Wednesday, September 19, 2007
News Failing grades in history
Posted by Scott Freeman on Wed, Sep 19, 2007 at 2:40 PM
A new study shows American colleges and universities are abjectly failing when it comes to teaching students about our country's history.
The Intercollegiate Studies Institutes gave a 60-question, multiple-choice test to 14,000 students at 50 institutions of higher learning across the country — including the University of Georgia and the Georgia College and State University.
Nationally, students scored a big, fat "F" on their knowledge of history, answering an average of 54.2 percent of the questions correctly. At UGA, scores were above the national average, though not by much. UGA students had an average of 57.76 percent, while Georgia College students had a dismal 43.68 average.
(The test is online and you can take it yourself; I scored a passing grade of 70 percent.)
Of the colleges that participated, Harvard students had the highest average, 69.5 percent. UGA was 17th on the list; Georgia College ranked 43rd.
What does this show? Are we now at the point where we're essentially teaching kids to pass standardized tests? Is history even relevant and meaningful to kids in the Internet Age?
One thing for certain, college students don't know their history. According to ISI:
- Seniors do not know basic facts of American history. Only 45.9 percent know that Yorktown was the battle that ended the American Revolution.
- Seniors do not know the basic time line of American history. Only 47.7 percent know that Fort Sumter came before Gettysburg and that Gettysburg came before Appomattox.
- Seniors do not know America’s founding documents. Only 45.9 percent know that the line “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal†comes from the Declaration of Independence.
- Seniors do not know the rudiments of America’s historical relations with the world. Only 42.7 percent know that NATO was formed to resist Soviet expansion.
Comments (12)
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I scored 75 percent. Which means one of two things... * I am 5 percent smarter than Scott Freeman * I am 5 percent better at guessing than Scott Freeman Hey, no shit about that economics crap. What's that got to do with history? Who am I, Alan freakin' Greenspan here? Sheesh.
Anyone who doesn\\\'t get an 80 or better on this shouldn\\\'t be allowed to vote.
Anyone who doesn't know what the Constitution says should have their Constitutional right to vote taken away! Right on, Geoff!
70 percent - just as smart as Scott H., but not allowed to vote. That was exhausting.
70 percent here, too. As a truly ethical journalist who prefers to act as an observer of the political milieu rather than a participant, I don't vote at all... *Cough*
87... had to guess on a few ... but most were simple elimination if you don't know the correct answer immediately BTW, it's a civics test, not a history test, so the economics questions are appropriate. Either someone didn't read closely or know the difference between civics and history, but a clue is the web banner that says "for teaching Americas history and institutions".
I hope the comment on it being a civics test was directed at the original writer of the article. I was well able to read it was a civics test, but the entire article is aimed at the apparent woeful amount of history knowledge. The results returned didn't appear to segment out performance on history versus economics, etc. Personally I've always zone out on econ. I did great on the history and didn't have the motivation to play process of elimination on the econ questions. It's a slippery slope when we start suggesting that tests should decide who can and cannot vote. Jim Crow anyone?
It would be directed at him, David Lee Simmons and anyone else who wonders what economics have to do with civics. The test seemed pretty fairly balanced between history, economics and government. tyhat makes ense to me becasue I don't think you can understand any of them without understanding all of them. The article is aimed at history and the author cites a civics test to support it. History is about a third o the story represented by the test. I think a better headline would be "Studies Indicate American Schools Suck".
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