Donald Trump was just impeached by the House for the second time, which is the first time in history a president has been impeached twice. Illinois just became the first state to end cash bonds by passing the Pretrial Fairness Act. Domestic terrorists attacked the Capitol last week. Joe Biden’s inauguration happened, and he isn’t riding the Amtrak as post-president-elects have done due to security concerns. These moments will undeniably be taught to future United States history students in their renovated “Brinkleys” and “Zinns.” So why aren’t we taking more class time now to unpack these events?

I understand that the nature of online learning has whittled down traditional curriculums to become less expansive, and, with this loss, it’s sensible that teachers will use as much time as possible to teach the course material. But sometimes we can’t pretend that math equations and conjugation techniques are our priority. As someone who really loves learning and is an inherently curious person, I genuinely always look forward to delving into the coursework of each of my classes. However, I wish we spent more time recognizing that school is not always the priority, and sometimes we need to talk about politics, learn from one another, and center current events in classroom discussions. 

Without comprehensively discussing current events, I worry that people will have to suppress their emotions, which inevitably would influence students’ ability to do classwork. Furthermore, political discussions offer rich insights into one another’s perspectives and experiences that we might otherwise not be informed of. I’m not suggesting that every single class should open with a conversation about the previous day’s events, but when significant events take place as we have seen recently, there should be an opportunity to have an open dialogue. Of course, students may wish to not speak, but simply providing a space for this discussion could help build deeper awareness within the community. 

I won’t feed into the argument that we shouldn’t have finals because I’m sure people are tired of hearing that, but I just want to recognize that we literally had finals during an inauguration. I’m still processing how students were expected to devote undivided attention to their C and D period finals as Biden was sworn into office. It seems tone-deaf to make students sit for an exam or present a project during this significant transfer of power. Once again, I understand that classes and course curriculums are not always malleable and thus cannot be terminated or amended as politics comes into play. However, I think it’s important that students engage with current events and pay attention to these historical moments, which, in the case of the inauguration, will be relatively unfeasible to do in live time if you have had a class period during it.