I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion.

Thomas Jefferson (1820)

 

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The Vital Importance of Civic Education

A free society must rely on the knowledge, skills, and virtue of its citizens and those they elect to public office. The primary opportunity for most American citizens to acquire the knowledge and dispositions essential for informed, effective citizenship is during their school years. Civic education, therefore, is vital to the preservation and improvement of American constitutional democracy. Today, more than ever before, our young people need to understand how our democracy works and how they can help to keep and improve it. The forces of technological, social and demographic change have the potential to pull us farther apart unless greater attention is paid to the values and principles that unite us as Americans. We must be guided by those values and principles and act upon them in order to narrow the gap between our ideals and the reality of daily life in our communities and nation.

In keeping with its mission of promoting an enlightened, competent and responsible citizenry, the Center for Civic Education is launching a Campaign to Promote Civic Education. This Campaign has two important objectives. The first is to reaffirm the civic mission of our nation� schools and the second is to encourage states and school districts to devote sustained and systematic attention to civic education from kindergarten through twelfth grade.

Why This Campaign is Necessary

Although every state acknowledges the need for civic education, this vital part of a student� education is seldom given sustained and systematic attention in the K�2 curriculum. The NAEP 1998 Civics Report Card to the Nation has revealed that only 25 percent of American children are receiving an adequate education in civics and government.

A 1999 study undertaken by the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs of the University of Texas at Austin found that while every state endorses the goals of developing competent and responsible citizens, little is done through state legislation, education codes and curricular frameworks to meet the civic mission of the schools. Several recent studies show alarming trends of young people exhibiting high levels of disengagement from their government. For example, in a 1999 survey conducted by Hart & Teeter, 68 percent of 18- to 34-year-olds felt disconnected from government. In a government that draws its legitimacy from the consent of the governed, these are disturbing trends of disengagement that we must reverse.

How the Campaign to Promote Civic Education Will Be Won

The Campaign seeks to strengthen instruction in civics and government and to reaffirm the traditional civic mission of the schools by promoting the establishment of curricular requirements and instruction in accord with the following principles:

· Education in civics and government is a central purpose of education, essential to the well being of American democracy.

· Civics and government is a subject on a level with other subjects. Civics and government, like history and geography, is an integrative and interdisciplinary subject.

· Civics and government should be taught explicitly and systematically to all students kindergarten through twelfth grade, whether as separate units or as readily identifiable parts of other subjects.

· Effective instruction in civics and government requires attention to the content of the discipline as well as the essential skills, principles, and values required for full participation in and reasoned commitment to our democratic system.

The Campaign is a fifty-state effort run by concerned citizens and organizations within each state who recognize the need for improvement in the civic education of American youth. As is appropriate to the American tradition of local control of the schools, the Campaign seeks improvement in each state� and school district� approach to education in civics and government. The Center� network of civic educators and other concerned citizens are organizing State Action Committees to bring about the appropriate changes in the educational policies of every state and school district in the nation.

The Campaign will target key decision-makers and individuals and groups that influence education policy, specifically curriculum policy. These may include legislative and executive bodies of state and local government, administrators and boards of education of state and local education agencies, parents organizations and other community organizations, and professional associations.

In 1994, the Center for Civic Education published the widely acclaimed voluntary National Standards for Civics and Government with the advice and assistance of 3,000 individuals and organizations, under a grant from the U. S. Department of Education. The standards provide a resource for state and local school systems to use in developing their curricular programs in civics and government. The Center also has developed recommended allocations of instructional time in civics and government from grades kindergarten through twelve for the National Commission on Time and Learning established by the U.S. Department of Education. Both documents are available from the Center� web site at www.civiced.org.

What You Can Do To Help

Join us in this Campaign. Your involvement is needed and welcome. This is a state-by-state effort focusing on the civic education improvements needed within each state, led by concerned citizens in each state. Please join with those in your state who are spearheading the Campaign. Contact Ted McConnell at mcconnell@civiced.org to get involved with the effort in your state or for more information on the Campaign.

Please join us in the National Campaign to Promote Civic Education and help the next generation preserve and improve our constitutional democracy.

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Rationale and Proposed Requirements

The Civic Education of American Youth: From State Policies to School District Practices
Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs
A study commissioned by the Center for Civic Education

Executive Director Charles Quigley's Response to the NAEP 1998 Civics Report Card for the Nation
Center for Civic Education

NAEP 1998 Civics Report Card for the Nation

The Role of Civic Education:
An Education Policy Task Force Position Paper from the Communitarian Network
by Margaret Stimman Branson