Dear Ms. Wimmer,





I am answering your e-mail since it was sent to me rather than Superintendent Dickson. You should also be aware that Superintendent Dickson is not an elected official. She is appointed by the elected State Board of Education. I would encourage you to write
 directly to your elected officials. Contact information for all of your elected representatives, including your state and local school board representatives, can be found on this website:

https://votesearch.utah.gov/voter-search/search/search-by-address/candidates-and-issues. All you need to do is put in your address and click on the "Contact my elected officials link." We also have contact information for each of the Utah State Board of
 Education Members on this page: https://schools.utah.gov/board/utah/members.





I also saw the KUTV report. I did not get the impression that Dr. Gadson would introduce Critical Race Theory (CRT) to the Salt Lake City School District. I understood the conversation to be about the large amount of attention drawn to Critical Race Theory
 in the community made students curious and they then asked questions of their teachers. Dr. Gadson said that it was in that context that CRT had to be addressed.





The Utah State Board of Education does have control over the Utah Core Standards (https://www.uen.org/core/). CRT is not a required education standard in Utah. In fact, the Core Standards do not even mention
 CRT. Last month Board leadership did address the issue: https://schools.utah.gov/file/e5fe6009-e508-4e1f-8d22-f7604af2a429. They also passed this new administrative
 rule: https://schools.utah.gov/file/7858dc3a-deea-440b-8823-516fe7f4342e. It was discussed at length in this month's Education Interim Committee meeting: https://le.utah.gov/MtgMinutes/publicMeetingMinutes.jsp?Com=INTEDU&meetingId=17664.





CRT is not a required topic in Utah schools. State law, however, gives districts and charter school wide discretion in the types of instructional materials used in the classroom (https://le.utah.gov/xcode/Title53E/Chapter4/53E-4-S403.html?v=C53E-4-S403_2019051420190514).
 To that extent, it is a matter of local control unless the Legislature amends the law. 








Mark Peterson ꟾ Public
 Relations Director ꟾ Utah State Board of Education

250 E 500 South ꟾ PO Box 144200 ꟾ Salt Lake City, UT 84114-4200 ꟾ 801-538-7635

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