U.S. teachers told not to talk about racism, race: survey

NEW YORK, Aug. 12 (Xinhua) -- One in four U.S. teachers report being told by school officials or district leaders to limit their classroom conversations about race, racism or bias, NBC News reported on Thursday, citing a new survey.

Nearly one-third of educators reported being told to limit their classroom discussions in more than a dozen states with state-level restrictions on classroom conversations about racism, sexism and other contentious topics.

"One in four social studies and English teachers and one in four principals say they've been harassed about policies on race, racism or bias," said the report.

"The data provides one of the first comprehensive looks at how efforts to restrict classroom conversations about race in many states and districts have affected educators and school administrators," it added.

The nationally representative survey, which pulled from responses from nearly 2,400 K-12 teachers and about 1,500 principals, was released on Wednesday and conducted by the Rand Corp., a nonpartisan think tank.