(NASHVILLE, TN) – May 15, 2023 – An announcement has come from the office of the Tennessee Speaker of the House that Laurie Cardoza Moore has been appointed to serve on the State’s Standards Recommendation Committee overseeing Social Studies materials being reviewed for use in classrooms statewide. She has since 2021 served on the Tennessee Textbook and Instructional Materials Quality Commission by appointment of Speaker of the House, Cameron Sexton.
Just last week Cardoza Moore came under fire for her criticism of Governor Bill Lee’s appointment of Lizzette Gonzalez Reynolds as the new Tennessee Department of Education Commissioner.
She has in recent memory been active in the review of textbooks for the Florida Department of Education under Education Commissioner Manny Diaz, Jr. – a successful review effort that “caught and corrected dozens of books to prevent political indoctrination of Florida’s children,” a spokesperson for Governor Ron DeSantis noted.
Of her new appointment to the Tennessee Standards Commission, Cardoza Moore noted: “Serving on the Tennessee Standards Recommendation Commission is both an honor and an entrustment of great importance to me. Social Studies is a fixed part of every K-12 curriculum. It is considered crucial in educating our children to be good American citizens and to understand other cultures. As such, it is critical to today’s education. Social Studies as a curriculum is comprised of courses in history, government, economics, sociology, geography and civics. The materials we will be reviewing can only accomplish the mission of educating good American citizens if our Tennessee textbooks are devoid of left-aligned historic revisionism and the toxic material found in the antisemitic Critical Race Theory; Diversity, Equity and Inclusion; Social-Emotional Learning and Ethnic Studies.”
Her history of activism in Middle Tennessee has not been without controversy. Cardoza Moore’s widely reported grassroots campaign for the removal of culturally biased textbooks in Williamson County followed by her call–out of one of two Hamas Board members of the Islamic Center in Murfreesboro in 2010, who was actively recruiting Muslims to kill Jews on his MySpace page, brought strong opposition to her appointment to the Textbook Commission in 2021. A major campaign by organizations including the American Muslim Advisory Council had tried to block her seat on the Commission.
In closing, in her comments on Tennessee’s textbook agenda, she added: “I am committed in my role to serve the best interests of Tennessee parents in their desire of assuring the best quality education for their children—an education that will allow them to flourish in our changing world. I will vow to help ensure, protect and enrich America’s next generation of leadership: our children. Our future leadership begins with the quality materials given Tennessee’s children within their classrooms.”
Laurie Cardoza Moore is the Founder and President of Proclaiming Justice to The Nations (PJTN), a 501c3 national advocacy organization based in Franklin, Tennessee.
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