What's New in Civic Education and Youth Civic Engagement Work .... (March 2004 Archive Section)

March 31, 2004

• An online youth civic culture, largely unnoticed by the general public, has taken root on the Internet and is fostering Generation Y's participation in U.S. politics and community affairs, according to a report released by American University's Center for Social Media. The report can be viewed at http://www.centerforsocialmedia.org/ecitizens/youthreport.pdf

  "So much of the debate over young people and the media culture has focused on protecting youth from indecent, violent, or pornographic content," explained the study's principal author, Kathryn C. Montgomery, Ph.D., professor in AU's School of Communication and co-director of the Center for Social Media. "What this study reveals is that young people also use the Internet for civic and political engagement. They go online to register to vote and to volunteer; some of them are also writing about world events, launching projects for community improvement, and learning skills for political action."

  The 155-page report, Youth as E-Citizens, identifies and analyzes almost 400 websites, created for and in some cases by young people, that engage youth in civic activities. An "online tour" of this new online youth civic sector (http://www.centerforsocialmedia.org/ecitizens/index.htm ) provides links to seventy-five websites that vividly embody this new digital civic landscape.

  Youth as E-Citizens received major funding from the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE). The study is part of the Center for Social Media's new Youth, Media, and Democracy Project, which is supported by the Surdna Foundation and the Ford Foundation.
  

  March 30, 2004

• Växjö University and the Maastricht Center for Transatlantic Studies (MCTS) invite you to participate in the third MCTS international and interdisciplinary conference "Democracy and Culture in the Transatlantic World." The conference will be held in October 27-30, 2004, in Maastricht, the Netherlands. For more information, go to: http://www.vxu.se/conference/mcts2004.
  

  March 29, 2004

• The Academy for Educational Development, (AED) announces an opening for the Director of Educational Products (New York-based), Civic Mission of Schools (CMS) Campaign School and Community Services. The Director will lead the development of various educational products for AED's management role in the Civic Mission of Schools campaign. This position is based in New York City. Eight years of relevant experience and a Masters degree are required.

  The Civic Mission of Schools (CMS) report (http://www.civicmissionofschools.org), published in February 2003 under the auspices of the Carnegie Corporation and CIRCLE (Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement at the University of Maryland), is a call to action for this preparation and for the school's primary responsibility to provide it. The report reflects a broad consensus that most young Americans have a poor understanding of representative democracy and their role in it, and that the schools need to play a major role in fixing the problem. It identifies six promising approaches to good civic education:
  - instruction in government, history, law, and democracy
  - class discussion of current local, national, and international issues and events
  - application through community service linked to curriculum and class instruction
  - extracurricular opportunities to get involved in the school and community
  - participation in school governance
  - simulations of democratic processes and procedures

  Interested applicants should send resume with cover letter referencing position #CS4074circ to: AED/HR, 1825 Connecticut Avenue, NW, Washington, D.C. 20009; fax: (202) 884-8413 or email: employ@aed.org. For additional information, visit the AED website at http://www.aed.org. To read the job announcement go to: Director of Educational Products.
  

  March 26, 2004

• Implementation of NCLB Curtails Study of History, Civics, Languages, & the Arts, While Expanding Learning Time for Literacy, Math, & Science Minority Students Most Affected by Curriculum Changes. The first significant study of how the No Child Left Behind Act is influencing instructional time and professional development in key subject areas reveals that schools are spending more time on reading, math, and science but squeezing out social studies, civics, geography, languages, and the arts.
  
  The report, conducted by the Council for Basic Education (CBE) and funded by the Carnegie Corporation of New York, says that the shift away from these liberal arts subjects is most pronounced in elementary schools and schools with large minority populations.
  
  The study, Academic Atrophy: The Condition of the Liberal Arts in America's Public Schools, is based on a survey of more than 1,000 principals in four representative states (Indiana, Maryland, New Mexico, and New York) that were chosen for their socio-economic, political, and geographical diversity…. Council for Basic Education, Washington DC, March 8, 2004
  

  March 25, 2004

• The Centre for Civil Society at the London School of Economics is proposing to launch a new scholarly journal entitled "Civil Society: Journal of the Public Sphere" and would be interested in hearing from individuals interested in contributing as article authors, as members of the editorial advisory board, and as contributors of ideas or suggestions

  The idea behind the journal is to provide a multi-disciplinary forum in which to discuss the concept and practices of civil society. The topic, while enjoying considerable intellectual attention as of late, tends to be discussed in particular understandings. For example, there are journals devoted to voluntary action, or 'the third sector', and political theory journals carry occasional contributions dealing with the topic. They want to provide a broad canvas, one which will allow these themes to be heard in one place, making the variety of narratives and approaches more intelligible, and allowing for a more holistic treatment of civil society in all its forms.

