Resolution No. 164-26A2, In Support of the Inclusion of the History of Comfort Women into the Statewide History Curriculum.pdf (47 KB)
Adopted, as amended, at the Special Meeting of the Board of Education held on April 26, 2016
Subject: Resolution No. 164-26A2
In Support of the Inclusion of the History of Comfort Women into the
Statewide History Curriculum
– Commissioners Sandra Lee Fewer and Hydra Mendoza-McDonnell
WHEREAS: The California Department of Education has proposed to add the topic of Japan’s
enforcement of women into sex slavery before and during World War II in a draft framework for
the state’s 2017 public school curriculum, and:
WHEREAS: The draft framework of history and social sciences for students in Grade ten,
aged fifteen to sixteen, would include the history of ”comfort women” which describes the
victims of Japan’s sexual slavery institution as an example of institutionalized sexual slavery and
that it is one of the largest cases of human trafficking in the 20" century, and
WHEREAS: In 2007 US Congress unanimously urged the Japanese government to formally
acknowledge, apologize, and accept historical responsibility of its role in sexually enslaving
women and gitls during World War II in a clear and unequivocal manner and educate current and
future generations about this horrible crime committed against humanity, and which has not yet
been fully resolved; and
WHEREAS: In October 2015, the SFUSD Board of Education unanimously adopted a
resolution to educate from middle to high school students on the history of “comfort women” in
connection with the issues of sex trafficking.
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED: That the SFUSD, consistent with its position of educating
its students on the history of “comfort women” as it relates to sex trafficking, supports the
California Department of Education plan to add to the high school curriculum the history of
young women and girls as young as 9 years of age from the 11 countries colonized by Japan,
majority of whom were from China, Korea, Philippines and Dutch Indonesia, and who were sex
slaves coerced by the Japanese military to perform involuntary sexual servitude to the Japanese
soldiers from 1931 — 1945; and
FURTHER BE IT RESOLVED: That the purpose of this inclusion to the curriculum is to
teach the atrocities of war and to recognize that sex trafficking has been and continues to be a
national and international issue of crisis; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED: That the SFUSD submits this resolution to the California
Department of Education in an e-letter to the California Department of Education at the
following official email address: HSSframework@cde.ca.gov.
4/26/16