English, history, mathematics and science are all required subjects of study in grades one through 12 in the United States. In many other countries, one other subject is also weighed as equally important– geography.
Many Americans may be unable to locate these other countries on a globe.
Students in the United States lack basic geography in their education throughout much of the K to 12 years, according to Dr. John Carthew, geography professor at Pierce College.
Carthew said that students from other nations are not necessarily smarter than U.S. students, but their schools do focus much more on geographic literacy than do school in the states.
Carthew has watched students file in and out of Pierce for 43 years. He has taught college level courses in physical, cultural, and world regional geography, and also courses on the geography of California.
In his experiences as a geography teacher, he has realized that the Los Angeles Unified School District puts much more of an emphasis on history than it does on geography.
Carthew feels that the LAUSD teaches students to pass tests, rather than to retain information.
“I notice that my students are much more interested in passing tests than they are in gaining knowledge,” said Carthew.
Gail Hobbs, geography professor at Pierce, also agrees that students come to college with little physical knowledge of the Earth.
“I went to Grant High School in Van Nuys decades ago, and the only type of geography course offered at all was a 10-week history class. That was all we could take in high school,” Hobbs said.
Even at U.S. colleges, geography is offered as an elective course. Students may take geography to fulfill certain science requirements, but an array of other subjects may also be taken in its place.
Biology, oceanography and history courses are some of the classes that may be taken instead.
“Many students think that geography is just memorizing places and names on a map,” Carthew said. “They don’t realize what geography is before they take the course, so they just avoid it all together.
“‘Geo’ means earth description and ‘graphy’ is a representation of a specified thing. Some of it is social science and some of it is physical science. It is not all just map work,” he said.
Currently, geography is part of the anthropological and geographical sciences department.
Pierce is working on expanding the geography program at Pierce and also on forming a separate geography department.
“Pierce has a good geography program,” Carthew said. “There are always three to four professors on faculty and 20 to 30 sections offered every semester.
“I’ve developed several upper division courses that will be offered in the spring semester at California State University, Northridge, including ‘The Geography of the U.S. and Canada’ and ‘The Geography of Latin America’,” he said.
Hobbs feels that many students have a small understanding of natural geographic patterns in our world.
“History is shaped because of the earth it happens on,” Hobbs said. “People don’t understand what happens beneath them on the surface of the earth.
“Certain events could have only taken place because of their geographical location.”
There are certain places on planet Earth that many people could locate by eye on a map. These places of common knowledge are often related to major military confrontations.
“The location of Iraq, Korea and Vietnam are much more known than the location of Zimbabwe,” Carthew said.
The geography courses offered at Pierce are the same level as the classes offered at California state universities.
“The students, in terms of availability in their math and language levels, are all over the place, and we work with an increasing number of students that don’t have language and math skills and still attempt taking geography courses that are at university levels,” Hobbs said.
“Many students test into prerequisite math and English classes,” she said. “Especially if English is not their first language, they need to beef up those skills before they take the college level geography courses.
“It’s like trying to play a professional sport when you are only at an entry level.”
Students are advised to take college level English and mathematics courses before taking college level geography courses.
“Taking those classes before may make the geography class easier to understand and it will make more sense,” Hobbs said.
Just in case students forget where they are, they can refer to the globe. ()