Ethnic Studies Mandates: What Could Go Wrong? Teacher Dispositions, Pedagogy, and the Future of K–12 Ethnic Studies

Abstract In 2021 California became the first state to mandate ethnic studies as a high school graduation requirement, to begin in 2030. There is cause for celebration at this effort to improve the ways in which schools, teachers, and students are intentionally preparing for the realities of multiracial democracy, but extensive unresolved questions of implementation exist as California considers how to scale ethnic studies—with fidelity—beyond idiosyncratic classrooms. Based on multiyear case study research, this article explores the challenges educators face while implementing ethnic studies and how this is manifested in praxis. Michael Domínguez and Suneal Kolluri explore how attention to the dispositions of educators tasked with this work, and ongoing support for curricular and identity transitions of newly minted ethnic studies educators, are vital to the implementation of ethnic studies.