The AP World History curriculum is abundant with information on the Ottomans, the Mughals, Champa rice and the various Chinese empires. But when it comes to the period 1939-1945, the topic of World War 2 is sort of brushed over—with no real depth on the atrocities that occurred. The curriculum allocates only around four days, which, compared to other topics, is a very short amount of time to go over a very important event in our world’s history.
WWII is a topic that many people are uneducated about, whether it relates to the Holocaust being a topic that not many individuals know about in depth, or even who the man behind the atrocities and the ideology is. With AP World History being a class that around 450 students take yearly, it is crucial for this information to be presented to the next generations. Being informed on WWII is valuable as this traces back to literacy on other socially relevant events. The lack of WWII coverage in AP World further perpetuates the low understanding of the war and its effects.
Knowledge concerning who the Nazis were and how fascist and hateful ideologies lead to the events of World War 2 isn’t common for the majority of our population. When asking some students the question of “who are the Nazis?” The question is always followed with a vague description or no knowledge at all. Even students taking AP World can be seen with the same confusion. Why is it that a student taking a college-level world history class can’t answer a question about something that should be information almost everybody should know?
With AP World history being such a profound class that is taken by hundreds of students, having enough coursework and designated number of days to teach this material will help increase the knowledge students will have about key factors like the ideas and impacts the Nazis had, the impact of the Holocaust and more. Being able to introduce this material in a timely fashion with the correct amount of information would be adequate in supporting the education of WWII and the Holocaust in a way that will be impactful, instead of a one day lecture with no real meaning or content behind the teaching.
