Staples’ social studies department has recently drastically changed their curriculum. Instead of a euro-centric, American-centric, and really white-person-centric syllabus, the social studies department has opted for a more multicultural curriculum.
These changes are certainly an improvement. Staples students need to get a global perspective in order to succeed in the globalized economy that exists today. It isn’t 1953 anymore; you cannot get by on just knowing who our founding fathers are, or what the contributing causes to the Civil War are.
No other country has as self-centered an education system as does America. Spain doesn’t just study the history of Spain, they study the history of the entire world: during elementary school! During my elementary school history class, I remember learning the capitals of the fifty states, and the virtues of presidents Washington and Lincoln.
Don’t get me wrong, I loved taking both Honors American History and AP U.S. History, and AP U.S. Government was also a great class. But I’m also a self-proclaimed HistoryNerd who has taken almost every course the Social Studies Department has to offer, and I know that only taking classes with the word “American” or “European” in them is not a substantiating education. I may be able to tell you about the Emancipation Proclamation all day long, but what good is that if I can’t connect it to the United Nation’s declaration of Human Rights?
This new curriculum also encourages multiculturalism. In a suburb that is 95% white, we could stand to use a little culture shock. The real world is not like homogeneous Westport, and school should be educating us in preparation for the real world. History isn’t just composed of white faces, despite what our American history books may proclaim. Our very civilization was built upon ideals, materials, beliefs, innovations and philosophies drawn from all around the world. If you go into the world thinking that the only people you need to know about are Napoleon and Washington, you are in for a big surprise. Confucius and Siddhartha Gupta are considered just as important in many areas of the world, for example.

It isn’t even just a favor to ourselves to be educated in worldly affairs — it’s a duty to others. Every single one of our actions, whether we want to realize it or not, as consumers, as voters, as thinkers, as students, has a profound impact on the rest of the world. Your “Wreckers” sweatshirt you’re wearing? It was probably made by a sweatshop worker in Indonesia. Your cell phone on which you’re texting your friend about Friday night? The tungsten from inside your phone was probably mined by an eight year old child in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. And that isn’t something you were able to learn in AP US History.