Editor's Introduction -- Once in a great while, the corruption that pervades the schoolbook business is displayed so vividly that it draws the attention of the national media. That is what happened in 1991, when the Texas State Board of Education staged an adoption of American-history books.
from The Textbook Letter, May-June 1992
Deep in the Heart of Folly
William J. Bennetta
When the Board met in February, the error-count for the Glencoe book stood at 881. And the four other publishers now reported that they had found some 600 errors that nobody had noticed before. (Not all of these were errors of fact. During most of the error-clearing effort, the announced error-counts did not distinguish factual errors from technical errors, such as mistakes in punctuation or typography.)
By now the antics in Texas had attracted the attention of the national press. Here are excerpts from Gary Putka's story in the Wall Street Journal for 12 February 1992:
"These are the worst errors I've seen in my career as an educator," says William Hudson, a retired school superintendent who is a member of the Texas Board of Education. "Horrifying," adds Jane Nelson, another board member, who says the publishing industry is inept and adds: "Maybe we need the Japanese to produce our textbooks." . . . Gilbert Sewall, who reviews many schoolbooks as editor of Social Studies Review says the errors are indicative of deeper problems in the way such books are made. He says the books generally aren't written or reviewed by top university scholars, who prefer more prestigious work.
By the time of the Board's March meeting, the error-count for the Glencoe book was about 1,200. The combined count for all ten books was 5,552, with the three Scott, Foresman books accounting for more than 2,400 of them. The Board was contemplating fines totaling $647,100, including $271,900 to be paid by Glencoe and $192,900 to be paid by Scott, Foresman.
Click on the link below to read the entire article.
http://www.textbookleague.org/32tex.htm
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1 comments:
This in so unacceptable that it is happening again. I think the thing that struck me the most was university scholars who read and sometimes write
these textbooks don't really like doing it. They prefer more Prestigious Work. What could be more prestigious than knowing you are contributing to millions of student's educations and that they are being taught the truth, especially in history, and not the thoughts and opinions of a few misguided individuals. How is this not a prestigious role in the national school systems. Oh I forgot prestigious means being named, honored in some way, recognition by all including the press. If you are doing this for schools with millions of students, you don't get that. Guess I wasn't looking at the big picture for these scholars. (lol) I would think as scholars they would realize that this would be the correct and moral thing to do for our children, and they wouldn't feel so insecure about their being credited for doing the right thing. Again it is never about the kids. It is always about the adult's egos, greed, and what is best for them and not the masses. But what else is new? We live in a mostly (ME) world!
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