SAN FRANCISCO - As America reels from its latest spate of deadly hate crimes and racism, the California State Board of Education on Thursday approved the nation’s first statewide ethnic studies curriculum for high schools, saying the teaching of discrimination and oppression has never been more important.After an eight-hour public meeting Thursday, board members voted unanimously, 11-0, to approve the curriculum it hopes will become a model for other states to follow.Educators and civil rights leaders who spoke at the meeting mourned this week’s killing of eight people, most of them Asian women, in Georgia, as the latest tragic example of racism but also a poignant reminder that education is an essential strategy to combating hate."We are.