What's New in Civic Education and Youth Civic Engagement Work .... (January 2005 Archive Section)

January 27, 2005

• The Public Education Network (PEN) announces "Participate in January 2005: The Fourth Annual Character's Cool Contest!" Attention teachers and students! The MindOH! Foundation's fourth annual Character's Cool Contest will be accepting entries January 1st through the 31st in 2005. The contest is a national online contest to help middle and high school students reflect on what it means to have good character. Students can fill out the online survey to win prizes such as a Nintendo Game Cube, a portable CD/MP3 player, gift certificates, games or sports memorabilia. Students can also enter the essay contest to win cash prizes of $500 for first place, $250 for second place and $175 for third place. The school with the most survey entries wins the grand prize of a new computer and a one-year subscription to MindOH!'s Discipline and Life Skills Series. The second place school receives Project Wisdom's character education materials. For more information e-mail, contests@mindohfoundation.org or visit: http://www.mindohfoundation.org/contest
  

  January 26, 2005

• Service-Learning Advances, the National Service-Learning Partnership's e-newsletter, announces the following:

  - "Teaching Tolerance" is seeking information about projects that promote diversity, community-building, peace and justice. Fees from $100-$800 are offered for each published item.

  - Grants to Help Underserved Children and Families. The Tiger Woods Foundation will fund nonprofit organizations, projects, and programs supporting underserved children and families in the areas of education, youth development, parenting, and family health and welfare. Next deadline: February 1, 2005.

  - Volvo Awards for Heroes. The Volvo for Life Awards honors people who have helped others in Volvo's core areas of safety, quality of life and environment. The Alexandra Scott Butterfly award will be given to a child hero who has shown conscience, care, and character in helping others. Nomination deadline: January 10, 2005.

  For more: http://www.service-learningpartnership.org/publications/sla_funding.cfm
  

  January 25, 2005

• The Dirksen Center would like to remind you of its featured grant-funded project: Congressional Research Awards. The Center invites applications for grants totaling $35,000 in 2005 to fund research on congressional leadership and the U.S. Congress. The competition is open to individuals with a serious interest in studying Congress. Political scientists, historians, biographers, scholars of public administration or American studies, and journalists are among those eligible. The Center encourages graduate students to apply and awards a significant portion of the funds for dissertation research. Undergraduate or pre-Ph.D. study, research teams of two or more individuals, and organizations are not eligible.

  There is no standard application form. Applicants are responsible for showing the relationship between their work and the awards program guidelines. Applications are accepted at any time. Incomplete applications will NOT be forwarded to the screening committee for consideration.

  All application materials must be postmarked on or before February 1, 2005. Awards will be announced in March 2005. Complete information about eligibility and application procedures may be found at The Center's Web site http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?t=vckjh9aab.0.ocj9kzaab.epgwpvn6.421&p=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.dirksencenter.org%2Fprint_grants_CRAs.htm. For more information contact Frank Mackaman, program officer at fmackaman@dirksencenter.org.
  

  January 24, 2005

• The Brookings Institution has announced the release of the "Moral Values, Politics and the Faith Factor" transcript. Panelists discussed whether common ground can be found on the role of religion in public life during the president's second term and beyond. For more go to: http://www.brookings.edu/comm/events/20050118.htm.
  

  January 14, 2005

• Service-Learning Advances, the National Service-Learning Partnership's e-newsletter, announces the following:

  - Partnership Annual Meeting. All are welcome to participate in a discussion on communicating effectively about service-learning. The meeting will be held during the National

  - Service-Learning Conference on Friday March 19, 2005. Register by January 28 to get the early bird rate for the National Service-Learning Conference on March 16-19, 2005 in Long Beach, California.

  - Expert Advice on Service-Learning Partnerships. Barbara Holland's column "Building Successful Service Partnerships" offer techniques and tools for service-learning collaborations.
  

  January 13, 2005

• The Dirksen Center announces two new items:

  - Feature: Setting Course for the 109th Congress - The House. Last month the Center introduced the new U.S. senators who took their seats when the 109th Congress convened on January 4, 2005. In this issue of Communicator. This feature briefly looks at the new House members - there are 38 of them, a smaller freshman class than the 52 who won their first elections in 2002.

  One thing to notice about the new House members is their youth. Patrick McHenry (R-NC) is the youngest at 29, but four others are under 40. The oldest freshman is 67-year-old Joe Schwarz, a Republican from Michigan.

  The House has four new black Members, all Democrats: Emanuel Cleaver (MO), Al Green (TX), Cynthia McKinney (GA - McKinney has served before), and Gwen Moore (WS). Two Hispanics joined the Democrats' ranks in the House, too, John Salazar of Colorado and Henry Cuellar in Texas. Republicans added the first ever Indian-American Member, 33-year-old Bobby Jindal (LA). Eight women will take their seats for the first time, five Democrats and three Republicans.

