RI high school students need exposure to more Global Studies content - in The Independent (3-17-16)

by Jim Buxton

         

NOTE # 1: THIS ARTICLE APPEARED IN THE INDEPENDENT 3-17-16.

SEE THE ARTICLE AFTER THIS ONE FOR A MUCH MORE DETAILED ANALYSIS OF THIS ISSUE.  IF YOU'RE INTERESTED IN EMAILING ME ON THIS TOPIC, RATHER THAN COMMENTING AT THE END OF THE ARTICLE, YOU CAN DO SO AT:  

JBuxton564@cox.net)

  
NOTE # 2:  The CAPITALIZED SECTIONS IN THE FOLLOWING TEXT ARE SOME THINGS I WOULD HAVE LIKED TO HAVE PUT INTO THE ARTICLE, BUT COULD NOT BECAUSE OF THE WORD LIMIT.

            To solve the immigration problem, Donald Trump proposes that “he’ll build a great wall on our southern border, and he’ll make the Mexicans pay for it.”  He overgeneralizes about Mexicans saying they’re criminals and rapists.  Trump disrespects 20% of the global population which is Islamic, while proposing that we need to build an anti-ISIS coalition with Islamic countries.  He says he’ll just “bomb the h…..” out of ISIS, and then take the oil!  You would think that these simplistic approaches would cause his poll numbers to go down. This is not the case.  Trump offers simplistic solutions to extremely complex, international controversies which are appealing to many of his supporters who may have insufficient background information on global matters.  Would Rhode Island high school graduates have the requisite knowledge regarding causes for refugees leaving Central America, or why there is such conflict in the Middle East, in order to evaluate the “Trump Doctrine”?

            Where does this need for simplistic global solutions come from?  I can only legitimately comment on RI.  I am concerned by the meager prior global knowledge of the Freshmen I teach in my International Politics course at URI.  (SKHS grads do better than most because most have taken Global Studies in high school.  WELL DONE, SKHS SOCIAL STUDIES DEPARTMENT) THE 100 LEVEL INTERNATIONAL POLITICS COURSE IS AN ELECTIVE.  MOST WILL NOT TAKE IT.  THEREFORE, the vast majority of RI high school graduates, who eventually graduate from URI, will do so without learning very much about the modern Middle East, a subject much debated in the current Presidential race.  Indeed, RI high school graduates should already have learned a lot more about current global history.  

            I’m certainly not blaming Social Studies Departments for this!  Since 2009, I’ve been supervising student teachers in a variety of high schools, and many of the teachers I come in contact with share a common concern; every year they’re able to teach less and less historical content.  In Western Civilization classes, they barely make it to the 20^th Century, and in US History they have to skim over the last 50 years.  The result is that they have insufficient time to teach about modern global issues.  Why is that?

