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Removing Sexism and Racism from Primary Readers in 20th Century America

During the 1970s in America, the Second Wave of Feminism made great strides towards equality for women. Men and women across America worked to improve the status of women in many areas, including how girls and women were portrayed in the primary school readers used by young children. Until this time, the textbooks given to beginning and early readers were full of sexist and racist language and scenarios, which negatively affected the children’s concepts of themselves, and what boys and girls were capable of doing. Efforts to revise the readers were happening at the same time and via different methods. National level change happened due to the Women’s Educational Equity Act of 1972.

Soon after its formation in 1966, the National Organization for Women (NOW) called for a nationwide action to review primary school readers for sexist and racist content and to have new, more inclusive, standards created for the content of textbooks. (Online posting. National Organization for Women.  http://www.now.org/history/past_presidents.html.)  Immediately, men and women across the nation began working on state- and national-level solutions to this problem.

The national effort created the Women’s Educational Equity Act (WEEA). WEEA was written by Arlene Horowitz in 1972 and was intended to provide funds for women’s studies courses, but also to revise sexist textbooks, educate teachers, and set up a system for review of the position of women in education. The WEEA bill was sponsored by Representative Patsy Mink, democrat from Hawaii. In 1973, Mink handed the bill over to Walter Mondale, democrat from Minnesota, who had agreed to sponsor WEEA in the Senate. He added it to the education bill currently under consideration in the Senate and when that bill became effective, WEEA became the law of the land (Davis, Flora. “Moving the Mountain: The Women’s Movement in America Since 1960”.  New York, Simon & Schuster, 1991, pg. 213-214.)  It is not clear what bill WEEA was absorbed into. Perhaps it was The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974 (Section 513 of P.L. 93-380). However, other sources state that WEEA was included in The Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1974 (Love, Barbara J. “Feminists Who Changed America: 1963-1975”. Urbana and Chicago, University of Illinois Press, 2006, pg. 223).

In the 1980’s, under the Reagan administration, a concerted effort was made to disband the WEEA benefits for American children. In 1982, Leslie Wolfe, WEEA’s director when Ronald Reagan was elected, was transferred out of that position and individuals aligned with Phyllis Schlafly’s right-wing Republican Eagle Forum were brought in to review grant proposals being considered for WEEA funds. In 1984, feminists persuaded Congress to rewrite the WEEA legislation making its mission and purpose more explicit and therefore keeping its actions true to its original goal (Davis, Flora. “Moving the Mountain: The Women’s Movement in America Since 1960”.  New York, Simon & Schuster, 1991, pg. 443).

The Women’s Educational Equity Act again came under attack in 2003 when the George W. Bush administration ended federal funds for WEEA’s Resource Center, a mechanism for collection and sharing of information about gender equity programs (vivhdem. “Reauthorization of the Women’s Educational Equity Act (WEEA) of 2001”. Online posting. The National Council for Research on Women. 15 July 2010 http://www.ncrw.org/content/womens-educational-equity-act-weea).

The last documented funding for WEEA was in 2010 (Online posting. U.S. Department of Education. http://www2.ed.gov/programs/equity/funding.html ). For fiscal year 2014, the President’s budget does not request funding for WEEA (Online posting. National Alliance for Partnerships in Equity.  http://www.napequity.org/public-policy/current-laws-and-bills/womens-education-equity-act/ ).

The Southern California effort created an Education Task Force to document problem areas in primary school readers and to agitate for new readers in the classrooms. This Task Force was formed by the San Diego County Chapter of NOW. It’s efforts were later joined with the Northern California effort and presented to the State Board of Education.

This is a brief timeline of the efforts from the perspective of the Southern California group:

1969 – Anne (Radlow) Ewing attended a lecture by Aileen Hernandez (Second president of NOW, 1970-1971) about the sexism in primary school readers. (Recollection by Ewing told to JTC, 2007)

1970 – Anne Ewing joins San Diego Chapter of NOW and volunteers to be on the Education Task Force. (Recollection by Ewing told to JTC, 2007; Feminists Who Changed America, 1963-1975 pg. 138-139)

1973 – Anne Ewing becomes chair of California NOW’s Education Task Force. (Feminists Who Changed America, 1963-1975 pg. 138-139)

