Join 12,000 Minnesotans and weigh in on social studies draft

Center of the American Experiment had to react quickly to the Walz administration’s release of the second draft of social studies standards on Friday, July 30, 2021. Despite missing their own February deadline for publishing the second draft by six months, the Minnesota Department of Education provided a little more than two weeks for the public to read the 168-page document and provide feedback.

Even with the compressed timetable, over 12,000 Minnesotans have utilized American Experiment’s website so far at www.RaiseOurStandardsMN.com to send in comments. That is more than double the number of comments submitted for the first draft. The deadline for comments is Monday, Aug. 16, 2021 at 4:00 p.m.

According to Education Policy Fellow Catrin Wigfall, improvements were made to the second draft, including the elimination of derogatory references to “whiteness” and bringing in more objective facts of history, including the key facts of World Wars I and II and the Holocaust. Those improvements were the direct result of feedback from the Raise Our Standards campaign.

“Although better, the proposed second draft standards and benchmarks still lack important historical content and include inappropriate themes that would take Minnesota education in the wrong direction,” said Wigfall. “The new draft continues to manifest a negative and even hateful attitude toward the United States and its history with a focus on systemic racism, group identity, and a zero-sum power struggle between racial groups.”

In fact, the Critical Race Theory framework can be found throughout the second draft of the social studies standards. 

Minnesotans interested in providing feedback to the Department of Education before the August 16 deadline can visit www.RaiseOurStandardsMN.com or go directly to the Department’s standards webpage at https://education.mn.gov/mde/dse/stds/soc/.