“… A new report by the American Council of Trustees and Alumni, a nonprofit group that advocates for accountability at schools, found that just 23 of the institutions among the 76 deemed to be the “best” by U.S. News & World Report’s 2016 rankings require history majors to take at least one U.S. history course.” …
Studying US history would be seen as too parochial.
So? It’s not like they’re American studies majors. Are we supposed to care that a student fascinated by the history of China didn’t take a course on American history?
I think at most students are already familiar with U.S. history when they enter college. They have been learning it their whole lives in elementary, middle, and high school. At my school we were required to take a US history course in middle school (seventh and eighth grade) and in high school. In contrast, I think most people are not aware of the history of the world around them. Most foreign high school students that I have met know several things about US history and culture, whereas I think it is embarrassing that we know very little about theirs.
Maybe. I remember lots of history, but it was very, very sanitized. Little about, for example, disastrous American involvement in Central America. Many students don’t learn the dark side of US history until college.
Unless the major is “American history” or “American studies” (rather than more generic “history”), is it a problem that a “history” major does not take an American history course?
Note, however, that the ACTA group advocates a college level American history or government course as a general education requirement for all students.