U.S. Students Remain Poor at History - And An Easy Targets for Demagogues

I have lamented many times about the utter ignorance most American students display when it comes to a knowledge of history - even U. S. history. This ignorance plays directly into the hands of Christian dominionists like David Barton who seek to re-write history to further their goals of a Bible based theocracy. It also plays into the hands of Demagogues - principally on the GOP side of the isle - who count on an ignorance of accurate history so as to convince the ignorant that they are the protectors of the nation and all kinds of other bullshit. The New York Times looks at this very, very dangerous deficit in knowledge among not only our school students but also far too many adults. Here are some highlights:
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American students are less proficient in their nation’s history than in any other subject, according to results of a nationwide test released on Tuesday, with most fourth graders unable to say why Abraham Lincoln was an important figure and few high school seniors able to identify China as the North Korean ally that fought American troops during the Korean War.
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20 percent of fourth graders, 17 percent of eighth graders and 12 percent of high school seniors demonstrated proficiency . . .
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Diane Ravitch, an education historian who was invited by the national assessment’s governing board to review the results, said she was particularly disturbed by the fact that only 2 percent of 12th graders correctly answered a question concerning Brown v. Board of Education, which she called “very likely the most important decision” of the United States Supreme Court in the past seven decades.
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History advocates contend that students’ poor showing on the tests underlines neglect shown to the subject by federal and state policy makers, especially since the 2002 No Child Left Behind act began requiring schools to raise scores in math and reading but in no other subject. The federal accountability law, the advocates say, has given schools and teachers an incentive to spend less time on history and other subjects.
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“History is very much being shortchanged,” said Linda K. Salvucci, a history professor in San Antonio who is chairwoman-elect of the National Council for History Education.
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Many teacher-education programs, Ms. Salvucci said, also contribute to the problem by encouraging aspiring teachers to seek certification in social studies, rather than in history. “They think they’ll be more versatile, that they can teach civics, government, whatever,” she said. “But they’re not prepared to teach history.”
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This abysmal lack of knowledge is how someone like Sarah Palin - a certifiable idiot in my opinion - can be taken as credible despite their constant gaffes in factual accuracy.