First-Year Seminar: Summer Reading
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The summer reading is chosen each year by a committee of students, faculty, and staff from the Ramapo College community. Committee members use selection criteria to ensure that a book is chosen which:
- Will elicit rich discussions among first-year students in their first-year seminar classes
- Will have a subject that is current, thought-provoking, and relevant to first-year students
- Will have an author who is an engaging speaker
- Will have style and content accessible to all students
Class of 2015 Summer Reading
The Summer Reading Committee has selected "Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong" as the 2011 summer reading. In his book, retired Prof. James W. Loewen describes how American history is rendered bland and factually incorrect in high school textbooks by omitting all of the ambiguity, passion, conflict, and drama that existed at the time when important historical events unfolded. Whether the writing was a result of blind patriotism, mindless optimism, sheer misinformation, or outright lies, American students are not presented with the whole story.
Lies My Teacher Told Me will be read by all incoming first-year students this summer and will be used to exercise their critical reading and thinking skills in all First-Year Seminar courses in Fall 2011.
Summer Reading Suggestion Form
Summer Reading Essay Contest for members of the Class of 2015
You are currently reading Lies My Teacher Told Me. Now kick off your first year at Ramapo College with some reflection and a shot at a $100 prize and lunch with author James W. Loewen. (Up to three winning entries will be selected.)
Answer this essay question:
Professor James Loewen’s research on high school American history textbooks has shown that high school students are exposed to American history in a simplistic, idealized, and often incorrect manner to enhance a certain viewpoint. How has reading Lies My Teacher Told Me changed your ideas on the teaching of American history in high schools? How has your own knowledge of American history been altered?
Contest parameters:
- Make sure to reference the summer reading in your essay. You may use supporting evidence from other sources, but your primary source should be Lies My Teacher Told Me.
- Please consider the context of critical thinking when writing your essay.
- Essays will be judged based on use of text, effectiveness of reflection, and use of supporting evidence.
- Please limit your response to 750 words to help us ensure that all submissions receive fair evaluation.
- All work must be your original contribution.
- All essays must be received by September 1st, 2011 at 5:00 PM. The three winning essays will be announced at the Opening Convocation on September 21st, 2011.
- Entries must be submitted to Prof. Robert Mentore, Director of FYS by attaching your essay to an e-mail message and sending it to this address: rmentore@ramapo.edu.
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Appearing with President Mercer and
author James W. Loewen arePrevious Summer Readings
- Fall 2010: Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder
- Fall 2009: The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch and Jeffery Zaslow
- Fall 2008: The Canon: A Whirligig Tour of the Beautiful Basics of Science by Natalie Angier
- Fall 2007: A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah
- Fall 2006: Fast Food Nation by Eric Schlosser
- Fall 2005: Reading Lolita in Teheran by Azar Nafisi
- Fall 2004: One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
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