GOP vs. PC: Complaints about biases in history courses and exams

[emilynghiem]

GOP lawmakers intensify complaints about bias in U.S. history exams - Houston Chronicle

Republican lawmaker Dan Fisher, who wrote the bill, complained that the course’s guidelines focus too much on “what is bad about American” and does not teach the idea of "American exceptionalism." The Oklahoma legislator withdrew the bill for revision after facing criticism. But Oklahoma is not the only red state with major issues with the history course’s guidelines.

In Texas, where 47,500 high school students took the test in 2013, Republican representative Ken Mercer said the exam doesn’t talk enough about historic triumphs like the liberation of Holocaust camps or civil rights leaders like Martin Luther King Jr. and Cesar Chavez. A Georgia congressman recently called AP history lessonsanti-free enterprise and presenting a “more politically correct” and “revisionist” version of history.

Conservatives in South Carolina, North Carolina and Colorado also protested the tests guidelines, which do not actually mandate what can and cannot be taught in class. One complaint included not specifically calling World War II veterans “the greatest generation,” and another disliked questions asking students to think critically and assess the U.S. atomic bombing of Japan. In South Carolina, a teacher called not educating students with patriotic lessons amounts to “almost a national-security risk.”

===============

Instead of this being an adversarial issue, historians teachers and students should be REWARDED for coming up with well-written history books, materials and exams.

Why not collaborate and work out these writing and editing projects as part of the education itself?

Then the versions that get the best reviews and receptions are rewarded with contracts,
and the school district get to vote on which textbooks they want to use, etc.

Make it democratic and educational. Frankly it is interesting to me to see both sides of historic debates, and challenging to find ways to express and include both, so you get the FULL perspective, not just one side over another. Why not show the whole context?

 

[idb]

One complaint included not specifically calling World War II veterans “the greatest generation,” and another disliked questions asking students to think critically and assess the U.S. atomic bombing of Japan. In South Carolina, a teacher called not educating students with patriotic lessons amounts to “almost a national-security risk.

?!!!!!!!!!

 

[Tom Sweetnam]

Good, it's about time our public schools and universities were called to task for the crap that passes as historical empiricism these days. Remember when our schools were the best in the world instead of the 37th best? We're the laughing stock of the industrialized world, and we have no one to thank but democrats and their great desulatory Marxist centering that's had as positive an effect here, as its had anywhere its been tried in the past 98 years.

 

[Nutz]

There is nothing democratic about facts and history. An event happened - what caused that event to happen may be up for debate...but that is for the student to decide....not for the books. America may be exceptional...that doesn't have to be taught...the proof is in the pudding.

 

[emilynghiem]

There is nothing democratic about facts and history. An event happened - what caused that event to happen may be up for debate...but that is for the student to decide....not for the books. America may be exceptional...that doesn't have to be taught...the proof is in the pudding.

??? Nutz
You don't think it makes a difference to remove Thomas Jefferson from history textbooks:
Texas Board of Education cuts Thomas Jefferson out of its textbooks. ThinkProgress

Don't you think a vote by a diverse review of historians might have mattered here?

"The Texas Board of Education has been meeting this week to revise its social studies curriculum. During the past three days, “the board’s far-right faction wielded their power to shape lessons on the civil rights movement, the U.S. free enterprise system and hundreds of other topics”:

– To avoid exposing students to “transvestites, transsexuals and who knows what else,” the Board struck the curriculum’s reference to “sex and gender as social constructs.”

— The Board removed Thomas Jefferson from the Texas curriculum, “replacing him with religious right icon John Calvin.”

— The Board refused to require that “students learn that the Constitution prevents the U.S. government from promoting one religion over all others.”

— The Board struck the word “democratic” from the description of the U.S. government, instead terming it a “constitutional republic.”

As the nation’s second-largest textbook market, Texas has enormous leverage over publishers, who often “craft their standard textbooks based on the specs of the biggest buyers.” Indeed, as The Washington Monthly has reported, “when it comes to textbooks, what happens in Texas rarely stays in Texas.”

-DJ Carella"

 

[regent]

Good, it's about time our public schools and universities were called to task for the crap that passes as historical empiricism these days. Remember when our schools were the best in the world instead of the 37th best? We're the laughing stock of the industrialized world, and we have no one to thank but democrats and their great desulatory Marxist centering that's had as positive an effect here, as its had anywhere its been tried in the past 98 years.

When were America's schools the best in the world? And who rated the American schools as the greatest?

 

[idb]

Good, it's about time our public schools and universities were called to task for the crap that passes as historical empiricism these days. Remember when our schools were the best in the world instead of the 37th best? We're the laughing stock of the industrialized world, and we have no one to thank but democrats and their great desulatory Marxist centering that's had as positive an effect here, as its had anywhere its been tried in the past 98 years.

If the US is the laughing stock of the world, don't you think this might be part of the reason?

One complaint included not specifically calling World War II veterans “the greatest generation,” and another disliked questions asking students to think critically and assess the U.S. atomic bombing of Japan. In South Carolina, a teacher called not educating students with patriotic lessons amounts to “almost a national-security risk.”

 

[idb]

There is nothing democratic about facts and history. An event happened - what caused that event to happen may be up for debate...but that is for the student to decide....not for the books. America may be exceptional...that doesn't have to be taught...the proof is in the pudding.

??? Nutz
You don't think it makes a difference to remove Thomas Jefferson from history textbooks:
Texas Board of Education cuts Thomas Jefferson out of its textbooks. ThinkProgress

Don't you think a vote by a diverse review of historians might have mattered here?

"The Texas Board of Education has been meeting this week to revise its social studies curriculum. During the past three days, “the board’s far-right faction wielded their power to shape lessons on the civil rights movement, the U.S. free enterprise system and hundreds of other topics”:

– To avoid exposing students to “transvestites, transsexuals and who knows what else,” the Board struck the curriculum’s reference to “sex and gender as social constructs.”

— The Board removed Thomas Jefferson from the Texas curriculum, “replacing him with religious right icon John Calvin.”

— The Board refused to require that “students learn that the Constitution prevents the U.S. government from promoting one religion over all others.”

— The Board struck the word “democratic” from the description of the U.S. government, instead terming it a “constitutional republic.”

As the nation’s second-largest textbook market, Texas has enormous leverage over publishers, who often “craft their standard textbooks based on the specs of the biggest buyers.” Indeed, as The Washington Monthly has reported, “when it comes to textbooks, what happens in Texas rarely stays in Texas.”

-DJ Carella"

Good grief!

 

[regent]

Does history have a purpose, if so, is one purpose to teach patriotism, or allegiance to a political party?