Daily Kos and Texas Freedom Network gathered 116,582 petition signatures.
On the eve of submitting science textbooks for approval by the Texas State Board of Education, McGraw-Hill publishing has removed climate change denial from its books—after Pearson Education (the largest textbook publisher in the world)
did so last week.
This is a huge victory against right-wing bullies who have tried to pressure book publishers into misleading students about climate change.
Daily Kos and the Texas Freedom Network collectively gathered 116,582 petition signatures to the book publishers requesting this change.
From the Texas Freedom Network:
While we still haven't seen any changes to the portions of the textbooks that exaggerate the impact of Moses and other religious figures on the U.S. founding, we'll be delivering your signature on those issues to publishers and the SBOE tomorrow morning. We won't back down.
This big win for science gives us significant momentum before tomorrow’s SBOE meeting, where members will cast an initial vote on the proposed textbooks. The hard work of getting the publishers to change their books is done. Now, TFN will remind the state board that the public stands behind the publishers' revisions, and we'll keep you up to date on any new developments.
Because of the size and influence of the Texas textbook market, books approved in Texas end up in classrooms around the country—which made this a national issue. We must be vigilant, because the right-wing bullies will be back to pressuring textbook companies in the future.
In the meantime, please share this graphic on Facebook to spread the great news!