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I’m not sure when the change occurred. I just read a (very Western-centric and biased) book that talked about development of the university system in the 13th century. But it is true that early European universities emphasized an undergraduate liberal arts education.</p>
<p>I’m a high school student. I recently took one of the civics surveys that they offer to college students and got a 93%, which I attribute to the fact that I just took AP US History. Next year my score would probably go down, as it would the year after that, and it would probably go back up if I took a US history or government course in college. The scores will be a function of how recently students took such a class, so colleges that require those classes will probably do much better.</p>
<p>That said, students’ specific knowledge will still atrophy after a few years. Taking a required course doesn’t mean you’re going to remember it for life, so requiring those courses does not necessarily prepare better citizens in the long run.</p>