Gee, I wish I'd thought of that.
Mandatory, Jarod. That's your wonderful PC at work, attempting to bully some 12 year old kids into self-loathing.
A 12 year old is old enough to stand up for himself.
Its only mandatory if you let it be. Were they going to shoot your kid if he wrote a paper rejecting the premise? Hell no.
If a teacher assigned a paper telling the kids to write why their race is superior, would that have been politically correct? Why or why not?