Lucy Calkins, a professor at Columbia University, has long been a controversial figure in the education world for her approach to reading. Her highly anticipated new curriculum was intended to appeal to her critics with a more research-based, sound-based approach to literacy.
But the curriculum has encountered a new problem, entangled in the debate over state laws restricting how race, gender and other identities are taught.
Her publisher, Heinemann, a division of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, has decided to discontinue kindergarten publication through a second-grade curriculum known as “Units of Study” after an internal debate over a fundamental question: should curricula comply with these conservative laws?
The decision to stop publishing could affect as many as a quarter of primary schools in the country. And it illustrates the compensatory pressures educational publishers face: on the one hand, right-wing legislation restricting the curriculum; on the other, the pressure from progressive educators to produce material that more explicitly addresses race, gender, and other forms of identity.
Heinemann and Professor Calkins were concerned after focus groups with educators in conservative states said the new materials could violate curriculum laws now in effect in more than 15 states, including Florida and Texas.
Examples of the content of concern included a suggestion to teachers not to create boy and girl groups during class activities, and a reference, including in teaching materials, for educators to consider children’s racial backgrounds and identities, according to several sources who wished to remain anonymous due to the sensitivity of the subject. The phrase BIPOC was also highlighted, which is an acronym for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color.
Professor Calkins’ publisher and team began editing the material to avoid violating state laws, and planned to make limited changes, Professor Calkins said last week during an online meeting with educators in her network. Other major publishers have done the same.
But that process was halted amid protests from other authors on the Heinemann list who questioned whether such revisions would best serve different groups of students.
Among the authors who have distanced themselves from Heinemann is Sonja Cherry-Paul, co-founder of the Institute for Racial Equity in Literacy. For another publisher, she adapted Jason Reynolds and Ibram X. Kendi’s best-selling book for young adults “Stamped: Racism, Antiracism and You” into a children’s edition, “Stamped (for Kids).”
In a statement posted on Twitter Monday, Dr. Cherry-Paul and her institute co-founder, Tricia Ebarvia, wrote“Due to irreconcilable differences regarding the work of equality, inclusion and anti-racism, we are immediately terminating our professional development and publishing relationships with Heinemann.”
dr. Cherry-Paul had served as director of diversity and justice for the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project, the organization Professor Calkins leads in Columbia. dr. Cherry-Paul left that position in May and the position remains unfilled.
In a July 7 email obtained by DailyExpertNews, Vicki Boyd, then general manager of the publisher, called the editing process “inherently flawed at best and a violation of Heinemann’s entrenched values at worst. “
Referring to the protest among Heinemann authors, she wrote, “We’ve been meeting members of the authoring community one-on-one over the past week to listen to their questions and concerns.”
According to the company, Ms. Boyd is now leaving Heinemann.
In a written statement, Heinemann said it remained committed to the publication of the new Calkins curriculum later this year and that “under new leadership, a comprehensive editorial review is underway of the forthcoming edition of ‘Units of Study’, in strict adherence to HMH’s Guidelines for Content, Equality, Inclusion and Diversity.”
The Teachers College Reading and Writing Project said in a written statement: “It is important to both protect teachers and uphold our values. Neither Calkins nor Heinemann waver in their support of children and educators of color and the LGBTQ+ community.”
Professor Calkins’ curriculum is popular in liberal states like New York and California, as well as conservative states like Texas and Florida, which have laws designed to protect children from discussions of such concepts as structural racism, white privilege, and transgender identities.
In Florida, parents can sue school districts for violating these laws, and schools should cover the costs.
The Florida laws went into effect on July 1, so it’s not yet clear how they will be implemented. But many educators fear being targeted by an actively involved conservative parent movement and losing their jobs.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is also an advocate of phonics and will sign an executive order in 2019 that requires core reading materials to be scientifically researched and include explicit, systematic, and sequential approaches to teaching phonemic awareness and phonics.
Professor Calkins’ new reading curriculum — now delayed — addressed that concern, after decades of downplaying its importance. But critics have called on her to send free corrections to the many thousands of schools that use older editions of her program.
At the online meeting last week, Professor Calkins expressed regret at the delay in publication and said that while she wanted her curriculum to be used nationally, she would not make changes to issues of diversity and equality that she saw as unethical. She indicated that she disagreed with state laws that placed restrictions on what could be said about race and gender.
Still, Professor Calkins said she felt a “moral responsibility” to get more inquiry-driven reading strategies for as many young children as possible this fall, according to Margaret Goldberg, a California literacy coach who attended the meeting. The discussion in the meeting was confirmed by The Times with other sources.
Professor Calkins offered to provide schools that had ordered her new curriculum with abbreviated nursery and primary lesson plans, which can be used until Heinemann publishes the full version, which she owns the copyright. She also offered those clients access to a free three-day conference next month to learn new teaching strategies.
At the meeting, several attendees said they had already put away their old teaching materials and were concerned about the lack of adequate lesson plans for the upcoming school year, which starts as early as August in some Southern states.
For critics of Professor Calkins’ long reluctance to emphasize sounds, the latest problems only add to their sense of frustration. Ms. Goldberg pointed out that without new curriculum materials, thousands of schools and teachers across the country may not realize that Professor Calkins recommended a major change in literacy strategies, in part because she hadn’t sent free corrections to her old curriculum materials.
The publication delay comes as millions of young children across the country are lagging behind in basic reading skills after more than two years of pandemic disruption.
