In Report, University History Departments Face Scrutiny
At a press conference on Thursday afternoon, three conservative groups — the Texas Public Policy Foundation, the National Association of Scholars and the Texas Association of Scholars — will release a sure-to-be controversial report alleging that the University of Texas and Texas A&M University offer students "a less-than-comprehensive picture of history.”
The report’s rollout is part of a three-day policy orientation by the TPPF, an Austin-based think tank that has been tied to some of the state's most hotly debated proposed higher education reforms. It signals a renewed push to reconsider the course offerings in the history departments of ...
Comments (12)
Joshua Bradshaw via Texas Tribune on Facebook
Shouldn't basic American and Western history already be a core part of middle and high school education? I feel strongly that history should reflect multiple perspectives and be comprehensive in scope, and students should also have opportunities to take courses with specific focuses at universities. An effort to make standards and requirements to "de-politicize" or "eliminate political correctness" is itself restrictive and counterproductive.
Karen Spivey-Cummings via Texas Tribune on Facebook
The dumbing down of Texas children continue. Yikes.
Lucian Villasenor via Texas Tribune on Facebook
No mention of the $1,000,000 UT College of Liberal Arts cut from the ethnic and identity studies centers 2 years ago, and that Asian American Studies is going to disappear soon?
Delbert Bradshaw via Texas Tribune on Facebook
I can remember when A & M allowed one race, one gender, and many people said they had no class. Oh t'was the good old days. Just kidding, let's get back to the good stuff.
Michelle Michon via Texas Tribune on Facebook
TPPF is the Texas arm of ALEC. They have NO business in the reform of our History Studies. None what so ever! Don't be fooled Texas!
tthomas48
In case this wasn't obvious. Yo. This is racist.
Joseph Lippert via Texas Tribune on Facebook
Generally this reflects the development of the discipline to explain what present-day historians think is the nature of human behavior. Military and diplomatic fields can be important, but their explanations can be influenced by social or economic fields. Interference with this development is kinda like steering what some interests may believe is important, rather than empirically determining the approach.
cb waldrep
Are they upset that history is no longer just great deeds done by white men?
Bill Bush via Texas Tribune on Facebook
I hope they did not learn their "research methods" from an actual history program. It would be kind of like claiming to know what happened in the Clay-Webster debate by reviewing the the House meeting agenda for that day.
Chris Lawrence via Texas Tribune on Facebook
The most notable failing of the full report is that the authors complain that there is insufficient focus on general political history (including sources in that area), failing to acknowledge that the Texas legislature also requires students to complete 6 hours in American and Texas politics courses in which these topics would be covered in depth (usually by political scientists rather than historians). Thus coverage of items such as the Declaration of Independence, Bill of Rights, Federalist Papers, and Supreme Court cases would properly be found in Texas Common Courses in that field, GOVT 2301-2302/2305-2306, not the HIST sequence.
Robert Ruiz via Texas Tribune on Facebook
say it isn't so.
Stefan Haag
A link to the report would be helpful. It's http://www.nas.org/images/documents/Recasting_History.pdf