Maine Nesties
MainelyFoolish
member
Dear Community,
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Maine has no U.S. History education standards
Well, none that mean anything, anyway. 
Check out this report:
http://www.edexcellencemedia.net/publications/2011/20110216_SOSHS/SOSS_USHistory_Maine.pdf
Re: Maine has no U.S. History education standards
Maine got a 0/10 for a grade; my home stat of CT got only 1/10. Awesome!
Did you see the science report (from 2005; the next one is in progress)? Maine got a D in that, too. What the heck?!?
Well really, I mean, who needs to know anything about history?
KIDDING! This is appalling!
In my school in VA we took social studies classes for 3 years of high school. (On the above report, VA scored a 6/10.) My high school teachers were really good, especially my World History and U.S. History. It's a good thing, too, since I never took any more history or government classes past high school.
My sophomore year I took Humanities I, which was a combination of English 10 and World Geography and History. We had to memorize the name and capital (with proper spelling, of course) of every country in the world. We had to write a research paper. We had to write our own practice SAT questions. Part of our final exam (open notes, thank goodness) was designing our own museum -- we had to select objects from different periods of history and explain their significance. It was hard core. I can't believe how much I still remember from this class after twenty years.
My junior year I took Humanties II, which was a combination of English 11 and AP U.S. History. Not quite as difficult as Hum I (if you can believe it) but it prepared me well. We did watch Glory, but we had to stay after school to do so. I got a 5 on the AP exam.
My senior year I took AP U.S. Government and AP Comparative Government. That class was actually really easy. I goofed off a lot. Got a 5 on the US Gov AP exam but only a 4 on the Comparative Gov AP exam.
I have no idea what public schools in CT were like except for the one I taught in (which SUCKED) because I went to the private school where my dad taught. TOTALLY worth the low salary he got for teaching there-- best education ever. I was very well prepared for college.
But they didn't have to follow any state standards, really-- they were clearly working above the lowest common denominator there! LOL
I think my kids are going to get a lot of supplementation at home unless something changes in the next 5-10 years.
In my high school, science was the big weakness. It drove my dad (who has his doctorate in materials science) batty. We could never figure out why the rest of the teachers at the school were amazing and science teachers couldn't even teach basic concepts correctly.
I find the lack of U.S. history standards really sad. Granted, I'm a history buff but we had an amazing curriculum at my high school - I got to take AP U.S., comprehensive modern European, Asian Studies (focused on China, India and Japan), an AMAZING Western Civ english-art history combination course, and write a thesis. My experience in high school is what first got me interested in history and had me think about public & social policy as a career choice. It was an incredible experience for me and makes me sad to think some kids' experience doesn't even come close.
DH being a history teacher, I can say that his students are far more challenged to learn and use history than it sounds like you were Megan!
So I just took a look at the Maine Learning Results and while they do not specifically have a heading on US History... the expectation that students are learning US History is clearly written out under different standards. And while the Maine Learning Results may be broad... I don't think that makes them ineffective... plus I don't know of any high school (having worked in 4 either as an intern or a staff member) that isn't teaching US History and that doesn't go way beyond what is stated in the Maine Learning Results.
http://www.state.me.us/education/lres/ss.htm