Anti-Defamation League Backs Down Over Textbook Dispute

By Andrea W. Lorenz

It is not uncommon for special-interest groups to take textbook publishers to task over treatment of a controversial issue. What is uncommon is for a committee of secondary school teachers to stand up to a well-funded interest group and win. However, that is exactly what happened in San Diego this May when the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) of B'nai B'rith sought to have the world history text The Human Experience withdrawn from consideration in San Diego schools and replaced by another text of its own choice.

The dispute began early this year, when the San Diego Board of Education asked a committee of local high school teachers to review 13 world history textbooks and select two to "pilot" during the 1992-93 academic year. Teachers in the 12 schools will be asked to use the two books for eight weeks each and then to evaluate them. Based on their evaluations, one will be selected by the school board for use by area schools.

In April, the 19 teachers who volunteered to review the books submitted their selections to the school board. Their top choice was a text entitled World History: The Human Experience, co-authored by Mounir Farah and Andrea Karls. Now in its third edition, the text was first published in 1985 and has been adopted in Florida, Georgia, Louisiana and New Mexico.

At the meeting at which the committee of teachers gathered to discuss their choices, many were surprised when several local residents, who identified themselves as representatives of B'nai B'rith's Anti-Defamation League, vehemently objected to their first choice. The ADL's regional director in San Diego, Morris Casuto, charged that the text "leans over backward to provide a flattering portrait of Islamic civilization." He told a San Diego Tribune reporter: "It is so irreparably flawed that we believe it is beyond redemption."

The teachers were equally taken aback when the vicar for ecumenical and inter-religious affairs for the diocese of San Diego, Father Dennis Mikulanis, also objected to their choice. Father Mikulanis had been asked by Carol Holstrom, the regional coordinator for the National Conference of Christians and Jews (NCCJ), to review the text.

In an April 7 letter to Casuto, the Catholic priest outlined his objections. They included his belief that because the only video available from the publisher is on the Arab world, this "automatically seems to tilt the text to an Arab apologetic." (Father Mikulanis apparently overlooked the supplement on the Holocaust which several of the teachers interviewed by the Washington Report found excellent.)

In response to the criticisms, the book's publisher, Glencoe, a division of Macmillan/McGraw Hill, said it would correct any inaccuracies at the next printing and send the new edition for piloting in San Diego. It also volunteered to provide the Holocaust curriculum to teachers free of charge. (Schools must buy all other supplemental materials, including the video, "Introduction to the Arab World.")

A second puzzling incident was the appearance of an anonymous letter.

The NCCJ had also asked Father Mikulanis to review a second book. Oddly, it was not the teachers' third or even fourth choice, either of which would have had a better chance of being selected. Instead, it was their fifth choice, Perspectives on the Past, by Larry Krieger. Mr. Krieger had sent the committee's coordinator, Mark Wolf, a memo several weeks before the teachers made their decision, alerting him that the Anti-Defamation League had tried to persuade the Florida school board not to adopt The Human Experience. He failed to mention that the Florida board adopted the book anyway.

A second puzzling incident was the appearance of an anonymous letter to the school board that began: "I am a young and very enthusiastic world history teacher..." and went on to pan The Human Experience and to laud Larry Krieger's book. The teachers received copies of the letter at their April meeting. One committee member, Jim Fletcher, who teaches world history and runs Clairemont High School's Model U.N. program, told the Washington Report that he was "floored" that the school board was treating an anonymous letter with respect. John Harris, who teaches history at Montgomery Academy, said, "We all resent [the letter's] anonymity. It weakens its case." Mark Wolf did not want to speculate on who might have prepared the letter. He noted, however, that when it comes to state adoption of textbooks, "there's a lot of money involved."

Meanwhile, the five Board of Education members, who are responsible for the final decision, expressed concern at the ADL's charges. School board member John DeBeck, who has taught for 36 years, told the Washington Report: "I found it unusual that a social studies book would arouse such animosity."

He said he had reviewed the supplement on the Holocaust and had found it very good. Nevertheless, despite an admission that he could not judge the factual content of the book, he said he could not support adoption of a text that had caused so much controversy. Several other board members agreed with DeBeck.

The board members asked the teachers to review their reasons for selecting The Human Experience and to meet again in several weeks to discuss the matter again.

No Qualms About an Accurate And Unbiased Text

Unlike the school board, the teachers had no qualms about adopting the textbook, so long as they were satisfied that it was fair, unbiased, and accurate. Several told the Washington Report that although they felt that some of ADL's criticisms were valid, many were "petty" or "nit-picking."

Norma Gimber, a teacher at Point Loma High School, said she and two of her colleagues on the committee felt the ADL has a political agenda, adding, "I'm livid about this."

As word spread of the ADL's campaign to have the book withdrawn, letters supporting the text flooded the office of superintendent of the San Diego Unified School District and secretary of the school board Thomas Payzant. During the weeks that they were re-evaluating the textbook, the teachers received both the ADL list of objections and copies of the letters supporting the book.

Four prominent Jewish scholars of Middle East history, Don Peretz of the State University of New York at Binghampton, Joel Beinin of Stanford University, Zachary Lochman of Harvard University and Norton Mezvinsky of Connecticut State University, wrote to Superintendent Payzant expressing anger over the ADL's tactics. Professor Mezvinsky wrote: "Frankly and simply stated, I am antagonized as a scholar, teacher and Jew by the charges made against this book by the ADL."

Several Catholic professors also came to the book's defense. One was the Rev. G. Simon Harak, a Fairfield University professor of religious studies, who wrote to Superintendent Payzant: "The book fairly presents the many views which encompass the whole human experience. For those who are accustomed to thinking of their own view alone as dominant, this can be threatening. I believe, however, that those of us in education have a larger duty to our students than to cater to special interest groups."

The Council of Islamic Education, based in Tustin, California, sent the school board a petition signed by 1,000 members of the Muslim community protesting the ADL's objections as offensive and racist.

On May 19, the teachers met again to make their final recommendation. After eight hours of discussion, they voted to drop their fourth and fifth choices (including the Krieger book) from consideration and to recommend that the school board pilot three books rather than two. Their first choice was still Mounir Farah's The Human Experience.

The school board was to make the final decision on June 9. But before they met, they received a surprise telephone call from Nadja Frank, director of the Jewish Community Relations Council, who informed them that the ADL had decided to withdraw its protest. The Board of Education then voted 5 to 0 to go with their original decision to pilot the top two books.

Farah, who this March received the 39th annual award for the "Outstanding History Scholar-Teacher in New England," and who was 1990 Connecticut Economics Teacher of the Year, said he was relieved by the outcome. "Basically, the ADL opted to save face," he said.

Andrea W. Lorenz is the features editor of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs.