LINCOLN — The world may look different for K-12 students returning to Nebraska classrooms this month because of a new state law.
The law, passed earlier this year, bans public schools from using Mercator projection maps, a common type of world map that distorts the sizes of continents and countries. The law allows exceptions for previously purchased materials and for lessons involving multiple types of maps.
State Sen. Justin Wayne of Omaha proposed the legislation, arguing that Mercator projection maps, widely used in schools, have given generations of students a misleading understanding of the world.
Wayne
The maps make areas closer to the North and South poles appear larger in comparison to areas closer to the Equator. As a result, Alaska appears to be the same size as Australia, which is actually more than four times larger. Great Britain appears to be the same size as Madagascar, which is twice as big.
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And Greenland looks roughly the same size as Africa, which is 14 times larger and is big enough to fit the United States, Mexico, Europe, China and India combined.
“When you look at these maps, we are truly giving a false impression of what the world looks like,” Wayne said at the public hearing on his bill. “And I think, at a basic level, we should at least be honest with kids about what the world looks like.”
Rex Cammack, a cartographer who chairs the Geography/Geology Department at the University of Nebraska at Omaha, said all maps have flaws because they are two-dimensional representations of a three-dimensional world.
He compared the job of a mapmaker to a person trying to flatten out an orange peel. There are various ways of attempting mapmaking but none can avoid all distortions. Each type of map, or projection, involves trade-offs of angles, areas, directions, shapes and distances.
“The statute’s well intended,” Cammack said. “Understanding how we present our world to ourselves is complex. The map is the language by which we start to explain the differences in our world.”
The Mercator projection, named after Gerardus Mercator, the 16th-century Flemish cartographer who created it, does well at showing shapes and directions. It was developed and became widely used to help sailors navigate the world. Google maps still uses it because it works well for navigating city streets and other small areas.
But the projection makes the world appear like a rectangle, with the North and South Poles stretching the same length across the paper as the Equator. That make northern countries larger than those in the tropics and sub-tropics.
Coupled with the common practice of putting western Europe at the center of world maps, the projection reinforced political and social views that diminished the importance of countries and peoples in Asia, Africa and South America, Wayne said.
Rex Cammack, chair and associate professor in the Department of Geography and Geology, pulls out a map in the map library in the Durham Science Center at University of Nebraska at Omaha.
MEGAN NIELSEN, THE WORLD-HERALD
Cammack said map projections have been used for propaganda purposes, such as making the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics appear bigger and more fearsome.
“People pick these projections to strengthen a point, usually,” he said, adding: “We need to teach people more about how to understand maps and understand place.”
As alternatives to the Mercator projection, Nebraska’s new law requires schools to use the Gall-Peters projection map, the AuthaGraph projection map or another equal-area projection map.
All do a better job of showing the comparative size of countries and continents, although the Gall-Peters projection distorts the shape of areas, while the AuthaGraph version distorts distance and direction. Cammack said he prefers the Equal Earth projection, which shows accurate sizes and minimizes distortions of shape and distance.
At the hearing, Charles Riesdel, a Beatrice Public Schools board member, objected to the proposal in part because of the flaws inherent in all maps and in part because of concerns about the Legislature directing curriculum.
“State mandates such as this do not respect Nebraska’s philosophy of local control,” he said. “Please leave it to the teacher to decide which map is most appropriate for their particular purpose.”
Jack Moles, executive director for the Nebraska Rural and Community Schools Association, said superintendents at member schools have similar concerns about “legislative overreach” in areas typically left to local boards and the state Department of Education.
At the same time, superintendents told him the law would not change the way maps are used in their districts. They said their teachers already talk to students about the ways in which flat maps distort sizes, distances and shapes of different areas and that some use on-line projections that help show and explain the distortions.
The law does not require districts to get rid of or replace books and materials bought before the law took effect. Nor does it change state standards, which call for high school students to be able to evaluate geographical information sources, such as the strengths and weaknesses of various maps.
Omaha Public Schools replaced and upgraded older materials at all grade levels using federal COVID-19 relief funds, according to spokeswoman Bridget Blevins. She said the new material does not include Mercator maps and staff were to inventory and remove any existing material that did not comply with the law.
State education officials have provided guidance for schools about implementing the new law, along with links to downloadable maps and to a map tutorial created by the GIS Research & Map Collection at Ball State University Libraries in Indiana.
Photos: First day of school at McMillan Middle School in Omaha
Students in Anthony Marino’s sixth grade class work through a worksheet on the first day of school at McMillan Middle School in Omaha, on Wednesday, Aug. 14, 2024.
LIZ RYMAREV, THE WORLD-HERALD
Anthony Marino, sixth grade teacher, hands out papers to his students on the first day of school at McMillan Middle School in Omaha, on Wednesday, Aug. 14, 2024.
LIZ RYMAREV, THE WORLD-HERALD
Crayons, colored pencils and markers are on a table in Anthony Marino’s sixth grade classroom on the first day of school at McMillan Middle School in Omaha, on Wednesday, Aug. 14, 2024.
LIZ RYMAREV, THE WORLD-HERALD
KhaMani Hawkins, center, and Ja’cionn Grimes, right, work on a worksheet as Jessica DeWitt, left, sixth and seventh grade teacher, walks around on the first day of school at McMillan Middle School in Omaha, on Wednesday, Aug. 14, 2024.
LIZ RYMAREV, THE WORLD-HERALD
Sixth grader KhaMani Hawkins colors in a worksheet on the first day of school at McMillan Middle School in Omaha, on Wednesday, Aug. 14, 2024.
LIZ RYMAREV, THE WORLD-HERALD
Sixth grader D’Riyah Key, center left, walks to the front of the class on the first day of school at McMillan Middle School in Omaha, on Wednesday, Aug. 14, 2024.
LIZ RYMAREV, THE WORLD-HERALD
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Publish date : 2024-08-16 01:45:00
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