  They are particularly interested in receiving feedback from scholars from the disciplines of political science, international relations, sociology, anthropology, and development studies.

  The journal is predicated on the understanding that the concept of civil society is a contested and multifaceted one. Therefore, articles that challenge 'conventional wisdom' or interrogate the underpinnings of the very idea of civil society, from any theoretical-or indeed cultural-perspective or tradition are desirable. While voices from practitioners are welcome, it is hoped that all contributions will contain a strong theoretical element.

  Email Chris Ankersen (c.p.ankersen@lse.ac.uk) and Ebenezer Obadare (obadare@lse.ac.uk).
  

  March 24, 2004

• Developmental Research Postdoc, University of California, Santa Cruz. Two-year postdoctoral traineeship (post-PhD) in NIH-funded developmental research training program, to begin Fall 2004 (contingent on funding). The trainee will develop research of mutual interest with program faculty, focusing on cultural, interpersonal, and individual processes involved in human development in diverse communities and in institutions such as families, schools, and museums. Send vita, statement of research interests and career goals, and reprints, and request at least three recommendations to be sent to: Barbara Rogoff, Postdoc Search, 277 Social Sciences 2, University of California, Santa Cruz, CA 95064. Application review begins 4/2/04. Position open until filled. Applicants from underserved minority groups are especially encouraged to apply.

  Information about postdoc program: http://psych.ucsc.edu/Content/Faculty/devpostdoc.html; information on UCSC faculty: http://psych.ucsc.edu/Faculty/index.shtml
  

  March 23, 2004

• The International Leadership Association will be holding its annual conference "Improving Leadership Around the World: Challenges, Ideas, Innovations" on November 4-6, 2004 at the Hyatt Regency on Capitol Hill, Washington, DC.

  As part of this work, ILA's annual conference brings together a wide array of people from the academic, public, and private sectors, who present, demonstrate, evaluate, and respond to new ideas, programs, practices, research, and theories about leadership. "Improving Leadership Around the World: Challenges, Ideas, Innovations," this year's conference theme, speaks to this commitment and was selected by the program committee to inspire the submission of a wide variety of topics from those eager to explore together the complexities of leadership for three days in Washington, DC.

  The commitee is accepting submissions from all related disciplines, multiple sectors and professions, and various fields. Submitters may propose an innovative presentation format or can choose from a wide array of proposal formats. The paper should be no more than 4,000 words. The submission deadline is April 5th. Additional submission information, a link to works in progress, and a link to the online submission form are available at: http://www.academy.umd.edu/ila/Conferences/cfp.htm or email questions to ILA@academy.umd.edu
  

  March 22, 2004

• "Getting Out the Vote: How to Increase Turnout in 2004" Election experts Donald Green and Alan Gerber, the authors of Get Out the Vote! How to Increase Voter Turnout (Brookings Institution Press), challenge the conventional wisdom - and the advice of professional campaign consultants. Participants in this discussion, sponsored by the Brookings Institution and the Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE), will debate the best and most cost-effective ways to increase voter participation and youth turnout in the 2004 presidential elections. The event is on Tuesday, March 30, 2:00pm in Falk Auditorium. For more information go to: http://www.brookings.edu/comm/events/20040330.htm.

  March 19, 2004

• Two new resources relevant to civic education are now available:

  - Education Next has a forum on "Teaching Citizenship": Stephen Macedo summarizes and defends the Civic Mission of Schools report, and Chester Finn responds. See http://www.educationnext.org/20042/9.html.

  - Diane Ravitch reviews high school history textbooks in this Thomas B. Fordham Foundation publication:
  http://www.edexcellence.net/institute/publication/publication.cfm?id=329.
  

  March 17, 2004

• The American Political Science Association's Centennial Center for Political Science and Public Affairs is now seeking applications from political scientists planning to conduct research or writing in Washington, DC. The Centennial Center provides visiting scholars the infrastructure needed to conduct their work, including furnished work space with computer, phone, fax, conference space, and library access. Stays may be for as long as one year or as short as several days. Senior or junior faculty, post-doctoral fellows, and advanced graduate students are encouraged to apply. There are three primary application deadlines, but applications will be accepted on a rolling basis throughout the year. Space is filling quickly for the summer.

