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I want to reply to Russel Tordoff’s letter to the editor (Oct. 2), which falsely describes Gov. Walz and Minnesota State lawmakers’ steps being made to make ethnic studies available in Minnesota schools statewide beginning in 2026. This program will meet the required credits just as social studies, language arts, arts, math or science credits. This is ethnic studies and not “liberated” ethnic studies as quoted in his letter. Please see below from MPR news (Dec 6, 2023) about this program. Notice it is much different than what Russel describes as being radical.

“Danyika Leonard, a member of the committee that worked to draft the new standards, said the introduction of ethnic studies is a response to both established scholarship and the requests of students who want to see their perspectives and experiences taught and addressed.

“Our children, our scholars, our community, they had been asking for this,” Leonard said. “This was an opportunity to make sure that our social studies standards are inclusive, and that they embody a fuller story, and they embody more perspective. And it invites other people to see themselves in, you know, see the windows and mirrors in their learning.”

For Leonard, getting ethnic studies into schools is also a way to address Minnesota’s close-to-worst-in-the-nation achievement disparities between white students and students of color.

“We have an opportunity through social studies to … support better outcomes for our babies, and we know that ethnic studies support academic outcomes,” she said. “It supports graduation, it supports increases in graduation, student engagement and student attendance. This is something that has evidence of success.”

Russel references the Wall Street Journal article by Katherine Kersten, a senior fellow at the Center of the American Experiment in his letter, which is a conservative organization giving bias opinions. People should not be fear mongered by Russel’s claims that this is dangerous when in fact it is beneficial to be inclusive to all people in this country and not just white people. I believe the ethnic studies course, for all students, will be greatly beneficial. As stated in the MPR article, much of the effort to get this into our schools came from students and what they wanted. As also mentioned in the full article, stories from some of these students is heartbreaking, due to students not feeling seen and having their cultures made fun of or being targeted for something that’s going on across the world.

Hopefully we can start having a little more (or a lot more) compassion and love for one another and not hate and fear. We do not need to fear knowledge.

Patty Larson
Alden