HARTLAND, Wis. (CBS 58) -- The Arrowhead Union High School District's Policy Committee has approved some language changes to their curriculum development guidelines which will soon go to the full board for a vote and some parents have concerns with the update. 

According to board documents, the committee addressed technical corrections review of changes to various policy outlines for the district. In one of the changes to the curriculum development page, a line stating the curriculum would 'provide instruction, at all grade levels, designed to give students an understanding of human relations, particularly with regard to American Indians, Black Americans and Hispanics' would be removed. 

At policy committee meeting on Tuesday, Feb. 4, Committee Chairperson and School Board Vice President Chris Farris opened the meeting by acknowledging some of the conversation surrounding the change

"I know there are members of the public that see a bogeyman behind every tree, but there is no bogeyman to be seen here," Farris said. "These are all legal decisions that our team of lawyers have decided to keep us safe and to keep us on track to other districts.” 

Darcey Sobczak, a parent in the district, said she doesn't approve of the language change. 

“They’re going to try to white-wash our history classes again, and I’m vehemently opposed to that," Sobczak said. “Everyone needs to have a voice, for us to eliminate certain aspects of curriculum development, my child won’t learn about the entire world that way.”

At the meeting, Farris said the language exists elsewhere in the district and was unnecessary in this particular document. CBS 58 asked Farris and other members of the policy committee if they could speak to the changes in an interview and they declined. 

“That’s really upsetting to me," Sobczak said, regarding what she described as a lack of transparency from the committee. "It was just glossed over, like it was anything else. It doesn’t feel like the community has much say because they push things through."

"Districts are required under Wisconsin law (Wis. Stat. §118.01(2)(c)7 and Wis. Stat. §118.01(2)(c)8) to provide 'an appreciation and understanding of different value systems and cultures' and 'at all grade levels, an understanding of human relations, particularly with regard to American Indians, Black Americans, Hispanics, Hmong Americans and Asian Americans,'" said Chris Bucher, an Interim Communications Director with the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, in response to this proposed policy change. 

The full Arrowhead Union High School Board will vote on this policy change at their next meeting on Friday, Feb. 14