  The Center also offers a number of research grant programs providing supplemental funding in the range of $500 - $2,000. Some grant programs are tied to research stays at the Centennial Center while others allow for use of the money to cover outside research expenses.

  For more details visit the Center web site at http://www.apsanet.org/centennialcenter or contact Sean Twombly at twombly@apsanet.org.

  March 16, 2004

• The Civic Mind has announced its March award for the Michigan Nonprofit Association as well as a few updates:

  CIVIC MIND AWARD: MICHIGAN NONPROFIT ASSOCIATION
  A nonprofit, nonpartisan membership organization which provides information about thousands of candidates and elected officials at the federal, state and local levels.

  ESSAY: CAMPUS-COMMUNITY PARTNERSHIPS
  For the past 20 years, a new movement within higher education has emphasized community engagement as an integral part of every university's mission to teach and conduct research.

  DIRECTORY BY TOPIC: TRIAL LAWYERS ASSOCIATIONS
  Trial lawyers' associations at the state and national level are dedicated to preserving the civil justice system and the right to trial by jury in civil cases; protecting consumers; advocating for civil rights; protecting the health and safety of children and families.
  

  March 15, 2004

• FROM EDUCATION COMMISSION OF THE STATES: The 2004 National Forum on Education Policy, sponsored by the Education Commission of the States, will be here before you know it! Information about sessions and registration is now available on our Web site at http://www.ecs.org/NationalForum2004. You can also register online.

  Plan to spend July 13-16 in Orlando, Florida, with hundreds of other education policymakers. The meeting is designed specifically for governors, legislators, chief state school officers, state higher education executives, state board members and others interested in improving education by improving state policy. It's the only meeting all year where you can talk and network with such a variety of education's movers and shakers.

  For questions, contact Dara Piltz at 303.299.3621 or dpiltz@ecs.org.
  

  March 12, 2004

• The Council for Excellence in Government and CIRCLE have released poll data showing that U.S. government and history classes emphasize the U.S. Constitution and political system and American heroes and virtues of the system. The survey was conducted by Democratic pollsters Lake Snell Perry & Associates and Republican pollsters The Tarrance Group.

  When asked to choose one or two themes that were emphasized the most in middle and high school classes, the respondents said:
  
  - 45% -- The Constitution or the US system of government and how it works
  - 30% -- Great American heroes and the virtues of the American system of government
  - 25% -- Wars and military battles
  - 11% -- Problems facing the country today
  - 9% -- Racism and other forms of injustice in the American system
  - 5% -- Other, all of the above, or don't know

  The survey also found correlations between the themes students said were emphasized and their likelihood to participate in various ways.

  - Those who say that their classes emphasized "Great American heroes and the virtues of the American system" are most likely to trust other people, to trust the government, and to say that they have volunteered recently.

  - Those who report that "problems facing the country today" was the major theme in their social studies classes are most likely to feel that they can make a difference in their communities and the most likely to think that voting is important.

  - Those who feel that their teachers concentrated on "racism and other forms of injustice" are most likely to be engaged in community problem-solving and also most likely to be registered to vote (counting only those 18 and over).

  - Those who report an emphasis on "the US Constitution and system of government" and also "great American heroes and the virtues of the system of government" are civically engaged, across the board.

  There is more information and statistical analysis available in these two documents:
  1) a press release with major findings: http://www.civicyouth.org/PopUps/civic_ed_release.pdf and 2) a fact sheet with more detailed analysis: http://www.civicyouth.org/www/PopUps/fact_sheet_civic_ed.pdf
  

  March 11, 2004

• The Dirksen Center is accepting applications for the Robert H. Michel Civic Education Grant. If you are a teacher who wants to develop lesson plans that would help students understand why congressional incumbents have had such great electoral success and why they sometimes lose this is a great opportunity. For more information about the program, including a sample grant proposal and a list of previously awarded grants at: http://www.dirksencenter.org/grantmichelciviced.htm.

  REMINDER - The application deadline for The Dirksen Center's Congress in the Classroom is March 15, 2004. The program theme will be Election 2004. Individual sessions will be offered on such topics as: (1) Election 2004, A View from Capitol Hill, (2) Finding the Right Candidate: The Recruitment Puzzle, (3) Covering a Political Campaign: A Media Perspective, (4) Predicting Who Will Win the Presidency, (5) Show Me the Money: Can One Buy the White House?, and many others.

  Go to http://www.dirksencenter.org/progcongressinclassroom.htm to learn what participants say about the program. If you are interested in registering for the Congress in the Classroom 2004 workshop, you can complete an online registration form at: http://www.dirksencenter.org/CiCapplication.htm.
  

