By Dave Dahl

SPRINGFIELD – The goal of improving education – especially for Black and Brown children – was batted around by lawmakers and education experts Wednesday at a virtual committee hearing.

A Black lawmaker talked about growing up seeing no superheroes or cartoon characters of color. Another emphasized the importance of teaching Black history. A Latina said history textbooks should not be written in places such as Texas.

Gholdy Muhammad, an education professor at Georgia State University, discussed the importance of “identity”: “Our students should not have to wait until adulthood to have a confidence and a refuge of self. Identity deserves a space in K-12 learning. With every lesson plan and every unit plan, teachers must answer the question: how does my curriculum and instruction help my students to know who they are, or to learn about the lives of people who are different from them?”

And researcher Raya Hegeman-Davis of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign had a point some may find disturbing: Illinois is about to let Arkansas surpass it in computer science education.

Dave Dahl can be reached at [email protected].