Conservatives Win Big Fight Over ‘Radically Revisionist’ High School American History Curriculum

[WestVirginiaRebel]

The Blaze:

After persistent pushback from conservatives, the framework for high school Advanced Placement U.S. history has been revised to give more weight to the country’s positive past — and even includes a new section on “American exceptionalism,” Newsweek reported.

 

The previous incarnation of AP American history standards — which took a decade to put in place — were released last year to a volley of criticism. Names such as Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton and John Adams were omitted and detractors said negatives in U.S. history were emphasized while positives — such as America’s role in winning World War I and World War II — were tamped down.

 

Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson said the course was so anti-American that those who completed it would be “ready to sign up for ISIS.”

 

Colorado high schoolers hit the headlines last September when students from several schools walked out of classes to protest the new curriculum.

 

Oklahoma, Georgia and Texas introduced bills threatening to pull the course, Newsweek said, adding that the matter reached the ears of the Republican National Committee, which passed a resolution saying the AP U.S. framework reflected “a radically revisionist view of American history that emphasizes negative aspects of our nation’s history while omitting or minimizing positive aspects.” The recommendation was for Congress to withhold federal funding to the College Board until a new revision was cast.

 

So the College Board began accepting comments from teachers and others last fall, Newsweek said, and then in April it was announced that revisions would be published in July.

 

Now Franklin, Jefferson, Hamilton and Adams are back in — and the accomplishments of America’s founders have been reemphasized. And as for the new section on “American exceptionalism,” a College Board official told Newsweek the phrase didn’t make it to the 2014 edition because the assumption was that the concept didn’t need spelling out.

________

 

Unfortunately, some "educators" needed to be reminded. Good for those who stood up for real history over revisionism.

 

[Valin]

 

Colorado high schoolers hit the headlines last September when students from several schools walked out of classes to protest the new curriculum.

 

Todays Ray Of Hope!

[Geee]

AP U.S. HISTORY FRAMEWORK REMAINS FLAWED; COLLEGE BOARD NEEDS COMPETITION

 

The College Board has revised its framework for the teaching of AP U.S. History. The College Board has done so, it says, in response to the “principled criticism” and “legitimate concerns” of its 2014 framework by non-liberal scholars. Based on my quick review, the new framework looks like is an improvement.

Power Line has promoted criticism of the 2014 framework by scholars and intellectuals like Charles Kesler and Stanley Kurtz. We have also supplied criticism of our own. We welcome the improvements.

But let’s not pop the champagne. Kurtz argues that the changes to the framework are largely cosmetic:

The College Board has removed some of the framework’s most egregiously biased formulations, yet the basic approach has not changed. Since the College Board has said that the revised framework will not require modifications to textbooks, there is reason to believe that we are looking at largely cosmetic changes.

The textbooks are what students actually see. If the latest revisions won’t change the texts, they can’t mean much.

 

http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2015/07/ap-u-s-history-framework-remains-flawed-college-board-needs-competition.php