by Hibah Samad
The Manhattan Beach Unified School District is preparing to implement Ethnic Studies courses at Mira Costa High School.
These courses will meet new state graduation requirements set forth by California Assembly Bill 101 in 2021. The bill mandates that all California high schools offer ethnic studies courses in the 2025-26 school year and that students in the class of 2030 take at least one such course before graduating from high school.
During the March 13 MBUSD Board of Trustees meeting, Dr. Irene Gonzalez-Castillo, Assistant Superintendent of Educational Services, presented an implementation plan for board approval. The plan includes two pilot courses which will be offered next year.
Gonzalez-Castillo and the Ethnic Studies Committee, which is made up of board trustees, administrative staff, students, and parents, spent over a year collaborating on the development of these courses and the implementation plan using the Ethnic Studies Toolkit provided by the Los Angeles County of Education (LACOE).
“A lot of passion and commitment” went into the process, Gonzalez-Castillo told the school board. She said that the Committee thoroughly reviewed community, staff, and student input, survey responses, and scheduling data to build consensus on course recommendations for the Board.
“We had several discussions around student needs and how to ensure that there are options for students to meet Ethnic Studies requirements during their time at Costa,” Gonzalez-Castillo said.
Trustees applauded the process, its timing, and the resultant plan.
“I want to thank you for starting this process early and for being so thoughtful,” said Trustee Wysh Weinstein. “There was a comment made earlier saying that it feels rushed, but I don’t think anything about this has felt rushed. I commend you for starting it way sooner than we need to.”
MCHS history teacher Andy Caine will teach the courses. Caine has been an educator at Mira Costa since 2007 for the Social Studies Department and taught Introduction to Law and AP Government last year. He transitioned into the Ethnic Studies Teacher on Special Assignment (TOSA) role during this school year and spent the year focused on leading the effort to develop the new courses. In an interview, Caine said he wanted to do this because of the importance of going beyond meeting the state mandate for him and others invested in this process.
“Rather than just saying, ‘we will squeeze it in somewhere,’ we started from scratch,” Caine said of the process. “We wanted to have a gold-standard curriculum where students could really learn to be meaningful and engaged citizens in our society. The District should be really proud of this commitment, and it motivates me to make sure every day that the students get an amazing and meaningful diversity studies course.”
Having been involved in the process from its inception, Caine is currently the sole teacher slated to instruct the courses next year.
“I’m very excited about it,” he said. “It’s one of the reasons I wanted to do the Ethnic Studies TOSA position. I volunteered because I just think this material is so important to the community and individual growth of all of our students. In order to become not only more productive for the future and life, but for our students to become better human beings. To me, that is what a teacher’s job is about: to offer our students an education where they feel more confident and inspired to make the world a better place.”
The Board unanimously provided the final stamp of approval to pilot stand-alone one-semester and year-long courses called Diversity and Cultural Studies as elective options for Ethnic Studies in the 2024-2025 school year. This will be followed by an integrated course option offering in 2025-2026. Diversity and Cultural Studies will meet the Subject Area G College Preparatory Elective of the University of California and the California State University systems.
The state-mandated graduation requirement for the Class of 2030 is already included in the District’s Board Policy 6146.1: High School Graduation Requirements.
“The Ethnic Studies course naturally aligns with our Board goals focusing on academic excellence and developing a climate of care in our District. We know that ethnic studies will have many benefits for our students,” said MBUSD Superintendent Dr. John Bowes. “It will provide an opportunity for our scholars to have meaningful discussions, broaden their educational horizons, and explore diverse experiences other than their own. A well-informed understanding of these experiences and perspectives will positively impact students as they go out into the real world.”
“Our idea is to pilot the classes, review student feedback, and then refine the courses for the following year,” said Gonzalez-Castillo.
Caine also reiterated that the courses aim to improve students’ writing, speaking, and analytical abilities, enhance active listening skills, cultivate empathy, and promote students’ sense of civic literacy. Board President Cathey Graves emphasized the importance of these skills for MCHS graduates.
“One of the primary goals here is for our students to learn to think critically and evaluate truth from fiction, and misrepresentation from fact,” Graves said. “And that’s part of this education, and why our students will come away from Costa Education, well prepared for college and beyond.”
MBUSD staff said they called the course “Diversity and Cultural Studies” because they wanted to ensure that it was inclusive beyond race and ethnicity. The first part of the course focuses on personal identity, with subsequent units focused on understanding different individuals and groups and celebrating their achievements and contributions in overcoming obstacles and helping to shape the history of the United States.
“The opportunity to learn about the experiences of others will help provide students with the knowledge and skills they need to succeed in a multicultural world,” Caine said. “The course will inspire academic curiosity and related research, analysis, and presentation skills and will help students gain effective communication, collaboration, and problem-solving skills.”
Countless studies have demonstrated that an increased understanding of others, their experiences, and perspectives fosters an environment of trust and caring,” Caine said. “Diversity Studies will motivate students to consider and create a vision for a more unified nation based on justice, empathy, and collaboration.”
While the model curriculum provided by the California Department of Education focuses on four ethnic groups — African Americans, Latinos, Native Americans, and Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders — MBUSD staff emphasized that they listened to community feedback and expanded this scope in the District’s curriculum. The course will also include other groups’ experiences, including Jewish Americans, Muslim Americans, the LGBTQ+ community, and students with disabilities, to name a few. The course description states that it is “designed to provide a broad and deep exploration of the topics addressed in and expand upon the California ‘ethnic studies’ requirements to include the experiences of groups that have experienced bigotry and discrimination in this country based on identities arising from, but not limited to, race, ethnicity, religion, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, ability, and age, or intersectional combinations thereof.”
The course will also encompass local history from within Manhattan Beach and the South Bay, including Bruce’s Beach, the Uyematsu family history underlying the Mira Costa campus site, recent incidents of antisemitism, the celebration of the Juneteenth holiday, and the No Place for Hate® program presented by the Anti-Defamation League.
“My view of teaching is that the closer the connection the student has with the material, the more likely they will feel engaged with it, and it’s a more powerful experience,” Caine said.
District staff also responded to questions about “guardrails” in place regarding discussions of controversial issues in the classroom. Gonzalez-Castillo stated that the District Board Policy provides guidelines on how educators must present materials neutrally and may not advocate their personal opinions or viewpoints.
“What I learned from all of these opportunities of engagement with our community is that there are a lot of people out there who feel strongly about their views,” Caine said. “It’s important to listen to those views. Through this course, students will also listen to divergent views that will be discussed. There is always something to be learned from that. The wonderful thing about the process was listening to others and hearing what they want the class to cover, which will inform our work.”
MBUSD staff will next turn its attention to the selection of instructional materials for the course and will bring these for approval by the Board of Trustees later this spring. ER
