Part of the process of becoming a legalized U.S. citizen is to successfully pass a basic U.S. history and civics exam, which has been the case since 1986. Alarmingly, statistics show that only 1 in 3 adult Americans can successfully pass that exam, which means that two-thirds of our newest citizens are better versed in our history than we who have longed called ourselves Americans. In my view, there is something fundamentally wrong with that and should be remedied.

I believe it should be mandatory to earn the right and privilege to vote, all Americans should be required to pass the very exam that we expect of immigrants seeking U.S. citizenship. Further, no child should receive a high school diploma until they can pass the exam. Certainly, no policy-making elected official should be allowed to hold any public office unless they can successfully pass the exam.

I believe it is imperative that all adult Americans should have a basic understanding of our history and how our government works in order to make informed decisions presently as well as for the future. It would be interesting to see how our current political policy makers from local officials to the White House would do on the exam. It actually might be quite frightening, although eye opening.

If literacy is an issue, oral exams are available and there are many audio books by such historians as David McCullough, Stephen Ambrose, Shelby Foote, and the list goes on. Not to mention documentaries by Ken Burns that are amazing and covers a wide range of topics.

Gerard Austin

Solon

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