Calls to delay a controversial ethnic studies course at Tamalpais Union High School District for a year appear to be fading after a positive reaction by parents to aspects of the course.

“We are hopeful parent feedback, for which there has been broad consensus and which aligns with lessons being provided by the Institute for Curriculum Services to the district, will be incorporated,” said Laurie Dubin, leader of the parent group Tam Union Together.

The district held a parent feedback session on Monday focused on the Jewish American experience. At the session, the Institute for Curriculum Services, a San Francisco nonprofit, provided a video on Jewish history, customs, culture and migration and on antisemitism for about 30 parents in attendance. Some said they appreciated the video.

“Transparency, which has been lacking on those units, needs to happen now,” Dubin said.

She hopes the district will open the feedback sessions to other parents who do not have ninth-graders in the Jewish American or Arab American experience classes, which are part of the semester-long ethnic studies course.

The parent group had pushed previously for the district to drop the course and move it to the 2025-26 school year, when it becomes a state graduation mandate. Dubin said Wednesday that the course is already in motion, so the focus now is adding more transparency and public comment.A parent forum on the Arab American experience class is set for 5:30 to 7 p.m. Feb. 6 at the Kreps Conference Center at 395 Doherty Drive in Larkspur. The Jewish and Arab American classes are set to run for one week each beginning in late February and in early March as part of the course.

Another round of parent sessions on the Jewish and Arab American classes will be held in March or April, according to Tara Taupier the district superintendent.

“We will continue to gather feedback from students and families throughout the semester,” she said on Wednesday. “Ensuring an open and ongoing dialogue remains a priority.”

The district board will likely discuss the process at a board meeting in February, she said. Taupier said teachers and administrators are responding to parent comments and will be making changes in both the Jewish and Arab American units.

“We plan to have another agenda item after we have held our next feedback session,” Taupier said. The next board meeting after the Feb. 6 Arab American session is Feb. 11.

The state mandates ethnic studies as a high school graduation requirement in 2029-30, meaning it needs to start with the freshman class in 2025-26. The Tam Union course, in preparation for more than three years, started Jan. 8, a year ahead of the state mandate.

Parents have pushed back on the entire course — called “Community and Consciousness” — since trustees approved it a year ago. Most recently, they called for it to be delayed until next year, saying it appeared to have been interlaced with political messages from outside activist groups.

The district plans to gather comments on the entire course after each of the four major ethnic group units — African American, Asian American, Latino American and Indigenous people — are completed.

“We will be gathering feedback after each unit from parents, students and teachers who are experiencing the course,” Taupier said.

Teachers and administrators said they will add material, as parents requested, about the rise in antisemitism globally after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terrorist attack in Israel in which 1,200 people were killed and several hundred others taken hostage.

District parent Randi Curhan said the Jewish American experience class must include that material because students are living through its impacts, such as widespread college campus protests, and need to understand and be prepared for the antisemitism in world events.

“Just as the murder of George Floyd triggered generational trauma in Black communities, our community experienced a similar trauma on Oct. 7, 2023 — and that trauma continues today,” Curhan at the trustees’ meeting on Tuesday. “But there was one major difference: We had no allies.”

Dubin said her group is asking the district to post lesson plans for the ethnic studies course and the additional Jewish and Arab American classes online so that the community may participate in comments.

Curhan agreed.

“We must remain vigilant about what is being taught to our children,” she said. “Education should build bridges, not deepen divisions. The ethnic studies framework should reflect that, ensuring that no community is left to stand alone in the face of hate.”