I teach at USC, and it's obvious to anyone who teaches college students that they don't cover much modern history and certainly not the modern presidency.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
I have taught history on the high school and college levels, and am or have been a lecturer at the Smithsonian, The National Institutes of Health, and numerous colleges and universities, mostly on science fiction and technology subjects.
I'm really interested in modern history, but to fulfill a History degree at Brown you have to do modern and pre-modern.
The school curriculum today, particularly American history, is a shame.
I didn't realize the president was such an historian.
One of the things that really bothers me is that Americans don't have any sense of history. The majority of Americans don't have any idea of where we've come from, so they naturally succumb to the kind of cliche version that Ronald Reagan represented.
I remember, growing up as a kid, history class was very washed-over. They didn't really get into the gritty bits of slavery. It's a very, very small section in the history books. It's not something they really touch on directly with American curriculums.
My mom was a history teacher, so I couldn't really avoid history when I was growing up. But we're very light on American history. We don't really have great opportunities to study both the Civil War and the Revolution.
And I also thought that Richard Nixon was the greatest political education we have ever had, but it looks like we need to relearn them again.
Man seems to insist on ignoring the lessons available from history.
American history has fallen more and more into the hands of academics.