Santa Ana Unified School District leaders announced it would maintain two recently-adopted courses on the Israel-Palestine conflict amid complaints from local Jewish groups that say the content is antisemitic.
At a May 23 board meeting, Superintendent Jerry Almendarez said the district wouldn’t remove any content from the two courses it adopted in April as part of its ethnic studies curriculum.
The district is in the process of developing such courses in anticipation of a 2021 state bill requiring them to do so by the 2025–26 school year.
The approved courses—“Ethnic Studies: World Geography” (pdf) and “Ethnic Studies World Histories” (pdf)—have been criticized by both the Orange County Anti-Defamation League and the Jewish Federation of Orange County for portraying a “biased” and “one-sided view of Israel” and the conflict….