African-Americans in Historic Perspective - Essay Example

The idea of National Standards seemed to offer a way of composing a coherent narrative of American development and of establishing clear expectations of the historical knowledge to be acquired by students."1 The idea of developing standards in all subjects of K-12 grade picked up pace in 1990 when the then Bush administration launched the National Education Goals aimed at inter alia, "a new standard for an educated citizenry, one suitable for the next century. America can meet this challenge if our society is dedicated to a renaissance in education."2

These goals were determined in the realization of the findings that the standard of education in the United States was not at par with other nations where students coming out of universities were more knowledgeable, better trained and creative. The National Education Goals initiative gave itself a time period of ten years, that is, by the year 2000 when students in America will deal with their subjects in a more competent manner in that they will be more creative and better able to apply their mind to learning.

The subjects students would learn with this new approach included English, mathematics, science, geography and more importantly history. The reasons behind setting these goals were nothing but preparing students for responsible citizenship, further learning, and productive employment in a modern economy. The 1983 report, A Nation at Risk also warned of a rapid decline in American students' academic achievements. But the truth, says Kevin Kosar in his new book Failing Grades, is that mediocrity "is not rising: it has been high for at least three decades.

"3 This chapter will look into the process of setting standards for the history subjects for students Kindergarten through Grade 12 and the notion of inclusion (and exclusion) in the American story with particular reference to the African-Americans. While the philosophy of what can safely be called rewriting American history is that it does not necessarily have to be a narrative of extraordinary people and events but the ordinary people and ordinary events were as much important. Although the National History Standards initiative had bipartisan support and the process adopted a participatory approach, the right-wing decided to take a snipe at the mention of certain people and events such as the Ku Klux Klan and McCarthyism and the inclusion of African-Americans.

The objection was also on presenting America's African heritage at the cost of downgrading the European heritage.