will need to change in Virginia’s Administrative Code to be in compliance with the new licensure requirement from HB1904/SB1196. In this meeting, Holly Coy, Assistant Superintendent for Policy, Equity and Communications, explained how this legislation came about because the African American History Education Commission created professional development ideas and gave them to the Governor and they used their recommendations to draft guidelines. Additionally, the Culturally Relevant & Inclusive Education Practices Advisory Committee has input into the guidelines and the guidance that will be going out to school boards on how to train teachers to be “culturally competent”. However, the Interim Guidelines for the African American History Requirement for Individuals Seeking an Initial License or License Renewal with an Endorsement in History and Social Science that were supposedly deferred to this meeting were not on the agenda.July 22, 2021 – The Board of Education met. Agenda Item L – Report on African American History Education in Virginia (info item only). This item outlines actions by the DOE regarding the approved Curriculum Framework content, the new African American history elective course, and the Standards Revision process. See attached agenda item. The new African American History Elective is also riddled with CRT, including blatant uses of the terms like “impact of White supremacy as social control of African Americans”. Additionally, VDOE offers a plethora of resources for this elective, including but not limited to the Dr. Carter G. Woodson Collerbative which offers resources for K-12 on African American history. If you click on “Support and Guidance for Selecting and Enacting Resources” it takes you to a page that includes a link for Woke Kindergarten, along with other resources including True for Who? (encourages subjective truth), a “protocol” regarding “People, Systems, Power, Participation“ (encourages systemic bias/racism = CRT), Ending Curriculum Violence (which offers lesson plans that encourage kindergarteners and up to identify what group they’re a part of, including sexuality groups),November 18, 2021 – The Board of Education met. They waived first review and moved to final review of the Guidance on Cultural Competency Training for Teachers and Other Licensed School Board Employees. This was done because the legislation required this guidance to be completed by Dec 31, 2021, but they were behind. The attached agenda item (Item I) states that this guidance will be posted on Townhall for 30 days public comment period. It can be found here: https://townhall.virginia.gov/L/ViewGDoc.cfm?gdid=7084. Comments can be entered HERE. Closing date is January 5, 2022.Currently: Amend the Licensure Regulations for School Personnel (8VAC20-23) to Include Instruction in Cultural Competency for Initial Licensure and Renewal of a License is in the Governor’s Office for review.Currently: I have not heard or seen anything else since January 6 regarding the revisions for History and Social Sciences. The timeline (attached) that was given to the Board in late January this year does not appear to be well heeded. By the November 18th BOE meeting, we should have seen an update on the process, but none was given. I expect we will not see a draft of this until summer (maybe July) 2022.Update on the Culturally Relevant and Inclusive Education Practices Advisory Committee (here on out known as CRIEP because I’m tired of typing all of that): After Jan 6, they had two more meetings: March 16 and June 10. These two meetings contained remarks from the chair, public comment, and then breaking into their respective subgroups which were not live-streamed. They had a deadline of Jul 1 to bring forth their recommendations to the Governor. If this was done there is no record of it.What is the CRIEP: what this committee is tasked with is laid out in the link code section at the beginning of this email, one of their charges was to revise the 2022 History and Social Science SOLs. Additionally, they address professional development (i.e. training teachers in CRT) which is where their reach extends to the “cultural competency” licensure requirement.African American History Endorsement Status: Unlike the CC requirement, the regulatory process for this guideline is being fast-tracked through the regulatory process and is currently in the Secretary of Education’s office for review. Anticipated regulatory changes regarding licensure for CC are not expected to be complete until July 2023 and the African American History component, July 2022.Inconsistencies: The Interim Guidelines for African American History Endorsement are not mentioned after the spring ABTEL meetings. Quite frequently advisory committees or VDOE will make remarks about their intentions to bring something before the board by a certain date, but then don’t follow through. I will be keeping my eye out for the interim and the permanent guidelines on this endorsement because the interim guidelines use CRT buzzwords.
