HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) — Two proposed measures that stirred controversy among community members were unanimously approved by Houston ISD board members.<\/p>\n
The use of Bluebonnet Learning<\/a>, a Bible-infused curriculum developed by the Texas Education Agency, and a plan to have non-profits operate top-performing schools, were approved by all seven board members who rule over the state’s largest school district. The measures were approved on Thursday evening.<\/p>\n SEE ALSO: Texas education board approves 4,200 corrections in Bible-infused curriculum<\/a><\/p>\n The Bluebonnet curriculum was opposed by advocates of the separation of church and state, though the TEA previously said that the religious references in the lessons make up only a fraction of the overall product, which includes reading and math.<\/p>\n The Texas Tribune<\/a> previously reported that multiple analyses<\/a> have found that the reading curriculum skews heavily in favor of Christianity compared to other religions. Parents and historians have also expressed concerns<\/a> about the materials downplaying America’s history of racism and slavery.<\/p>\n Another controversial measure that was approved on Thursday evening was the plan to have non-profits run the district’s top-performing schools.<\/p>\n “Bluebonnet has been widely criticized for including disproportional references to Christianity and Biblical stories in elementary literacy materials,” one parent told board members during Thursday’s board meeting.<\/p>\n “Forcing Bluebonnet on the district without transparency, clarity, or community involvement is unacceptable,” another parent said.<\/p>\n The district ultimately voted to use the curriculum’s math and reading materials for students in kindergarten through fifth grade.<\/p>\n The program includes some Bible teachings, which have drawn scrutiny from local religious leaders, including Rabbi Joshua Fixler, an HISD parent.<\/p>\n “Schools should leave religious education to rabbis, ministers, churches, synagogues, mosques, and other places of worship and should not be doing religious education,” Fixler said.<\/p>\n During the meeting, district officials said the focus will remain on academics.<\/p>\n “The guidance to teachers is that you are not allowed to promote religion. You are to stay focused on the academic learning objectives,” said HISD Deputy Superintendent Kristen Hole.<\/p>\n Superintendent Mike Miles also defended the curriculum.<\/p>\n “This curriculum will allow us to help kids grow in their reading skills. It’ll help us teach phonics and content,” Miles said.<\/p>\n While school districts are not required to use the lesson plans, HISD, the largest district in Texas, stands to receive an additional $3.3 million in state funding for adopting them.<\/p>\n Many parents who attended Thursday night’s meeting said they do not believe the funding is worth the cost.<\/p>\n “I’m not surprised. It’s very disappointing. It feels like a betrayal for the students,” HISD parent Kevin Lenhart said. Copyright \u00a9 2026 KTRK-TV. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) — Two proposed measures that stirred controversy among community members were unanimously approved by Houston…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":350999,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[125080,56,58,57],"class_list":["post-350998","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-houston","tag-125080","tag-houston","tag-houston-headlines","tag-houston-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350998","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=350998"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350998\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/350999"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=350998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=350998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=350998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
<\/p>\n