(From nas.org):
By Robert L. Paquette
The College Board’s Advanced Placement Program began in the mid-1950s. History numbered among the first subjects for which the College Board designed basic equipment to guide high-school teachers in preparing “college level curricula and standards that could be instituted at the high school level.” Over the years, the equipment furnished to high schools became more detailed and extensive in laying out historical themes and objectives. In 2014, the College Board rolled out a redesigned, 100-plus page “curriculum framework” for Advanced Placement United States History (APUSH). Critics, particularly those on the right, detect within APUSH a thinly-veiled political agenda. The advanced history advanced in these pages carries a range of prompts about identities, social justice, and exploitation. The words “race,” “class,” and “gender,” for example, appear dozens of times. “Property” and “patriotism” are mentioned twice; the Bible, once; “honor” and “virtue,” not at all. Does APUSH’s operational manual aim to elevate teachers’ and students’ understanding of American history or to smuggle into the classroom, Howard Zinn-style, a useable past, one tailor-made to advance identity politics and a progressive ideology? CONTINUE READING HERE