Dan Ritschel, professor of history and director of the Center for History Education, was a guest on Maryland Morning during a July 11th segment on Maryland’s newly-added government assessment test for high school seniors.
The test, which will be first given in 2017, was part of a new law passed by the Maryland General Assembly this spring. Ritschel spoke of the importance of the test’s introduction, but noted also that other fields – including his own – remain somewhat neglected as the high school level.
“There used to be a Maryland performance assessment in history until 2002, and following the introduction of the federal No Child Left Behind legislation, the Maryland Department of Education scrapped the testing of history,” he said. “So what we’re left with is the testing of U.S. government at the high school level – and I think it’s a wonderful thing that it’s been returned – but I think we shouldn’t forget the fact that history hasn’t been tested at the state level since 2002.”
