Authors: Bjorn Wansink and Jeremy Stoddard
During the EuroClio conference in 2026 in Brussels, I had the opportunity to give a workshop together with Jeremy Stoddard, professor of curriculum and instruction, from University of Wisconsin – Madison in the U.S.. I have known Jeremy for many years, and we share an interest in democratic education and in teaching civics and history in partisan contexts. Our workshop focused on teaching in the aftermath of elections and on populism. In this interview, I talk with Jeremy about history education in the US and his research on the role of 9/11 in education. He has conducted multiple studies on the topic, and now, twenty-five years after the attacks, his findings offer an important perspective. Let’s talk with Jeremy.
Bjorn: Jeremy, could you introduce yourself and tell us what inspired you to become a researcher in history education and the social sciences?
Jeremy: I grew up in a very rural area and was always interested in how history was represented in national narratives, for example through television and film. However, when I visited historic sites, I realized that the stories presented there were often quite different.
I eventually became a history teacher and taught middle school in Minnesota. During that time, I became interested in how young people understand the nature of history. Do they see it as a fixed story of what happened, as it is often presented in U.S. textbooks and schools, or do they see it as something that can be explored through inquiry and interpretation?
As I continued teaching, I also became interested in why teachers use different types of media to engage students with history. This led me to do graduate work in educational technologies, learning sciences, and social studies education. My initial research focused on the intersection between representations of the past and students’ epistemological understanding of history.
One thing I found is that teachers often select films that align with their own perspectives or even their political biases, but then present those films as though they were historical fact or a lecture, without encouraging students to think critically about how history is being represented. Other teachers, however, engage students much more deeply by inviting them to question and analyze those representations.
I still believe that, when used thoughtfully, media representations of history can be a powerful way to develop students’ historical thinking. They can help students better understand not only the nature of history, but also how media shape our understanding of the past, and how those same critical skills can be applied to interpreting the world today.
Bjorn: For teachers in Europe, what are the most important things to understand about the United States in order to make sense of history education there?
Jeremy: One of the biggest challenges for people outside the United States is understanding that there is no single U.S. education system. Instead, there are over 50 different education systems. The way subjects are taught vary dramatically from state to state, and even within a single state. In Wisconsin, where I live, the approach can differ significantly from one school, or even one classroom, to another.
In the United States, education is primarily the responsibility of the states. Federal policy generally only comes into play when the federal government provides funding for specific programs or initiatives or when federal law is violated (e.g., civil rights).
There are also major differences in how states are organized. Historically, states on the East Coast and in the South have tended to have more centralized education systems. States in the Midwest, however, developed quite differently. For example, Iowa only adopted statewide academic standards within the past 20 years.
In general, teachers in the United States have a great deal of autonomy, which is a real advantage. At the same time, they do not always receive much guidance, so students’ experiences can vary enormously depending on where they go to school and their teacher.
Bjorn: Has history education in the United States changed during the recent Trump era?
Jeremy: I think it is not so much a result of the Trump administration itself, but rather because many of these states were already moving in that direction. For example, between Trump’s two terms in office, we saw the rise of the so-called anti–Critical Race Theory movement and broader anti-“woke” campaigns. These developments happened mainly at the state level.
There were lobbying groups pushing policies, under the banner of “transparency,” to make all teaching materials publicly available on school websites by July — including all books, resources, and lesson materials. Realistically, that is almost impossible to do. However, there were financial penalties attached to these requirements if the policies were adopted.
What we are seeing is that many of these measures are essentially attempts to weaken or bankrupt public education. There has been a long-standing conservative criticism of public schools. In states that have passed “divisive concepts” laws, which restrict what teachers are allowed to teach, the language is often very vague. This makes it difficult for teachers to know exactly what is permitted and what is not.
The result is that teachers begin to censor themselves because they are unsure where the boundaries are. They have not removed slavery from the curriculum, for example. Instead, the goal is often to shift teaching back toward the way it was presented 30 or 40 years ago, with a more traditional historical narrative.
The reason is that during the pandemic we saw the growth of the Black Lives Matter movement and other anti-racist and social justice movements. These gained significant attention and encouraged many teachers across the United States, even in more conservative areas, to include more Black history and incorporate more anti-racist teaching approaches into their classrooms.
I think this is what many conservatives wanted to push back against very quickly. They argued that these approaches were anti-American. As a result, many teachers became concerned that community members might file complaints against them.
So, the national political rhetoric around these issues may have had a greater impact than the policies themselves.
Bjorn: You have extensively researched the role of 9/11 in history and social studies education. What first drew you to this area of research?
Jeremy: At the time, I was working for a regional education agency, so I was often out visiting schools. On the morning of 9/11, I was on my way to a school when I heard the first radio report that a small plane had hit one of the [World Trade Center] towers. That’s how it was initially described on public radio.
I spent that morning sitting in the school library with a group of high school students, watching events unfold live. We listened to stories as they came in. It was a massive collective memory event, especially because nearly everyone experienced it through television.
