Soc-I'm so tired of ignorance

  

I'm tired of American ignorance.

My knowledge wasn't my choice. I had excellent schools. The only private school I went to was first and second grade taught by a sadist that forced four years of learning into two. 

In third grade in the Reading, MA schools we colored maps of the states. We also had to learn the capitals and what the different states were known for. Because I'd lived in West Virginia, I knew that state mined coal. Because I loved waffles, my grandmother told me maple syrup came from Vermont. The teacher filled in the blanks for the importance of the other states.

Every other year we had some kind of history or geography. We learned about Greeks, Romans, the Middle Ages. 

Every other year we had American history. I'll admit there were faults. 

• We never got beyond WWI if we got that far.
• We never learned about American Indians
• We never learned much about Asia or Africa, although in the National Geographics in my Grandmother's attic I learned some things.

In seventh grade, Mr. Butcher taught Soc, short for social studies. He was a big man, a blond. I don't remember anyone ever acting up in his class, but I remember as he taught us about the world that he was interesting, very interesting. Sometimes we even played games using facts as quiz questions to win points.

To graduate from high school we were required to have a civics course. Mr. Bronner was a slob and also taught driver ed. However, we covered how the government worked.

Mr. Aldrich taught U.S. History, another requirement for high school graduation. We were also each assigned a country to follow and then share the week's information with the class. Mine was Cuba just after the Castro Revolution. 

Mr. Aldrich also tutored me in Algebra. Math, with the exception of geometry because it was visual, was my weak point.I tended to giggle during the lessons. I wish I could apologize to him now.

The sciences, geology, biology, chemistry, astronomy were all covered in some depth. I didn't take physics (math avoidance) opting for anatomy where the final included identifying every muscle in the body. 

Cuba was of special interest to me during the 1962 Missile Crisis. As a newlywed I was waiting to join my husband in Germany, where he was stationed. Was the world going to go to war? We didn't. 

February of my senior year at university, they discovered my group lacked the required U.S. history course. One was arranged FAST. We had a woman who had just gotten her PhD. She took us up to the depression. 

I remember one day she was out and the head of the department came in and gave the lecture without notes in an area that wasn't hers and without pause. I'd had Dr. Goler for an earlier course and was gobsmacked by her knowledge once again.

I've done my own reading on modern U.S. history but over the years I've discovered so many people have not. Some things that stand out:

• When Robert Dole ran for president in 1988, he said the Cuban embargo was beginning to work. It wasn't. That was 38 years ago. It still hasn't "worked."
• I worked with a woman in finance who didn't know New Mexico was a state. She has a degree.
• A Florida mother was furious her daughter's school time was being wasted on history.
• I listen to MAGAs who don't know the basics of U.S. history, such as that there are three branches of government never mind not knowing what they do. 
• Men, women of all ages asked on the street to identify an important member of their government can't. More than once a person couldn't identify a presidential candidate.
• A friend's granddaughter's and her boyfriend visited me from New York City when I lived in Boston. They wanted to know if we would have time to go see New England.

It is worse now. No wonder the U.S. is in such a mess.