School Board to Launch Nuclear Issues Debate

The Los Angeles school board, which usually keeps itself busy arguing over busing and closing schools, will plunge next week into the debate over nuclear war and nuclear energy.

Board member Jackie Goldberg, who says she is opposed to nuclear power plants and just about every aspect of the Reagan Administration’s military policy, wants the school district to prepare curriculum materials to “prepare students intellectually and emotionally . . . to cope with the reality . . . of life in a nuclear age.”

Although the school district has generally shied away from encouraging the teaching of highly controversial issues, Goldberg says the issue of nuclear war is a “pervasive one--you can’t just ignore it and hope it goes away.” She also said in an interview that she wants to see a “balanced approach, a diversity of views.”

However, critics have charged that most of the curriculum materials on nuclear war and nuclear energy have been prepared by left-wing activists who fervently oppose both nuclear weapons and nuclear power.

“Most everything I’ve seen is anti-nuke,” said Stanford University Prof. Richard Gross, an expert on social studies curricula. “Typically, they are against nuclear bombs, period. You don’t see much on deterrence,” he said.

In 1983, the National Education Assn. and the Union of Concerned Scientists, both of which favor a nuclear freeze, published a booklet for schools on nuclear war called “Choices.” Its 10 chapters included lessons on the size of U.S. and Soviet forces and the effect of a nuclear blast on a city’s population.

The American Federation of Teachers, the NEA’s rival organization, denounced the publication as “propaganda” at its 1983 convention in Los Angeles, noting that the nuclear booklet ignored the concept of deterrence.

Although the nuclear freeze and the Reagan Administration’s build-up of nuclear weapons have generated much debate, school officials in Los Angeles say teachers and administrators have not expressed much interest in bringing the issue into the classroom.

“At the time of ‘The Day After’ (the ABC-TV movie depicting the nuclear destruction of a Kansas town) we had a few calls from teachers asking about how you deal with this in class, but that’s about all we’ve heard,” said Los Angeles schools Supt. Harry Handler.

Phil Linscomb, associate superintendent for instruction, said the district ran a workshop for about 40 interested teachers last year on the subject of nuclear war and nuclear energy.

“We’re really not getting a lot of pressure on this from teachers. The pressure has been primarily from outside,” Linscomb said.

In December, 1983, the Santa Monica school board approved a motion that permits the teaching of nuclear issues in the classroom and ordered the district staff to prepare curriculum materials.

Although the idea was controversial at the time, few teachers have asked to use the curriculum materials, said Harold Connolly, curriculum supervisor for the Santa Monica School District. “There seems to be more interest now in the issue of world hunger,” Connolly said. Los Angeles officials say they are uncertain whether Goldberg’s move signals a district commitment to teaching about nuclear war or merely a plan to provide background materials for teachers who want to use them.

“I have talked with her (Goldberg) about this, and I don’t fully understand what she has in mind,” Handler said. “I want to listen to the discussion on Monday,” when the board votes on Goldberg’s motion.

Goldberg said in an interview that she believes that the district has no choice but to teach about nuclear war.

“Teachers tell me that they have kids that come to them and say, ‘I’m going to die.’ These kids are terrified, and we can’t just let them be immobilized by fear,” she said.

In the upper grades, the nuclear issues become an integral part of most subjects, she said.

“The nuclear issue is part of history, it’s part of politics, it’s part of science. You can’t discuss American history or foreign policy without recognizing the fact that we’re in a nuclear age,” she said.

Goldberg said she is personally very interested in the subject and has strong opinions on it.

“Well, for one, I think ‘Star Wars’ is the biggest hoax in America,” she said, adding that she is vehemently opposed to deployment of U.S.-made Pershing missiles by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and plans to build the MX missile in the United States.

“I think the most unbelievable thing is that the Soviet Union said, publicly, that they would not use a first strike” to start a nuclear war, Goldberg said. “I can’t tell you how impressed I was with that statement by the Soviet Union, even if it was propaganda. It was good propaganda.”

On Monday, Goldberg’s motion is likely to be approved, said school board President John Greenwood, who added, however, that he views it as allowing teachers to consider the nuclear issue, not mandating that they do so.

“Some of the teachers who are behind this effort want to put it into the regular curriculum, but I think that would be a serious mistake,” Greenwood said. “Some teachers are good at teaching controversial issues, and some aren’t.”

He said he favors “just making the materials available.”

Like other officials, Greenwood said he hopes teachers will present a balanced picture. He added, however: “What control do we have over a teacher in the classroom with the door closed? We just hope that the youngsters are not being brainwashed with a particular point of view.”