Texas Social Studies TEKS Revision Field Guide

Even at this late stage in the process, the SBOE can still change the content to be included in the new TEKS, as well as the skills to emphasize in the standards. If you only have time for a brief comment, encourage the SBOE to: fix problems with historical accuracy and balance, and edit down the overloaded TEKS drafts, especially content in Grades 5, 7, and 8 and in the high school Government course, so that they fit into the available instructional time; and substantially revise or reject the proposed high school World History course.

When developing a longer comment, you might consider articulating some of the following points:

Honest history and historical thinking are essential knowledge and skills for students preparing to enter the 21st-century workforce.

• Students deserve an honest, accurate, and full account of both US and world history. Anything less than this fails to meet the SBOE’s stated goal for this TEKS revision to “ensure that the standards are rigorous, reflect current topics and up-to-date research, and address the essential knowledge and skills at the appropriate grade levels.” The TEKS revision process is an opportunity for scholars, educators, and supporters of honest history to emphasize how evidenced-based scholarship might inform the content of K–12 social studies courses across Texas. The AHA’s “Criteria for Standards in History/Social Studies/Social Sciences” contains language and ideas that might help you to formulate your own points to advocate for a history-rich education.
• Texas law mandates the SBOE to adopt TEKS that prepare students to be college- and career-ready, and the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board and the Texas Education Agency convened faculty teams that articulated what that means. The required College and Career Readiness Standards for Social Studies are listed on pp. 23-27 of this pdf.
• Identify any errors or inaccuracies, including the grade level, the specific knowledge statement with number and letter. Either suggest cutting the standard or offer revised language to replace what is in the draft. Include a sentence explaining how the draft language is wrong.
• Suggest specific items to cut in the most overloaded grades/courses: Grade 2, Grade 5, Grade 7, Grade 8, high school World Geography, high school Government, and high school Sociology. You could also suggest ways to condense several items into one to reduce instructional time. Grade 8 will be tested.
•  Identify problems with coverage, balance, and omissions, and describe how these would impact the way teachers could teach honest and rigorous history. (E.g. weak coverage of the Atlantic slave trade, no direct mention of the Haitian Revolution, and exaggerated claims about opposition to slavery among Christians in the early nineteenth century, taken together, mean that students would underestimate the significance of or support for slavery in the United States before the Civil War, and would contribute to confusion about the cause of the US Civil War. Another example: there is no reference to the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act/Hart-Celler Act, and students would have no basis for understanding the sources of immigration for the past sixty years.)
• The draft over-emphasizes continuity and trivializes many important turning points and transformations that have shaped the present (no mention of the attack on Pearl Harbor, no acknowledgement of the mass movement in the Civil Rights Movement). It is vital that students understand change over time.
• Appraise whether the draft K-8 TEKS would teach students world history, as required by statute. (High school World History is now optional.) Point to specific places where proposed, Eurocentric TEKS could be tightened, and where significant histories of Asia, Africa, Latin American, or Oceania could be expanded and improved.
• Consider the balance of coverage in the high school US history course particularly, which has been changed from 1877-present to a full-scope course. Would students get sufficient depth in the history of the last century? Does the story of the colonial period align with current historical scholarship? Mention specific examples.
• Point out places where the draft uses outdated, discredited, or unfounded historical interpretations, and briefly describe the current consensus; if possible cite a source or sources for reference. Some of the language seems to go back to historiography from the 1920s; in other places, from the Cold War.
• Evaluate the rigor of the proposed TEKS. In order to squeeze in the large quantity of content, many of the new TEKS downgrade student expectations to lower-order thinking, like to describe or explain content. In early grades, many standards even require students to perform a task “with adult assistance.” Where would fewer standards with higher-order thinking verbs make sense?
• Contribute insights on the soundness of the pedagogical approach. While the notion of cumulative learning through a chronological sequence seemed to appeal to a slim majority of the SBOE when it adopted the K-8 framework in September, 2025, the reality of a content-heavy march through time in these draft TEKS would restrict how teachers can emphasize what is most significant for understanding the past and change over time. Instead of teaching spiraled content or having time for a deeper dive on important topics and themes, teachers would only be able to point them out to students as they skim past that time period and rush on to the next thing? The main themes that are revisited are Christianity and the free enterprise system, neither of which is treated with much nuance or attention to historical context.
• Point out where historical content needs to leave space for other important social studies learning. Geography, civics, and economics have been marginalized overall. Jury duty, practical information on military service, and why we pay taxes, as well as the process for amending the US Constitution, do not appear in the whole of the proposed K-12 social studies TEKS. Information literacy and civil discourse are also under-emphasized, despite a statutory requirement to develop these skills. Traditional social studies topics that students need to function effectively as adults in American society are not covered at all, K-12: there is no standard requiring an understanding of jury duty, military enlistment, or why we pay taxes. There is no standard on the process for amending the U.S. Constitution.
• Evaluate whether these TEKS would adequately prepare students for career and college, as required by law, and suggest specific improvements. Would graduates from such a social studies system be well equipped for higher education and to drive the local and state economy forward?
• Do these TEKS represent a viable model for social studies education in Texas public schools? If you are knowledgeable about your local schools, consider how disruptive they would be in your district, whether they might impact teacher retention, or divert financial resources from other necessary priorities. Describe what the likely impacts of implementation would be.