Texas Religious Curriculum Needs Nearly 2,000 Corrections After First Year

Texas education officials approved nearly 2,000 corrections to the state's controversial Bible-based curriculum after teachers discovered numerous errors during its first year of implementation. The "Bluebonnet" curriculum, which includes religious content in public school lessons, faced criticism for factual mistakes, typos, and copyright issues.

Texas education officials have authorized nearly 2,000 corrections to a controversial religious curriculum that was rolled out in public schools this academic year, following the discovery of numerous mistakes by educators and administrators.

The instructional materials, part of what’s called the “Bluebonnet” program, represent one of several Republican-driven initiatives across the country aimed at bringing more faith-based content into public education. While school districts aren’t required to use the curriculum developed by Texas’ education department, they receive extra state money for doing so.

The program faced opposition before its approval, with religious experts arguing the reading materials showed bias toward Christian beliefs while minimizing other faiths, and advocacy organizations claiming the content emphasized religious messaging rather than educational instruction.

During a Wednesday meeting, the State Board of Education approved the extensive revisions by an 8-6 margin. The changes address factual mistakes, grammar problems, punctuation issues, and image replacements needed for licensing and copyright compliance. Several board members expressed concern about the substantial number of errors discovered.

Democratic board member Tiffany Clark voiced her worries, stating: “My concern is that we have failed students this school year who have been utilizing this product.”

Republican board chair Aaron Kinsey questioned Clark’s assessment, asking whether she believed that addressing seemingly minor issues like copyright problems could mean “we failed our students and they are not going to pass” the state’s yearly standardized testing.

Clark responded that even small mistakes can have significant impacts. “If we have been teaching incorrectly this is going to have an impact,” she explained, noting that something as basic as a typographical error in mathematical formulas could cause problems.

Republican board member Pam Little acknowledged the varying severity of the issues but maintained that accuracy matters. “I understand that some of these errors are minimal, some of them are for clarity and some of them are for accuracy. But still, an error is an error,” Little said.

Colin Dempsey, who oversees the instructional material evaluation process for the Texas Education Agency, admitted to the “high number of updates” required while maintaining that factual mistakes were “minimal,” though he didn’t specify an exact count.

Board members indicated that more than 4,000 corrections were necessary. However, Texas Education Agency spokesperson Jake Kobersky clarified to The Associated Press that roughly 1,900 modifications were actually implemented, explaining that the higher number included repeated corrections across teacher guides, student materials, and other documents.

According to Kobersky, most revisions were “proactive in response to teacher feedback or grammatical fixes, not a result of factual errors.”

The exact number of school districts using the curriculum during its inaugural year remains uncertain. By August, over 300 districts and charter schools had expressed interest in adopting the materials, representing approximately one-fourth of Texas’ 1,207 educational districts and charter schools.

Following Wednesday’s approval of the modifications, the education agency announced that digital curriculum resources would be refreshed within a month. Officials did not specify timelines for printing and distributing updated physical materials or estimate associated costs.

Little, who supported the proposed corrections, expressed concern that the board has “set a precedent for sloppy publishing.”

Dempsey announced that the agency has expanded its review team from five to eight members for future material assessments.

“I’m hopeful that will improve our process, where these are caught in the summer and not later on,” he stated.