COLUMBUS, Ohio — The Ohio Progressive Asian Women’s Leadership organization, along with several other groups, want to make sure K-12 students can learn the “migration journeys, experiences and societal contributions of a range of communities in Ohio and the United States.”

What You Need To Know

• Rep. Mary Lightbody, OH-4, and other grassroots organizations launched the Educating for Ohio’s Future campaign in support of House Bill 171


• HB 171 would modify Ohio’s model curriculum to include instruction on the history of all students, including immigrants and refugees


• HB 171 would not be required, but permissive for teachers and districts to use


• HB 103 would develop a task force to develop statewide academic standards based on standards published in the American Birthright

OPAWL said the updated curriculum would bring a greater sense of belonging for students, giving them the chance to see themselves while feeling a perception of dignity and pride in the classroom. 

Students, like Saanvi Gattu, understand this.

“What tends to happen is a lot of the information is really diluted and very linear in my perspective," she said based on her classroom experience. "With such a constricted form of history, a lot of kids don't know about Indian culture—you know, Asian culture in a broader aspect, so a lot of kids would ask me questions like, 'isn’t India really economically poor?'” 

Taking her time to process it all, she went on to say that “like wow, these assumptions are being made about me and the root cause of that isn't because people are inherently ignorant; it’s because of the education system.”

This is why she believes the legislation needs to be modified.

“I do think that a bill like this has been a long time coming," said Tessa Xuan, statewide co-director of OPAWL. "I went through the Ohio public school system, and I didn’t learn about my own people’s history in American history class, and I had to seek out my information on my own.”

While HB 171 was just introduced last week, HB 103 also seeks to address social studies in grades K-12.

Rep. Don Jones has proposed developing “statewide academic standards in social studies for grades k-12 based on the standards published in the American birthright: the civics alliance's model k-12 social studies standards.”

The bill calls for public input on developing the standards.

“At no time in my experience has a particular, very narrow focus such as that from the birthright groups been requested to be used as the model and as an educator, I am significantly opposed to that particular bill," said Rep. Mary Lightbody, D-OH 4, who was a former educator.

When asked about HB 171, Rep. Jones said in a statement: 

“While we appreciate Rep. Lightbody’s attempt to improve the K-12 social studies curriculum, we believe that House Bill 171 does not solve the problem of presenting accurate, non-partisan learning objectives. The broad and undefined standards currently in practice leave Ohio students vulnerable to the political ideology of any classroom teacher. House Bill 171 as introduced mandates social studies curriculum. House Bill 103 only creates a task force to look at social studies standards. 

As a former teacher, I understand how important it is for educators to maintain local control and teach a curriculum they see as the best for their students. That’s why HB 103 creates a task force to review social studies standards, not curriculum. These standards will serve as guardrails rooted in teaching the rich history of America. By crafting new standards on this basis, we can ensure all Ohio students receive an accurate, non-partisan social studies education and strengthen Ohio’s public schools.”