The Politics of High School History Class
“I just don’t see myself in the U.S. history curriculum,” I overheard a student saying in my high school when it came time to select courses for the next year.
“It’s easy to forget people other than white men,” a friend concurred.
That student was not alone in their resentment for US history classes. Of all the classes at my school, history tends to generate the least enthusiasm, as many students struggle to relate to the content.
There is a burgeoning reckoning with the stories prioritized by the American education system, with a resistance movement originating from Gen-Z kids actually filling the seats of American classrooms. 29% of people born after 1997 either have parents who are immigrants, or are immigrants themselves, and 48% of the generation is nonwhite, compared to 39% of the previous generation, according to a study from Pew Research Center. This generation of students dedicates their time to curricula that they do not see their own lives, or their families’ histories, reflected in. The New York City public school system, for example, embodies this disconnect: though less than 20% of public school enrollees in the city are white, around 80–90% of curriculum materials are centered around white people and their history. Despite the ethnic diversity of American students, school curricula are consistently centered around white protagonists and histories. Liberal criticisms of standard high school curricula also point out their erasure of LGBT narratives and their de-emphasis on lower class struggles and culture.
The College Board’s Advanced Placement (AP) program, taught to over a million students each year, offers history courses in U.S. History, European History, and World History. The “World History” class was condensed in 2018, when the College Board decided to redesign the curriculum so it would start in 1200 BC, cutting out over 9,000 years of history. The new course “cuts out most of the golden ages of non-Western cultures,” said high school history teacher Eileen Baranyk in an interview with Politico, though the College Board promised to develop an “AP Ancient History Course” to cover these periods. In the meantime, the current course focuses largely on the colonial and post-colonial periods, which students and historians point out puts European colonizers at the center of the world history narrative.
A proposed solution to the dominance of white, western histories is to require “ethnic studies” courses in schools. The Boston City Council met this month to discuss potential changes to the city curriculum. City Councilwoman and Boston Public Schools graduate Andrea Campbell said during these meetings that the BPS system is “really missing the mark with respect to teaching history that is truthful, that is honest” and called for the creation of a pilot program for an ethnic studies curriculum. California, too, attempted to make ethnic studies a required high school course this September, though Governor Gavin Newsom vetoed the bill. Newsom rejected the Critical Ethnic Studies Association’s draft of the curriculum on the grounds that it was not “balanced and inclusive” enough, as it criticized capitalism and neglected to include topics regarding Native American and Middle Eastern groups. However, ethnic studies advocates saw a victory recently as the California legislature recently passed AB-1460, which requires an ethnic studies course as a graduation requirement at California State University. The new course requires Native Americans, African Americans, Asian Americans, and Latina and Latino Americans to be represented in the curriculum. However, not everyone was satisfied with the decision, and Middle Eastern groups in particular called to see their backgrounds represented in what could serve as a model for ethnic studies courses across the country.
Though curriculums have grown to represent a wider array of identities, modern teachers struggle to place them at the center of the narratives students learn. Only 10% of standard US history courses are spent dedicated to African American experiences. The AP Capstone course’s rigorous exploration of black history is not mirrored in the College Board’s primary history courses. The curriculum of AP US History, for instance, requires teaching about African American and Native Americans roles in the Americas’ development, but they play a secondary role in many classrooms. According to a current AP US History student from Massachusetts, the perspectives of racial minorities and women “are touched on and explored, but on tests they are not as heavily emphasized as the rest of the chapter” in her classroom.
Simply making history courses about minority groups available does not always translate to an inclusive, comprehensive view of history. Indeed, the way a teacher or textbook company interprets a course of study has a big impact on what parts of history students actually learn, even with courses that have national standards, like Advanced Placement classes. For instance, the same version of a textbook can come out of different states’ review boards with language that reflects the state’s political biases. The Texas edition of a McGraw Hill Textbook includes a comment that during the Harlem Renaissance, “critics ‘dismissed the quality of literature produced’”, which is not included in other states’ editions.
The way slavery is covered in history classes has become a proxy for the fights of US culture wars. Conservatives have attacked the diversification of historical narratives, saying it causes students to have an overly pessimistic outlook on US history. In particular, The New York Times’ 1619 Project, a series of essays that demonstrate how slavery was woven into the fabric of America since its inception has been under fire from prominent Republicans. These critics from the right worried that its emphasis on institutional racism would sow distrust in American ideals, and tried to prove that the project stood on historically unfounded claims. In response, the Trump administration issued an executive order, mobilizing a team of African American scholars to create the 1776 Unites project. The project aims to teach students how to “become agents of their own uplift and transformation, by embracing the true founding values of our country”, to retaliate against 1619 Project’s negative lens. Trump even threatened to cut funding from schools who used the 1619 Project in their curriculum, to show his full commitment to preserving a nationalist approach to history education.
However, criticisms of the 1619 Project ignore that it, in fact, was not meant to be a takedown of America, but to ask questions about who is put at the center of our national mythology, a pursuit for a more inclusive, positive national story that is actually shared by those working on the 1776 Project. Nikole Hannah-Jones, creator of the 1619 Project, argues that black communities have historically advocated for democratic principles, even when their nation did not. Rather than denouncing American values of liberty and republicanism because of their contradictions, the 1619 project shows how black Americans were central to the development of those values.
The contention surrounding the 1619 project actually serves its purpose: to put awareness of race at the center of historical debates. At the core of the debates over history curriculums lies the same goal: to expand curriculums beyond any one prescribed narrative, to reveal the wide breadth of experience that history comprises. A current high school junior interviewed for this story said that she worries that the history she learns in school is “making history appear more black and white than it was” and wishes that students were more “aware when something can or should be contested.” This ideal approach to the history curriculum means acknowledging the progress and resilience of everybody’s ancestors without whitewashing the history of racism and oppression in the name of patriotism.
There are a myriad of solutions that work to improve the high school curriculum beyond the 1619 project, 1776 Project, and ethnic studies curriculums. A path to a more inclusive history curriculum could include schools and national organizations like the College Board creating courses that explore time periods and issues that go beyond the western world. Many classmates I spoke to have suggested that it would be beneficial to require courses on African history, Asian history, and history of the Americas outside of the U.S. Other proposals include teaching only world history and breaking it up into smaller periods or themes. Some of the top US high schools have dreamt up even more unique courses, including a class on the intersection of capitalism and slavery, a course dedicated to comparing Asian and American history textbooks, and an elective dedicated to examining the school archives through a feminist lense. Though offering such a wide array of history classes is not attainable for most schools, they provide an example of unconventional ways to teach history.
But, desegregating the school curriculum also requires desegregating our classrooms. Students of color are less likely to have access to advanced courses, including history courses, and are less likely to enroll in them when they are offered. However, implementing more diverse curricula has been shown to increase GPA and test scores of students of color. In a Claremont College study, it was found that multicultural representation in lesson plans boosts self esteem in students who see themselves represented in the curricula and promotes tolerant attitudes among all students. The American school system itself should invest in underprivileged students and diverse staff. Creating curricula that are reflective of the backgrounds and interests of students that learn them will further propel student success. Allowing more students exposure to the many stories history encapsulates will create a generation of better students, citizens, and historians.
