Kim Mackey, a social studies teacher in Wake County, wants you to believe that the Republicans are trying to “dismantle and warp the social studies curriculum.” Mackey leaves a lot of inconvenient context out of her op-ed, including the fact that legislative changes to social studies were passed by bipartisan majorities.
At the February 2019 announcement of Republicans’ social studies shakeup, GOP Sen. Jerry Tillman said room for the new sequence of courses would be created by absorbing the “Founding Principles” course into American History. The official name of the course is “American History: The Founding Principles, Civics and Economics.” Never mind that Tillman championed the creation of the “Founding Principles” course just eight years before; he had a new itch to scratch.
While Sen. Tillman championed the Founding Principles Act and most of the bill’s sponsors were Republicans, the sponsor of the bill in the NC Senate was Democrat Don Vaughn of Guilford County, a longtime proponent of the course. The House and Senate passed the bill with relatively few “no” votes, and Democrat Gov. Bev Perdue signed the ratified bill three days after she received it.
Moreover, she attacks Dan Forest for his efforts to pass financial literacy legislation. She ignores the fact that HB 924/SL 2019-82 had both Republican and Democratic sponsors, passed easily with Republican and Democratic votes, and was signed by Gov. Roy Cooper.
