Some Texas students won’t be learning about Virginia this year—at least not through their school’s online learning platform.
As first reported by Axios, the Lamar Consolidated Independent School District, located just outside of Houston, removed a section on the Commonwealth of Virginia from its elementary curriculum last fall. The reason? The state’s flag features the Roman goddess Virtus, who appears with one breast exposed—a violation of the district’s recently adopted rules banning “visual depictions or illustrations of frontal nudity” in school library materials.
The image appeared in a digital lesson from PebbleGo Next, an educational platform used by the district for grades three through five. According to documents obtained by the Texas Freedom to Read Project through a Freedom of Information Act request, district officials confirmed the decision to block access to the Virginia module based on the flag’s imagery.
The lesson, still viewable in other districts, includes both the Virginia state flag and seal, which show Virtus standing over a fallen tyrant. The motto—“Sic semper tyrannis,” or “Thus always to tyrants”—remains unchanged, even if the goddess has now been digitally exiled from Texas classrooms.