  In the House as a whole in 2005, there are 42 African Americans, 24 Hispanics, three Asians, 68 women, 109 members with military service, and 281 members with advanced academic degrees. Reprinted from The Communicator a web-based e-newletter.

  - The Center also provides information about the leaders in the House from both parties, including Dennis Hastert who will be the Speaker of the House, with Tom Delay serving as the Majority Leader. Nancy Pelosi will continue as the Minority Leader. Find a roster of these leaders and the others on their leadership teams, together with links to their websites at http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?t=vckjh9aab.0.jcj9kzaab.epgwpvn6.421&p=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.congresslink.org%2Fprint_basics_currentleaders.htm.

  January 12 , 2005

• The following is shared by the National Center for Learning and Citizenship:

  Canada Considers a Lower Voting Age
  There is a Private Member's Bill before the Canadian government that seems very promising. Co-sponsored by members from all four of Canada's political parties, the bill would lower the voting age to sixteen. Inspired by www.vote16.ca, the politicians in favor of the bill cite declining voter participation as a major reason to lower the voting age, a problem certainly not exclusive to our friends north of the border.
  
  Feeling that a lower voting age would increase voter participation, and that empowering youth is a just end of its own, these Canadian MPs make encouraging arguments in favor of the bill. Co-sponsor Stephanie Bergeron had this to say: "In our society, a 16-year-old can hold a driver's license, he can work and thus must pay taxes. Under the principle of no taxation without representation, we should give 16- and 17-year-olds a say in how their tax dollars are spent."
  
  If the bill passes, time will tell the world that empowering young people is a good idea. People will see that it worked in Canada, and Canada will set a precedent for the United States and other nations to follow. NYRA extends its gratitude to Mark Holland, Nathan Cullen, Belinda Stronach, Stéphane Bergeron, and vote16.ca for taking on this important issue. Please visit the following link for more information, http://www.youthrights.org/forums/showthread.php?t=2340
  

  January 10, 2005
  
• Service-Learning Advances, the National Service-Learning Partnership's e-newsletter, announces the following:
  
  On January 17, Americans will participate in service-learning projects benefiting their communities to honor the work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Be a part of nationwide effort by joining an organized project or developing your own. Use the following resources to support your efforts.
  - Project ideas, tips on how to plan and run a successful project, and a state-by-state listing of events happening on Martin Luther King Jr. Day
  - Honor Dr. King's legacy by enlisting your school in Do Something's Eighth Annual Kindness & Justice Challenge.
  - Youth Service California provides educators with the critical elements of high-quality days of service, including MLK Day.
  - Partnership Board Member Anthony Welch adds four powerful tips for anyone seeking to create strong MLK Day service-learning projects.

  For more go to: http://www.service-learningpartnership.org/teaching/mlk.cfm.
  

  January 6, 2005

• Romance the Youth Vote. Leave it to the media to slam - unfairly - the nation's youth even as record numbers of 18-to-29-year-olds cast their votes in the 2004 election.

  Within hours of the polls closing, wire stories carried headlines such as "Youth, first-time turnout unchanged from 2000 level" and "2004 Not a Breakout for Youth After All," citing exit poll data to claim youth turnout was paltry.

  But later, a different picture emerged. According to the reliable Center for Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE), at least 4.6 million more Americans under the age of 30 voted in 2004 than four years before, with the turnout rate among those voters rising to 51.6 percent from 42.3 percent in 2000.

  In battleground states such as Pennsylvania, the upturn in youth voting appears to have been even more dramatic. The CBS News Survey Unit estimated that 18-to-29-year-old turnout in the state increased by about 75 percent over 2000, as compared with a 16 percent jump in total turnout.

  Now that we know youth voter turnout did spike up appreciably this year, the question is: What happens now?… 12/9/04. By Phyllis Kannis, director Student Voices, Philadelphia Inquirer.
  

  January 5, 2005

• The 4th Annual Hawaii International Conference on Social Sciences to be held June 13 - 16, 2005 at the Waikiki Beach Marriott Hotel, Honolulu Hawaii has issued a call for papers, abstracts and submissions. The submission deadline is February 1, 2005. The Hawaii International Conference on Social Sciences encourages the following types of papers/abstracts/submissions:
  - Research Papers - Completed papers
  - Abstracts - Abstracts of completed or proposed research
  - Student Papers - Research by students. Work-in-Progress Reports or Proposals for future projects. Reports on issues related to teaching

  For more information about submissions go to http://www.hicsocial.org/cfp_ss.htm.

  The conference is sponsored by the East West Council for Education, Asia-Pacific Research Institute of Peking University, and University of Louisville - Center for Sustainable Urban Neighborhoods. For more information on the conference go to: http://www.hicsocial.org or email social@hicsocial.org.