Knowing is Half the Battle

Oklahoma legislature never stops amazing me. If they're not passing laws to mess with gay people, they're sucking up to big energy and trying to pass laws that keep people dependent on said energy companies. Everything they do is petty and transparent, usually 'let's help the people lining our pockets while masking it in having values.'

Sometimes though, they find new depths to their idiocy. They did that yesterday, when a committee voted to get rid of AP American History in all Oklahoma public schools. They said they did this because it was too close to Common Core (even though AP has been around since I was in high school over 20 years ago) and that it didn't promote American Exceptionalism.

American Exceptionalism, if indeed it needs to be taught at all, is something that should be taught in elementary school. Charlie Brown did a special on it that explained everything perfectly. That special is set for little kids. And I'm not trying to be insulting here. I think it is important to talk about how America was formed with ideals in mind. It is something young children can understand. To try and apply that to Advanced Placement history classes is like wanting to force them to teach addition and subtraction in AP Calculus.

In an Advanced Placement class, the concept of Exceptionalism shouldn't be taught. Like I said, Exceptionalism is a basic and simplistic view of America. AP US History is an advanced class where advanced thinking is required. It's a class where we examine the history of this country in all of it's good AND bad steps. I don't think there is anything wrong with looking at where we've screwed up. To teach people their country is flawless is dangerous. To whitewash the history of what we have done is a disservice to the people who worked hard to learn from that history and try to do better.

I think it's important to recognize that we are a young country and have accomplished a lot for such a young country. At the same time, we've made some huge mistakes. However, as a young country, we can still learn from those mistakes and do better. The thing is, if we don't know or examine where we failed, how CAN we learn to do better? Doing better should always be the goal, not sticking your head in the sand and pretending everything is just perfect.