Where in the World is Our Geographical Knowledge?

If asked, do you think you could find Mississippi on a map? How about Malawi? Mauritius? Have you ever heard of the Maldives? Depending on your geography education in school, whether it was rote memorization back in third grade or if it was nonexistent, you may have very different answers to these questions. Even so, one’s schooling does not totally determine their knowledge, especially in our digital age where some young people are turning to online geography games as a way of entertainment and mental stimulation. And yet, members of generation Z, especially in the United States, have gained the reputation of being uninformed about the world around them. So, The Barefoot Times sought out students and teachers at Sequoyah to see if these accusations hold any water.

Rachel Youngstrom ’26 is definitely in the minority of current Sequoyah high school students who had any semblance of a formal geography class in lower school. Youngstrom, who attended the K8 from kindergarten on, still had a spotty education on the U.S. states and countries. “I had one geography free period once a week during eighth grade,” Youngstrom said, “and I think that’s pretty much it.” She also mentioned some occasional games and such in fifth and sixth grade, which she enjoyed. But she has continued to review and keep up her knowledge of the world, partially because these experiences “sparked something.” Today, Youngstrom plays geography games and feels confident in labeling the US and world, though she admits the small islands of Oceania (for example, Tuvalu, Kiribati, and Tonga) are difficult to remember. She sees all of this as a brain teaser of sorts and a fun way to challenge herself.

One of these games is called Worldle (a pun of the hit New York Times game, Wordle), where you are shown just the outline of a country and have to guess its name. Youngstrom thinks this is a little bit silly because “I don’t think you should be good at just shapes, because that’s not how the world is made” since you always have the context of other places in relation to each other. Still, Youngstrom thinks that making geography fun in this way “makes it easier for [her] to be interested in learning it” and should also encourage others to gain a necessary baseline knowledge. This is definitely true for Atlas James ’25 who, compared to Youngstrom, had a less thorough geography education. James does have a pretty good understanding of the world because they have learned some information from Sporcle quizzes and is “generally pretty up to date with geopolitical happenings,” leading to a sense of where things are in relation to each other.

This only represents two high school students, but what is their sense of their Gen Z peers? “I think we’re pretty darn mediocre,” Youngstrom said in response to this question. “I mean, there’s a lot of people who I know at the school who are really into geography, but at the same time, there’re some people who just don’t know anything and don’t really care.” Likewise, James noted they “have some friends who are into geography,” but did not elaborate further.

Meanwhile, United States history teacher Ian Gutgold observed he has “seen a lot of variation in students’ geographical knowledge” throughout the country and he “would say Sequoyah students would be on the more knowledgeable side.” All in all, student knowledge and interest level seems to be mixed.

As for our generation in the United States as a whole, Sequoyah students don’t seem to be the best measure of the average teenager. James thinks that compared to other countries, geography education here is “definitely not as good, because the US is pretty kind of America first” and there is a feeling that “we don’t really need to know about the rest of the world.” Youngstrom seconded this by admitting that she likes to be “known as knowledgeable” and that part of this stems from her desire to combat the stereotype of the uninformed American. But she doesn’t think “it’s just an our-generation sort of problem.” She suggested that we might be better informed than previous generations because of new technology and games that are available to us. Even if this is the case, there is no arguing that things have changed since fifty or even twenty years ago. Gutgold sees it as “different generations have different relationships with physical space, and I think a lot of that has to do with technology.” He gave the example of the modern GPS systems we rely on to go from place to place affecting how people of Gen Z understand where their surroundings are in relation to one another.

In light of modern technology, how important is knowing geography in our modern age? Well, there seem to be a variety of reasons people think we need to continue to have this education in some form or another. Youngstrom believes that “you really do need to know about … bigger places, and specifically places that are in the global South that get underappreciated.” She thinks that one should be informed for both political and empathetic reasons. James agrees with this, connecting it specifically with “paying attention to the news, [since] it can be helpful to know what countries might be affected by something,” bringing up the example of the beginnings of the Russia-Ukraine War. Meanwhile, back when Gutgold was in school, it was more just straight memorization, but “if you're not learning about culture too,” he says, “then it's really hard to appreciate” why you are doing any of it. “So I think geography is important, but I think that technology has changed the way we study and do geography,” and should have a greater emphasis on more applicable skills.

There does seem to be a continued recognition of the use for geographical knowledge, as James says, “I’d love to see geography in some kind of curriculum. I think it’s very important, especially in conjunction with geopolitics. I think they go hand in hand.” As long as there is a useful application of the knowledge gained, there continues to be value in continuing the expansion of our geographical knowledge.