Washoe County School District approves social justice curriculum task force

RENO, Nev. (KOLO) - The Washoe County School District Board of Trustees voted 6-1 early Wednesday morning to create a task force to look at the social justice curriculum. The vote came after a meeting lasting more than 10-hours, including 5 hours of public comment. Trustee Jeff Church was the lone dissenting vote.

The task force will be comprised of elementary parents, teachers, principals, and students. It will be instructed to avoid divisive or political content.

Some parents raised concerns the curriculum could do more harm than good.

“I think it’s going to create more resentment, anger, fear, violence in the future,” said Matt True. “I don’t think little children need to be looking at each other through the lens of race, I think they need to look at each other’s hearts and minds.”

But teacher Salena La Rue Hatch says the curriculum addresses an important issue that needs to be taught in schools.

“I think the fact that there are this many people here angry that we’re teaching about non-white peoples shows why it has to be in schools, because these parents are not necessarily teaching that to their students and you can’t teach something you don’t know,” said La Rue Hatch.

The Board of Trustees received more than 1,400 comments from the community ahead of the meeting. About 83% of them were opposed to the social justice curriculum.

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