Mike Curtin is a former editor and associate publisher of the Columbus Dispatch, and a former two-term state lawmaker who served on the Ohio Constitutional Modernization Commission.

Geography class isn’t what it used to be.

In the first two decades of the 21st century, our nation’s curriculum sages downgraded it. Then, in 2019, geography was removed altogether from the testing schedule of the National Assessment of Educational Progress.

What isn’t tested isn’t taught much.

Today most states include geography only as an option on a menu of social studies courses. Most students obtain a high-school diploma without having taken a standalone geography course.

Ohio does not require any geography course, although the state’s model curriculum recommends some K-8 geography content be taught along the way.

For example, it suggests introducing first graders “to maps of the local community, Ohio and the United States.”

The model says second graders should learn to distinguish north, east, south and west.

And third graders should learn the difference between physical maps (landforms, elevations, etc.) and political maps (boundaries of cities, counties, etc.)

Our continuing decline in geographic literacy no longer makes the news.

Perhaps it’s one reason Statehouse politicians, over the past two decades, have been more brazen in drawing political maps that are geographic absurdities – the most gerrymandered in Ohio’s history.

One glance at the current map of Ohio’s 15 congressional districts shows how blatantly it violates widely accepted best practices for fair districting.

Those standards, referenced in the Ohio Constitution, declare districts should:

• Be equal in population as nearly as possible.
• Be compact (square, rectangular, hexagonal), not irregularly shaped.
• Be contiguous – keeping neighboring communities together.
• Not be drawn to favor or disfavor any political party.
• No one acting in good faith, trying to abide by these best practices, would draw a map like the current map of Ohio’s congressional districts.

And no region of Ohio is as blatantly gerrymandered as the northwest.

• The Fourth, Fifth and Ninth congressional districts are the most meandering, misshapen, non-compact districts of all.
• The Fourth District snakes 150 miles, a 2 1/2-hour drive, from Fort Loramie in Shelby County to Sullivan in Ashland County.
• The Fifth District wanders 180 miles, a nearly 3-hour drive, from Mercer County on the Indiana border to Lorain County near Cleveland.
• The Ninth District stumbles 125 miles, a 2-hour drive, from Defiance to Vermilion, pretending those communities are Toledo’s natural neighbors.

These and other odd-shaped districts illustrate the arrogance of the mapmakers at the Statehouse, who act as though Ohioans don’t know or don’t care enough to insist on congressional maps that respect them and their communities.

Absurdly drawn districts are the result of attempts to pack as many voters of the opposite party into as few districts as possible, leaving more districts to be won by the party controlling the mapmaking process.

One of gerrymandering’s most pernicious results is the existence of fewer and fewer truly competitive districts, which drives partisanship and polarization, now at dangerous levels in Congress and many statehouses.

That’s why this fall’s Ohio debate over debate a proposed redistricting reform ballot issue is momentous.

The proposed state constitutional amendment headed for the Nov. 5 ballot would overhaul how congressional and state legislative districts are drawn.

The amendment would take the mapmaking power away from Statehouse politicians, and give it to a 15-member, independent panel composed of five Democrats, five Republicans and five independents.

If adopted by voters, Ohio would follow the lead of Arizona (2000), California (2008), Colorado (2018) and Michigan (2018) in creating an independent process for drawing districts. In many respects, the Ohio plan resembles Michigan’s, which passed by a 61-39 ratio.

The coming campaign, sure to be expensive and bitterly fought, will offer many educational opportunities in elementary geography and government – another subject, unfortunately, receiving too little attention in today’s classrooms.

Ohio’s model curriculum, by the way, offering guideposts rather than mandates, does suggest third graders be introduced to “the rights and responsibilities that are important to preserving our democracy.”

Mike Curtin is a former editor and associate publisher of the Columbus Dispatch, and a former two-term state lawmaker who served on the Ohio Constitutional Modernization Commission.

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