A nation should require all of its students to study the same national curriculum until they enter college.Write a response in which you discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree with the recommendation and explain your reasoning for the position

A nation relies on its schools to engender the leaders of tomorrow. Adopting a common national curriculum can bring the youth of a country in unison. An ideal curriculum should reflect what a nation wants its future leaders and citizens to know about its history, accomplishments and the challenges in the way ahead.

A national curriculum exposes students to the history of their nation, providing them with a holistic view of their cultural, economical, social and technological evolution, rather than promoting a provincial view circumscribed to their respective states. Students learn to appreciate the fact that their state(or local region) has evolved out of an agglomeration of states, which forms a nation, and is still contingent upon other member states for its progress in various spheres.

An identical national curriculum will persuade students to ponder on the problems of national importance, as they will learn to recognize themselves as a part of the whole. An instance emphasizing the importance of having a hawk-eye view on national problems is the current state of drug abuse in West Virginia. If we have a chapter on the perils of drug abuse and have the current state of West Virginia as a case study in the syllabus of schools in say New York, it will prompt students to come up with different experiments and solutions to eradicate this problem, even if this problem has no bearings on the New Yorkers.

When students across states share common information base, it ameliorates the plausibility of inter-state discourses of national interests during their childhood itself. The nation need not wait for their students to reach a maturity level for them to appreciate the value of national interests over that of their own state or province etc. For example, with a national curriculum in place, students from different states can participate in debate competitions with topics germane to the nation and not just their states or immediate neighbors.

Looking at the view of a common national curriculum in terms of convenience, it is common for students to migrate from one state to another due to personal reasons like their parents switching jobs etc. In such cases, having a common curriculum makes this transition easier for students as they do not find themselves completely alien to what is been taught in their new school. For example, India is known for its diversity in various spheres, and education sector is not untouched by this either. There are several education boards prescribing curriculum with little or no overlaps among one another. A student whose father has changed job or has been transferred from say Andhra Pradesh to Maharashtra, has to virtually start from scratch, aligning herself with the new curriculum, and an almost little to no overlap among those state board curriculum, leaves this goal an arduous one to accomplish.

On a bigger scale, fostering of the often pernicious regional politics and strong predilections of administrative officers, ministers and decision makers, in general, to benefit their states, while they are in power, is often the result of their provincial mindset, fomented by their early education. A national curriculum has the potential to subdue the development of these regional prejudices in the minds of students during their formative years. A common national curriculum will channel students to an unprejudiced path, with students viewing entire nation as their own, rather than developing affinity towards the welfare of their home state or region etc.

However, my advocacy on a common national curriculum should not be construed as disregarding the interests of individual students. My view does not discourage establishing special interest groups in schools focusing on different extracurricular, academic activities or even engaging in discussions on regional issues.

I would proffer that, schools(and the nation in general) should adopt a liberal view of informing students about their national history, current challenges, etc by adopting a nation-wide curriculum, but should not balk students from pursuing their special interests.