This is truly frightening. This is a direct quote from the official platform of the Texas Republican Party:
We oppose the teaching of Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) (values clarification), critical thinking skills and similar programs that are simply a relabeling of Outcome-Based Education (OBE) (mastery learning) which focus on behavior modification and have the purpose of challenging the student’s fixed beliefs and undermining parental authority.
Yes, the Texas Republicans are officially opposed to teaching kids how to think critically. They want their children to blindly believe whatever they are told.
This is a blatant ploy to gain votes from the strongly religious, of which Texas has a great many. If from the time a student was born, he has people telling him that the Earth is 6,000 years old and humans and dinosaurs were around at the same time, we definitely don't want his teachers to start "challenging the student's fixed beliefs" by introducing stuff that contradicts that, like geology or paleontology or pretty much any other branch of science. If mommy and daddy tell you that evolution isn't true and God did it all, well we wouldn't want to "undermine parental authority" and have Junior go and start thinkin' about it, now would we?
The fact that this is the Texan governing party's official position and they want to make this law makes me weep for the children of Texas.
One reason I could never live in Texas. Well, this and the scorpions.
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