We are strongly in favor of requiring high school students to learn American history before they can be handed a diploma, even if increasingly too much of what they are taught is a sanitized version, one reshaped to not offend a generation that seems to embrace victimhood.

American history, even when rewrapped, tells an incredible story of how an oppressed society took a journey over a treacherous ocean, started from nothing, and built the world’s greatest republic over a quincentenary plus a couple of decades. Doing so, yes, imperfectly, with plenty of victims along the way, American Indians having paid the heaviest price. But at the same time America provides an ideal that other countries have sought to emulate, giving us a better and more peaceful world. Our history should be remembered and celebrated.

That said, if some American history has to be jettisoned in order to provide room for a personal finance class as part of the required curriculum in North Carolina’s high schools, then we are good with it. We know of no measure that would come to any other conclusion than our future is more important than our history.

The state Board of Education, in an effort to meet a mandate by the General Assembly, last week dropped the number of American history courses required for graduation from two to one in order to make room for a personal finance class. The General Assembly’s decision to require the course did meet criticism, including among educators, but history is taught in earlier grades, and high school civics can be revamped to include more of it.

We see the personal finance class as critical for young people leaving high school, especially those who are headed to work, and not to further their education or to learn a marketable skill. In Robeson County, that need is much more so than in most places.

This nation is swimming in a sea of debt that has been accumulated in a variety of ways, including through school loans, but generally a willingness to use credit to live beyond a person’s ability. In a world in which young people are easily preyed upon by those offering expensive credit, too often bad sense prevails, and the uninformed dig a financial hole that is deep and wide.

The course, we presume, would touch upon basic tenants such as credit, its importance, and how to protect it; home mortgages; the value of investing now, even modestly; and the miracle of compound interest.

The truth is, even in a county such as ours where a third of the population is trapped in poverty, living above that line is not difficult. It requires good decisions, which are within most people’s reach, and not hefty paychecks, which aren’t always.

Any young person who delays marriage, delays having children, acquires an education or a skill, and shows up at work to become valuable and dependable is likely to avoid poverty. In fact, we would argue the biggest cause of poverty in Robeson County is children, specifically, having them before the ability to take care of them.

We expect that any financial course would make that understood.

We are sure that high school students who take the course, pay attention, and try to apply it to their own decision-making will have a brighter financial future. The course holds great promise for Robeson County.