Andrea Gabor, Columnist

California Ethnic Studies Plan Undercuts Itself

Students need to learn more about the dark side of U.S. history. But there's a better way to do it.

September 30, 2020 at 12:43 PM EDT

Andrea Gabor, a former editor at Business Week and U.S. News & World Report, is the Bloomberg chair of business journalism at Baruch College of the City University of New York and the author of "After the Education Wars: How Smart Schools Upend the Business of Reform."

It depends.
Photographer: Mindy Schauer/Digital First Media/Orange County Register via Getty Images

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Trust California to plunge deeper into the culture wars, even at the risk of undermining its own worthy objectives.

Under a bill headed for signature by Governor Gavin Newsom, the state would become the first to require that all high-school students pass an ethnic-studies course before graduating. The new mandate follows passage in August of a similar university-level requirement that is set to take effect in the 2021-2022 academic year.

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