The Fort Worth Independent School District could change course on its reading curriculum for elementary grades and adopt a new, controversial curriculum that contains religious references as the district battles an ongoing literacy crisis and a potential state takeover.

The Fort Worth ISD school board on Tuesday will vote on adoption of Texas’ Bluebonnet Learning curriculum for kindergarten through fifth-grade reading instruction. If the board approves the curriculum, it would be implemented next school year, Superintendent Karen Molinar announced at a news conference earlier this week. The district has already adopted math and phonics portions of the larger Bluebonnet curriculum, but the K-5 reading program has faced scrutiny since before its adoption by the State Board of Education in November of last year for its inclusion of biblical references. Supporters view the references as an integral part of helping students understand religion’s role in U.S. and Texas history.

Districts aren’t required to adopt it but receive up to $60 per student for instructional materials and related costs. Districts usually receive $40 per student when adopting state-approved materials.

A research paper on the curriculum authored by David Brockman, an adjunct professor of religious studies at Texas Christian University and Southern Methodist University, underscores the curriculum’s emphasis on Christian teachings. This includes reading and discussing the Genesis creation and flood stories, the Last Supper in the Gospel of Matthew and the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. There are “only brief mentions of Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism” in the curriculum, Brockman notes.

“What is novel about the Bluebonnet (reading language arts) curriculum is that, in those districts that adopt it, one religious community’s sacred text — the Bible — becomes a major component in what Texas students as young as 5 years old and as old as 12 are required to study in the public schools. In addition, they would study the Bible largely in the absence of texts and teachings from other religions that make up contemporary society in Texas and nationally,” according to Brockman.

Texas Education Agency officials have said the religious references “are used when contextually relevant for historical and literary value.”

“Only a small portion of the materials include these references. These references create a strong background of knowledge for students with rich texts to further their understanding of our society, including our history, economy, and culture,” state officials said.

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Gov. Greg Abbott voiced his support of Bluebonnet after its passage at the state level, calling it “a critical step forward to bring students back to the basics of education and provide the best education in the nation,” while also acknowledging other core-subject materials.

“These transformative educational materials are voluntary and free for schools and teachers to use. And with parents also able to access these materials online, we will ensure young Texans have access to high-quality, grade-level appropriate curricula that will provide the necessary fundamentals in math, reading, science, and other core subjects and boost student outcomes across Texas,” Abbott said.

North Texas school districts that have adopted the Bluebonnet K-5 reading curriculum include Irving, Burleson, Crowley, Duncanville and Lake Worth ISDs, according to news reports. The Star-Telegram reached out to each of these districts to ask why the curriculum was chosen and how it has served students in comparison to the prior reading curricula utilized by these districts. No district replied before publication.

Mark Chancey, a professor of religious studies at Southern Methodist University, told the Star-Telegram on Friday that some of the lessons are inappropriate for young children who would take the information at face value, compared to an older, high-school student who is able to recognize multiple interpretations of a Bible story. Chancey also takes issue with factual errors that show lesson writers “often did not understand the material they were writing about.”

Chancey authored a recent academic journal article analyzing the Bluebonnet reading curriculum, which draws similar conclusions to Brockman’s findings.

“One can imagine a lesson about the creation story in Genesis in high school English language arts class. But when a school presents that to kindergartners, what are five-year-olds supposed to do other than to conclude that their public school teacher just taught them that God made the Earth in seven days?” Chancey said.

“I do think that it sends the message to students that Christianity is worthy of study and other religious traditions are not. I think students of other religious traditions over the six years in which they take these lessons will come away asking, ‘With all of the topics that we covered in these lessons, why was my religious tradition never taken seriously?’” he added.

The curriculum is available to the public on the TEA website here: https://tea.texas.gov/academics/instructional-materials/bluebonnet-learning

District officials initially choose Amplify curriculum

In June, the Fort Worth ISD school board approved the secular phonics portion of the Bluebonnet curriculum for students in kindergarten through third grade. The association of the Bluebonnet name raised red flags for school board members Wallace Bridges and Camille Rodriguez. They were the dissenting votes in the board’s approval of the program at the time.

During the June school board meeting, district officials emphasized the phonics program did not involve the religious references contained in the kindergarten through fifth-grade reading instruction. Molinar said the phonics program would be implemented alongside the Amplify reading curriculum for the 2025-26 school year. Mohammed Choudhury, deputy superintendent of the district’s Learning and Leading Division, said it would be an extension of Amplify “but with major upgrades.”

During a news conference on Wednesday led by Molinar, the superintendent also described the K-5 Bluebonnet reading curriculum as an upgrade in comparison to Amplify.

“We kept Amplify in place. However, Bluebonnet reading is actually an enhanced version of Amplify with a lot, lot stronger parent resources attached to it. And then also resources for our teachers, including some content videos, also some other resources to help them in preparation for lesson planning,” Molinar said.

The school board’s consideration of Bluebonnet K-5 reading comes forward as Fort Worth ISD awaits a decision from Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath by the end of the calendar year about whether TEA will take over control of the district. The state notified the district of this possibility after the Leadership Academy at Forest Oak Sixth Grade Center received its fifth consecutive failed rating for academic accountability for 2023. The release of the A-F grades were delayed until earlier this year due to a lawsuit. The campus, though, has since been closed and consolidated with Forest Oak Middle School.

Morath visited the district last month and acknowledged the academic progress the district has recently seen in its test scores but noted the district’s historically poor performance that will require major changes to be addressed.