On Oct. 8, 2021, Governor Gavin Newsom signed Assembly Bill 101 into law, stating that by 2030 at the latest, Californian high schools would have to implement an ethnic studies course into their curriculum. AB 101 added that this course would become a graduation requirement.
At Oak Park High School, the ethnic studies syllabus laid out by the state of California would have been incorporated into the Movements for Social Change course option at the twelfth grade level. The class already fulfilled the state requirement of teaching comprehensive Black, Latino, Native American, Asian American and Pacific Islander and Jewish studies.
A committee comprising OPUSD staff, parents and students, collaborated to develop the curriculum for use within Movements. Recently, the district announced via email that the integration of the material is indefinitely delayed.
“The 2025-26 state budget was approved and signed without funding for AB 101,” Ellen Chevalier, Director of Curriculum and instruction wrote to the Talon. “Ethnic Studies is currently considered an unfunded mandate. The graduation requirement is not in effect at this time.”
It appears that Newsom allocated almost no explicit funding towards the appropriation of ethnic studies into Californian high schools. The apparent lack of financial support has only emboldened opponents of the measure, who advocate for an ethnic studies requirement to be delayed if not completely removed.
“The state, when they came out with their budget on July 1, said they’re not going to fund it,” Movements for Social Change teacher Jennifer Hankins said. “The schools just didn’t get the money for it. Without the money for the class—whether it be the training needed for teachers or the materials and books—it was a bit hard to incorporate it [ethnic studies] into Movements.”
The future of ethnic and racial studies in California public high schools has never looked more uncertain. While funding for the class has been all but forgotten and opposition to the AB grows stronger and stronger, certain teachers and students are surely wondering if those classes on inclusion will ever include them, too.
