Dear Principal:

Too often in high school, us students are denied the right to learn about certain events in our history. History that everyone should have the right to know. Even though we block out these events because they reflect our countries negatively, by teaching them we know not to make the same mistakes and it respectfully honors those who died in the events. While teaching them may put our country in a bad light and can alter people's perceptions, this is a fact that we need to overcome. Events like the Rape of Nanking, the Ukrainian Famine, and the Armenian Genocide go completely unnoticed and, in fact, I only recently heard of them. Relatives of those who died in these events probably feel insulted that people refuse to teach or talk about them, because it is an insult to their memory. Through the good and the bad, countries should be open with their citizens and tell them the truth. In the case of Japan, they refuse to acknowledge that the Rape of Nanking even happened and it is just wrong to deny the Japanese people this information when it is the truth and part of their history. I wish that you could please consider that we change our history curriculum to include these topics no matter how sensitive they are. We can all learn lessons from events like this and they can help prevent making these mistakes again.

Sincerely,

Lauren Adhav