Revolutionary War, Beginning of America, Civil War, World War I, The ‘20s, Great Depression, World War II. Every year it is the same thing, the same lessons, the same stories, the same videos. Every history class that I have taken since eighth grade has taught us history to about the ‘50s or so. I have hardly had lessons on the Vietnam War, the Cold War, Civil Rights, or cultural events in the ‘80s or ‘90s. 

History is important because it teaches us about what went right and wrong in the past and what we need to do and not repeat it. But we still have time to learn about the more current side of history. First off it helps us know what is happening right now and how it can affect us, secondly learning about current events would be relevant and make students care about the topics more. While what happened in the ‘60s or ‘70s or later may not be “current ‘’ it is still a period of time that we need to focus on more. 

Recently with the crisis in Ukraine there has been a lot of unease and questions from students. One of my teachers did take the time to talk with us about it, which I felt was particularly important. At the same time should it really take a huge crisis to talk about what is currently happening in our world? What is going on with Ukraine and Russia is and will affect all of us, and so will other important things that have happened in more recent years. 

During my freshman year of high school my world history teacher would show us CNN 10 at the beginning of most classes to give us some insight on current events, but I feel that even with that we weren’t getting enough information about the modern world. 

In eighth grade our history class was American history. Three years later I am once again taking U.S history and learning most of the same information that I did in eighth grade. My sister is currently an eighth grader and there were many days that we discovered that both of us were learning similar, if not the same, topics. Why are we required to take these classes that are almost the same? 

I have always enjoyed studying history, but recently the repetition is making it hard to enjoy the classes. I want the current history classes that we are required to take to build off of each other instead of repeating the same information every year. Instead of starting at the same point in history each year, pick up where the last class left off. We need to take time to talk about events that have happened during the times we experienced or just before our time, events that my peers and I can relate to and share our own experiences. 

The students of today are tomorrow’s future, and we must talk about what is happening today so we can be prepared for tomorrow.