A Closer Look at the Pentagon’s New Curriculum

Your kids spend about 1,000 hours in the classroom every year. What are they doing there?

That old question has now found its way into a fight over the schools that serve military families.

Last month, the Associated Press reported that the Defense Department school system, which serves roughly 70,000 students at 160 schools around the world, will offer a new course on Western civilization drawing on The Golden Thread, the two-volume history by Allen Guelzo and James Hankins, and lesson materials developed with Hillsdale College. The story quickly became a debate about ideology, historical interpretation, and what students should be taught.

There is a simple way to judge our work: read the curriculum.

Hillsdale College, unlike the education industry, is transparent: the Golden Thread Curriculum is available in its entirety, for free, to anyone who wants it, whether it is the Department of Defense, public school teachers, or a homeschooling parent. It contains unit guides, lessons, assessments, and a pedagogical framework for using these books in K-12 classrooms. Parents and critics alike can see for themselves what questions we ask and what we expect students to learn.