--- title: AP World History Is Changing. Here's Who Won't Make the Cut description: A recent decision by the College Board to begin the AP World History exam in 1450 has educators up in arms. Here's who gets left behind. canonical: https://time.com/5319902/ap-history-college-board/ author: Chris Wilson article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2018-06-25T16:19:35.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T20:39:43.874Z article:section: History og:title: Jesus, Genghis Khan and Joan of Arc Are Just Some of the Major Figures That Could Be Cut From AP World History og:description: Some educators are outraged as the class could now begin in the year 1450 og:url: https://time.com/5319902/ap-history-college-board/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Jesus, Genghis Khan and Joan of Arc Are Just Some of the Major Figures That Could Be Cut From AP World History twitter:description: Some educators are outraged as the class could now begin in the year 1450 twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # Jesus, Genghis Khan and Joan of Arc Are Just Some of the Major Figures That Could Be Cut From AP World History Classes > Sponsored content. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-sub-2026q3/newsletters?i=80755fb4-0a01-465e-871a-c6ea272c523e&cr=time-sub-2026q3-v1) * TIME Subscriptions: [time.com/subscribe-agent](/c/time-sub-2026q3/subscribe?i=80755fb4-0a01-465e-871a-c6ea272c523e&cr=time-sub-2026q3-v1)  by [Chris Wilson](https://time.com/author/chris-wilson/)  ## Chris Wilson Jun 25, 2018 4:19 PM UTC  by [Chris Wilson](https://time.com/author/chris-wilson/)  ## Chris Wilson Jun 25, 2018 4:19 PM UTC Some educators are [up in arms](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/21/us/ap-world-history-exam.html) over a recent proposal by the College Board to begin the [AP World History exam’s scope in 1450](https://apcentral.collegeboard.org/courses/ap-world-history/course/2019-20-changes) instead of the dawn of civilization. In justifying the move, the College Board cited the daunting amount of material that the course previously covered, beginning with early humans’ migration from Africa during the Paleolithic period. Should the new curriculum go into effect, it may require an amendment to a storied elementary school mnemonic: “In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue—42 years after the dawn of history.” (Christopher Columbus was [born in 1451](https://exploration.marinersmuseum.org/subject/christopher-columbus/), just making the cut for the new exam.) To capture how much of history would go untested after such a change, TIME compiled a list of the 200 most influential individuals in documented history. Our group is based on top-100 lists from [TIME’s previous rankings](http://ideas.time.com/2013/12/10/whos-biggest-the-100-most-significant-figures-in-history/), a highly cited roster [by the astrophysicist Michael H. Hart](https://www.biographyonline.net/people/100-most-influential.html), and the [MIT Pantheon project](http://pantheon.media.mit.edu/rankings/people/all/all/-4000/2010/H15). Based on dates of birth gathered from [WikiData](https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Main%5FPage), we found that 40% of the most influential people in history were born before the new AP World History cutoff. The curtailment would eliminate the [first three eras in the present course](https://secure-media.collegeboard.org/digitalServices/pdf/ap/ap-world-history-course-framework.pdf), which cover “technological and environmental transformations” up to 600 B.C.E., “organization and reorganization of human societies” until 600 C.E. and “regional and interregional interactions” until 1450, when the focus shifts to “global interactions.” Doing so would gloss past all Greek philosophers, ancient empires, and the founder of most major religions save for Mormonism progenitor Joseph Smith, Jr. When announcing the idea, the College Board stated that “the current AP World History course and exam cover 10,000 years of history across all seven continents. No other AP course requires such an expanse of content to be covered over a single school year.” Instead, the company proposes a “pre-AP” high school [course in World History and Geography](https://pre-ap.collegeboard.org/courses/world-history-and-geography). Critics have been quick to point out that beginning in 1450 would shift the course’s focus heavily to Western history. “They couldn’t have picked a more Eurocentric date,” World History Association president Merry E. Wiesner-Hanks [told The _New York Times_](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/21/us/ap-world-history-exam.html). As for here at home, the cutoff would only exacerbate the entrenched misconception that Europeans brought modernism to a New World that was in fact a hotbed of culture and innovation long before Cortes and Columbus walked the earth. The focus would also shift toward modern technological advancements over the cultural and philosophical foundations of modernity. TIME’s categorization of the list into major categories like “artists” and “scientists” — which were often judgment calls when topics like religion and philosophy overlapped — includes only two inventors in the pre-1450 crowd: [Cai Lun](https://www.paperdiscoverycenter.org/inductees/cai-lun/), the Chinese innovator credited with inventing paper, and Johannes Gutenberg, who put that paper to new use some 1,300 years later. (Archimedes was a tough call but ended up in the “scientist” category, though he is equally deserving of the “inventor” distinction.) Euclid was unavailable for comment. **Correction: June 26** _The original version of this story misstated the approximate birth year of Mary. 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