It’s very rare to be able to observe how major events are handled in schools starting from day one—how teachers respond the next day, how the conversation develops. My graduate advisor at the time, Diana Hess, received funding to study the curricula that were released for the first anniversary of 9/11. Many civic nonprofit organizations produced lessons and materials, and we found these curricula were using 9/11 to advance their own organizational goals, for example, encouraging students to vote or focusing on issues like free speech.
We also saw a pattern in how teachers approached 9/11. On the anniversary date, especially in the early years, teachers tended to treat it as a highly emotional exercise in collective memory and memorialization. But starting around 2003, the focus began to shift. With the invasion of Iraq, questions about the use of evidence and justification became central, and the discussion started to fragment into different political and ideological camps.
For instance, in Madison there was a school board meeting that lasted until two or three in the morning over a proposed requirement that schools either had students recite the Pledge of Allegiance or play the national anthem every day. That kind of daily patriotic ritual hadn’t been common before 9/11. Another change was the presence of military recruiters. Before 9/11, in most states, recruiters did not openly circulate in schools. But by 2002–2003, recruitment numbers were low, and the military needed more enlistees. Recruiters started appearing in school cafeterias, actively recruiting high school students, which became quite controversial in many communities.
Later, we examined the first generation of textbooks published around 2003–2004 that included special sections on 9/11. What we found was fascinating: in subsequent editions of those textbooks, the justification for the Iraq invasion changed significantly. Initially, the invasion was framed around weapons of mass destruction. When those weapons were never found, the narrative shifted to emphasize removing a brutal dictator. So the story in the textbooks was revised over time to fit the changing official narrative. Not all textbooks did this, but many of the major ones did.
Bjorn: Were there also differences between states?
Jeremy: Yes, we saw radically different emphases in different states, depending on their politics and on the style of their standards. Some states had a “radical Islamic terrorism” type of emphasis. Other states focused more on the controversy around the decision to invade Iraq.
Another thing we found was that the concept of “terrorism” in textbooks and standards was very blurry. Some definitions included attacks on the military, others limited terrorism to attacks on civilians. We also found that, before 9/11 in the US, the biggest terrorist threats were anti‑government groups and white supremacists. However, immediately after 9/11, in almost all textbooks and standards, only Oklahoma and a few other states included any examples of domestic terrorism.
After 9/11 terrorism was almost always connected to the Middle East and to Arabs or Muslims. As in popular culture, the narrative was basically: terrorism is done by people from the Middle East, and terrorists are Muslims. It doesn’t say this explicitly, but it strongly implies it. All of this rhetoric was used in ways that created fear of Muslims.
We even found that in liberal cities, schools were often not teaching against these narratives. If they didn’t have a large Muslim student population, they generally weren’t challenging or countering those portrayals.
Bjorn: To what extent has the narrative about 9/11 changed over time in the US?
Jeremy: I don’t think the narrative has changed very much. Especially for teachers who were alive at the time and remember 9/11, it is still largely taught as a memorialized historical event. Florida state legislation requires teachers to spend at least 45 minutes on the anniversary teaching about 9/11. As far as I can see, the emphasis is on heroes.
Similarly, Pennsylvania requires schools to hold a moment of silence and created a curriculum that was shared with schools, although they are not obliged to use it. These initiatives are largely driven by politicians who worry that 9/11 will no longer be memorialized in this way because they have heard that attention is starting to drop off. But instead of saying, “We should be teaching about it in a meaningful way,” they reinforce the memorialization and collective memory aspect.
Another problem is that teachers often use television footage on the anniversary with students who have no idea what this event is. It can be horrifying for them. Often, teachers are, for example, teaching about the early colonial period because that is what the curriculum prescribes, and then they suddenly spend a lesson on 9/11 early in the school year. The students think, “What is this?” They then go online, search Google, and end up finding conspiracy theories and similar material.
Bjorn: How could 9/11 be taught differently?
Jeremy: I think you can still address it early in the school year, but treat it as an event around which you develop skills in historical thinking or media literacy. Use it to start equipping students with critical thinking skills. Use it to explore the nature of history and memory — talk about it explicitly as a collective memory event. Why do people remember it?
This year there will be a lot of pressure because of the 25th anniversary and the current political context, and also because the conflict with Iran is still ongoing. We should show students the broader historical context. For instance, Iran was sharing intelligence with the US at that time. You should discuss why they were doing that, and show the complexity of the past.
However, it is very difficult in the US to counter the narrative about Iran when their slogan has been the last decade “Death to the US.” But that also creates an opportunity to ask: why is that their slogan? As teachers, we should encourage students to question the government’s case for major foreign policy decisions and engage with those debates in a way that is not simplistic. It should not be reduced to yes/no or good/bad, but instead focus on reconstructing what was happening and learning from it. We might also ask: if you were the government and had to make the same decision, how could this process be more thoughtful and less black-and-white?
Bjorn: In the Netherlands, teachers sometimes encounter conspiracy theories about 9/11. What have you learned about these?
