How ignorant are college students about history?

This professor asked students to name one country besides the United States that practiced slavery. The students seemingly thought America uniquely invented the institution, not just its racial overtones.

"We have so made American slavery the focus of our history education" that most students "have no idea that slavery is a worldwide phenomenon, that people of all races across the world have practiced it." And that wasn't the only major flaw in their knowledge — students could not identify Thomas Jefferson as a president, and could not explain Marxism, socialism, or capitalism in a sentence. Perhaps ironically, on one quiz, 29 out of 32 students knew Jefferson owned slaves, but only three identified him as president. Interestingly, six of them incorrectly believed Ben Franklin had held that office.

We've transformed the teaching of history into a political act, not a historical act.