1973 – 1974 – Anne Ewing creates a standard questionnaire for evaluating sexism in textbooks. At least 24 California NOW chapters use it to evaluate the readers used locally. (Recollection by Ewing told to JTC, 2007; Feminists Who Changed America, 1963-1975 pg. 138-139) Anne Ewing coordinated the Southern California chapters and Nancy Ward, a school librarian in Berkeley, coordinated the Northern California chapters. (Personal recollections, Feminists Who Changed America, 1963-1975 pg. 478)

1973 – Sheila (Moramarco) Sobell and Pat McCormick from San Diego NOW’s Education Task Force compiled a slide show called The Girl and the Primary Reader that clearly demonstrated sexist stereotyping in children’s books. This was an important tool to help the general public to understand the powerfully sexist messages in books aimed at very early readers, and the influence these messages would have on children’s developing self-identities. (The Herstory of San Diego County National Organization for Women: Twenty-five Years of Feminism 1970-1995, pg. 10) 1973 – 1975 – Many women and men contributed to this effort including: Peggy Budd, Elizabeth Burr, Susan Dunn, Allana Elovson, Norma Farquhar, Lilian Halsema, Robert W. Holden, Pat McCormick, Anne (Radlow) Ewing, Sheila (Moramarco) Sobel, Jean Stern, Victoria Torres, and Juli (or Julie) Weber among others.

In 1973, California State Assembly Member Kenneth Cory, a Democrat from Orange County, introduced Assembly Bill 2187 which stated that “no teacher shall give instruction nor shall a school district sponsor any activity which reflects adversely upon persons because of their race, sex, color, creed, national origin or ancestry. (amended Section 9001 of the California Education Code)” and “No textbook, or other instuctional (sic) materials shall be adopted by the state board or by any governing board for use in the public schools in which contains any matter reflecting adversely upon persons because of their race, sex, color, creed national origin, or ancestry. “(amended Section 9002 of the California Education Code)” The Bill was signed by the governor, and chaptered as number 571, on September 17, 1973. (California Legislature 1973-1974 Regular Session and 1973 First Extraordinary Session Summary Digest, page 78).

On May 3, 1973, California State Senator James Mills, a Democrat from San Diego, introduced California State Senate Bill 1285 which stated that instruction in the social sciences will include the role and contributions of women and other minorities with particular emphasis on portraying the roles of these groups in contemporary society. This legislation amended California Education Code Section 8553 and Section 8576. The Bill was signed by the governor, and chaptered as number 764, on September 25, 1973. (Online posting. California Senate Office of Research.  http://192.234.213.35/clerkarchive/)

1974 – The Task Force found obvious sexism in primary school readers used in California in their final report, “Sexism in California Readers”. These findings were presented by Public Advocates, Inc. to the California State Board of Education during the June 13, 1974 meeting. (Amyx, Carol. “Sex Discrimination: The Textbook Case” Comment in California Law Review, Vol. 62, No. 4, July-September, 1974, pages 1311-1343) During this meeting, lawyers for Public Advocates, Inc., on behalf of a coalition of nine feminist and minority rights groups, requested that the Board consider removing the old readers and replacing them with readers free of sexist and racist language and situations. The California State Board of Education voted down this request 7 to 3. (NOW San Diego County Chapter NEWS, July 1974, Vol. 5, No. 7, page 6; Feminists Who Changed America, 1963-1975 pg. 138-139; Los Angeles Times, June 14, 1974, page 3)

When a lawsuit was threatened over the issue, the California State Board of Education reversed its decision. (Recollection by Ewing told to JTC, 2007). The details of the threatened suit are not now known, but Carol Amyx has argued that a suit could be brought on two constitutional objections: one, “sex stereotyping in textbooks denies girls equal protection of the laws by providing them with a substantially different and inferior education than is provided to boys,” and, two, “Sex stereotyping denies both boys and girls basic personal liberty to develop as individuals, not to be required to conform to standard personality types; the denial is more destructive to girls since boys are encouraged to have a positive self-image and an expansive view of their own potential while girls are taught that they are inferior, are given a negative self-image and a limited view of their own potential.” (Amyx, Carol.  “Sex Discrimination: The Textbook Case” Comment in California Law Review, Vol. 62, No. 4, July-September, 1974, pages 1311-1343). Additionally, these events are happening at the same time that the WEEA bill is becoming the law of the land, and a suit could have been brought on that basis as well.

As of 2013, the California Education Code, Section 60040, reads, in part: “When adopting instructional materials for use in the schools, governing boards shall include only instructional materials which, in their determination, accurately portray the cultural and racial diversity of our society, including:  (a) The contributions of both men and women in all types of roles, including professional, vocational, and executive roles….”