Jeremy: We learned from some teachers what they are doing in response. Some teach explicitly about the concept of conspiracy theories — why they thrive — and then use them as case studies. I recommend starting with the question: where do we go to find information we can trust? So students are not just searching randomly online or waiting for news to appear in their social media feeds. This has always been important, but it is especially important now, given the massive, chaotic information environment we live in.
However, in our 2018 survey we also found a few teachers who fully believed in some of the conspiracy theories and were teaching this to students as if it were true. Other teachers asked students who held conspiracy beliefs to come back the next day with some evidence and discuss these. Still others were directly teaching the concept of conspiracy theories and their characteristics, so that when 9/11 came up, they could analyze it using those insights.
So I think it is about finding a balance: recognizing conspiracy theories, being able to name them and question the evidence, but also not giving them too much space in class or treating them as authoritative.
Bjorn: You are an expert on film footage and epistemology. What do you think teachers should do with the images of 9-11, show them or not?
Jeremy: Obviously, it depends on age appropriateness. I have seen that some teachers have taken a different route. Especially early on, there were a few short documentaries that did not show as much direct violence but focused on personal stories. One was about Manhattan and people who could not get off the island called Boatlift. Many boats came across and acted as ferries to evacuate people. This leads into an everyday-hero narrative: it shows how people respond in the face of a crisis by helping one another, without showing the full horror. It offers a more positive perspective.
If you do show the images, you need to build in space for students to have an emotional response. Talk about how people might have felt watching this live on TV. Why is it such a strong collective memory? I don’t know how much of the violence I would show. You need to discuss the importance of the event. The Twin Towers were symbols of American and global capitalism. So I would choose footage that helps students understand why it is still considered such a major event and why people remember it so clearly. But also underlying reasons why the attack took place.
Bjorn: How will 9/11 be taught in 50 years? Do you have any idea?
Jeremy: I think the real question is whether it will be taught at all. Will it become just a small episode in the broader narrative? In the last few years, when I talk to teachers, many say they are doing very little with it. I think that is also a problem, because after 9/11 the president gained much more power — and that is still the case. For example, since the Patriot Act, intelligence services do not have to get a judge’s warrant to collect data on American citizens. These are the kinds of things we should worry about and discuss.
But I am concerned that, with all the current political pressures, 9/11 will continue to be framed mainly as a story of heroism: we were a nation under attack; 9/11 came out of nowhere. It is still often taught as a sudden, shocking surprise, which is not an accurate representation of the broader context.
Bjorn: Do you have further recommendations for teachers when it comes to teaching about current events in the world?
Jeremy: We should more broadly teach students about the role of the US in the world. For example, why do we still have military bases in Kuwait? Even starting to question these things matters. Many people in the US have no idea where the US military is stationed; they don’t realize how many personnel are deployed around the world. At the same time, we have to be willing to understand why people might hold different views about current events, and engage in those conversations rather than avoiding them.
Bjorn: Finally, do you have any hopes regarding history education?
Jeremy: I do think there is hope, and we can see it. We’re doing a study on the 2024 elections, and as we dig into the qualitative data, we find that many teachers show resilience and continue to foster engagement with democratic values. I hope they make thoughtful use of the 9/11 anniversary. Especially for the teachers who did not live through it themselves there is hope that they will approach it differently.
Bjorn: After my conversation with Jeremy, I had a lot to think about. There is very little research on how teachers in Europe teach about 9/11. Still, I recognize the enormous differences between teachers, and also between European countries in how they politicize history education. I am worried about current events in the US and the rise of far-right politics and populism. At the same time, I know many American scholars and teachers like Jeremy who push back and strive for democratic values and a more peaceful world. It is a huge country with many different perspectives; a single stereotypical image of “Americans” does not help us understand the complexity of the country and its challenges. Finally, I wonder if European teachers will teach about the twenty-five year anniversary of 9/11 and what they will discuss. I think Jeremy has given us some good suggestions of how to approach it, and especially what not to do.
References and Additional Resources
Berman, D. S., & Stoddard, J. D. (2021). “It’sa growing and serious problem:” Teaching 9/11 to combat misinformation and conspiracy theories. The Social Studies, 112(6), 298-309. DOI: 10.1080/00377996.2021.1929054
Stoddard, J. (2021). Teaching about 9/11 and Terrorism and Against Islamophobia. Annals of Social Studies Education Research for Teachers, 2(1), 40–47. https://assertjournal.com/index.php/assert/article/view/15/85
Stoddard, J., & Hess, D. (2021). What schools teach about 9/11 and the war on terror. The Conversation. https://theconversation.com/what-schools-teach-about-9-11-and-the-war-on-terror-166936
Stoddard, J. (2021). Echoes of Terrorism in Today’s U.S. Classrooms: A Re-Reading of Media Used to Teach about 9/11. Canadian Social Studies, 52(2), 74-88. https://canadiansocialstudies.ca/index.php/css/article/view/26/26
Teaching Primary Sources Resource Site for Teaching 9/11 and the Global War on Terror, University of Wisconsin – Madison (Funded by the Teaching with Primary Sources project from the U.S. Library of Congress). https://teaching911beyondtwenty.wisc.edu/
