Government Regulation of Textbooks in Virginia

The Washington Post reports that a bill is being introduced in Virginia that would “overhaul the state’s textbook adoption process.”  This new bill is in response to a host of errors–mostly related to the slavery and the Civil War–that were found recently in a Virginia history textbook that was approved by the textbook review committee of the Virginia Board of Education.

Here is a snippet from the article:

The legislation would shift the responsibility of vetting textbooks from panels consisting mostly of school teachers to the publishers. Companies would have to be certified with the Virginia Board of Education before their books are approved for use in public schools…To receive state certification under the proposed bill, publishers would be forced to pledge, and later prove, that their books are reviewed by subject-area specialists whose expertise would be approved by the Board of Education. Publishers would also assume responsibility for correcting mistakes subsequently discovered by the board. 


This is why we sometimes need government intervention.

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