            In the past ten years there have been numerous good-hearted reforms implemented in order to help previously unsuccessful students, which is an important priority.   To help reduce dropout rates, the following reforms have been promoted by the RI Department of Education, and instituted to varying degrees by individual school systems.  I focus on those which have contributed to a reduction in HS Social Studies content coverage the most:  (1) flexible deadlines for submitting homework: (2) re-tests, re-writes; (3) more peer teaching; (4) portfolio, as a way to show what students learn; (5) advisory period; (6) more heterogeneous groupings, except for AP and Honors students; (7) differentiated instruction, as a theoretical way of teaching the huge spectrum of abilities in the non-AP classes; (8) maximum percentages that homework can count for course grade; (9) extensive time spent on reflections; (10) pre- and formative assessments.  All of these well – meaning measures, inevitably, reduce content breadth.  (TO UNDERSTAND WHY EACH OF THESE MEASURES REDUCE CONTENT BREADTH, SEE THE FOLLOWING ARTICLE ON THIS BLOG.)
             Added to THE AFOREMENTIONED TEN MEASURES is the extraordinary amount of time spent taking and preparing for  standardized tests which, by the way, do not measure Social Studies content knowledge. IN FACT, A CONSIDERABLE AMOUNT OF SOCIAL STUDIES CLASSROOM TIME IS SPENT HELPING TO PREPARE STUDENTS FOR THE ENGLISH AND LANGUAGE ARTS PART OF THE PARCC TEST.   
           Finally, I would assert that there are many educational authorities who support a “less is more” educational philosophy; less content breadth, more depth.  IN MY PAST GLOBAL STUDIES TEACHING AT SKHS, AND IN MY CURRENT INTERNATIONAL POLITICS TEACHING AT URI, I CERTAINLY DEAL WITH MANY ISSUES IN GREAT DEPTH. THAT'S VERY IMPORTANT.  HOWEVER, IN MY VIEW, YOU CAN'T ANALYZE AN ISSUE IN DEPTH UNLESS YOU HAVE ESSENTIAL BACKGROUND INFORMATION ON THE TOPIC.  THE MEASURES MENTIONED PREVIOUSLY ARE REDUCING BOTH BREADTH, AND DEPTH.  INDEED, LESS IS NOT MORE; LESS IS LESS!
          The policy making authorities who are pushing these reforms tend to have elementary education backgrounds (See FORMER RIDE COMMISSIONER DEB GIST).  THEY DO NOT SEEM TO BE AS CONCERNED AS HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS SEEM TO BE WHEN BIOLOGY, ALGEBRA OR WORLD HISTORY breadth (or depth) is significantly reduced.  I WILL POINT OUT THAT I HAVE GREAT RESPECT FOR ELEMENTARY TEACHERS - MY DAUGHTER IS A 4TH GRADE TEACHER, AND I WOULD NEVER BE ABLE TO DO WHAT SHE DOES!  I WOULD NEVER OFFER MY OPINION AS TO WHAT ELEMENTARY SCHOOL TEACHERS SHOULD TEACH, AND I WOULD RATHER HAVE HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS DECIDE WHAT IS TO BE TAUGHT AT THE HIGH SCHOOL LEVEL.  BY THE WAY, MY DAUGHTER USES ALMOST ALL OF THE 10 AFOREMENTIONED MEASURES IN HER 4TH GRADE CLASS.  I WOULD CONTEND THAT THESE SAME MEASURES CERTAINLY DO NOT APPLY TO HIGH SCHOOL TEACHING TO THE SAME DEGREE!
            I must acknowledge that the ten aforementioned measures have significant logic, and I’d imagine that they have reduced the likelihood of certain students dropping out, and that’s important!  However, what/who has been compromised?

            Most of the measures above don’t apply to AP students because the teachers are obliged to teach the content which will be assessed by national AP tests.  Therefore, they’re not compromised as much as the mid-level students who are exposed to less content than was once the case.  I ACKNOWLEDGE THAT THERE IS NO CLEAR DEFINITION OF A MID-LEVEL STUDENT, AND THE MID-LEVEL STUDENT IN MATH MAY BE AN AP STUDENT IN ENGLISH.  NONETHELESS, I WILL STILL CONTEND THAT THE TEN AFOREMENTIONED MEASURES, ESPECIALLY # 6, HAVE SIGNIFICANTLY IMPACTED THE BROAD MIDDLE.
                   Interestingly, private schools are not affected by 1 – 10 above, or by standardized tests.  
                  Although this topic is very complex, I would say that the “elephant in the room” is that the mid-level student in many public schools gets compromised the most in regard to potential global literacy.  In the end, an overuse of the aforementioned reform measures, with disregard for the breadth of history content covered, is dangerous to our democracy because we are graduating students who have insufficient global competence (WHICH IS THEORETICALLY A RI DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION GOAL). Therefore, ALL TOO MANY RI HS AND COLLEGE GRADUATES are subject to being manipulated by those who offer simplistic solutions to address complex global problems.  They’re also less likely to understand newspaper coverage of international news.

            For more “breadth” and “depth”on this topic, see my Blog: rihssocialstudies.blogspot.com

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            Jim Buxton taught Social Studies at South Kingstown HS for three decades, and is currently an Adjunct in the URI Political Science Department, and the Salve Regina Education Department.