  March 10, 2004

• In Coming Attractions of the Citizenship Matters, a bimonthly online publication by the National Center for Learning and Citizenship at the Education Commission of the States: "Identifying Four Key Policy Approaches to Citizenship Education" by Susan Vermeer, ECS project manager, describes four key policy approaches to citizenship education being developed by the ECS National Center for Learning and Citizenship and the professional judgment group process used to develop the four approaches. This work was based on the paper "Developing Citizenship Competencies from Kindergarten Through Grade 12" written by Judith Torney-Purta and Susan Vermeer arguing that to receive a balanced citizenship education, students need to acquire competency in three broad categories, including civic skills, civic knowledge and civic dispositions. To read more go to: http://www.ecs.org/clearinghouse/50/33/5033.doc.

  March 9, 2004

• The following items on youth voting has been added to The Pew Charitable Trust's website. If you are interested in receiving regular email alerts from Pew go to http://www.pewtrusts.com.
  
  - Newsweek GENext Poll: A press release from Newsweek
  
  - Secretaries of State and College Presidents Work to Mobilize Young Voters: Non-Partisan Effort Seeks to Make Students a Swing Vote in 2004
  

  March 8, 2004

• NACE is pleased to announce that it is now included as a regular feature in Citizenship Matters, a bimonthly newsletter produced by the National Center for Learning and Citizenship at the Education Commission of the States. For more information go to: http://www.ecs.org/CitizenshipMatters.

  March 5, 2004

• The guest editorial "Academic achievement and civic development go hand-in-hand," by Elizabeth Burmaster, State Superintendent of Public Instruction in Wisconsin asks "Are the goals of academic achievement and civic learning oppositional?" Burmaster believes that one way to foster civic development is throug cross-curricular service-learning. She offers Wisconsin's Toolkit for Service-Learning and Citizenship as an example.
  

  March 4, 2004

• There's a new CIRCLE fact sheet with comprehensive data on youth turnout in the 2004 Democratic primaries: http://www.civicyouth.org/PopUps/primary2004.pdf. The overall voter turnout in the 2004 primaries and caucuses declined and the percentage of voters who were young remained about the same as it was in 2000, just under 10 percent. But there were wide variations in youth voter turnout between different states.

  Some key facts about young voters (age 18-29) in 2004 are:
  - Young voters accounted for just under 10% (9.85%) of Democratic primary voters this year, which is consistent with the results in 2000.

  - 912,000 youth voters participated in Democratic primaries or caucuses in 2004. Youth turnout declined slightly more than overall turnout.

  - The number of young voters increased in Iowa, Ohio, Maryland, Massachusetts, Georgia, Missouri, New Hampshire, Delaware, Oklahoma, Vermont, and Tennessee - but declined in California, New York, Rhode Island, and Connecticut.

  - While the percentage of voters who are young was generally between 8-11 percent, their proportion ranged from a high of 17 percent in Iowa and 14 percent in New Hampshire to a low of five percent in Connecticut and six percent in Oklahoma.

  - In yesterday's Super Tuesday contests, the biggest increases between 2000 and 2004 in the number of young people voting were in Ohio (growing from 78,000 to 105,000) and Georgia (from 34,000 to 66,000), while the biggest decreases were in California (falling from 393,000 to 286,000) and New York (from 88,000 to 52,000).
  

  March 2, 2004

• The University of Missouri-St. Louis College of Education is seeking nominations and applications for the Theresa M. Fischer Endowed Professor of Citizenship Education. The professor will hold a twelve-month appointment in the University of Missouri-St. Louis College of Education, the largest preparer of educators for Missouri and the St. Louis Region.
  
  The Theresa M. Fischer Endowed Professor of Citizenship Education must be a leading expert in citizenship education, with a strong record of scholarship in a related field. The Professor will direct the Citizenship Education Clearing House (CECH) at the University and be responsible for its funding and development, including shaping the vision for the future of citizenship education at the University and elsewhere. The Professor will collaborate with and provide leadership to school districts and other organizations that influence the development of citizenship in children. The Professor will strengthen teaching, research and collaborative school and community efforts that promote citizenship education. Full development of the anticipated program will require an active and successful external funding effort which is consistent with the College of Education's theme of Creating the 21st Century College of Education. The successful candidate will join thirteen other endowed professors who hold academic appointment in the College of Education.
  
  

  The application review process will start on March 15, 2004 and continue until the position is filled. The preferred starting date is August 15, 2004. For more information go to:
  http://www.umsl.edu/~educate/.
  

  March 1, 2004

• A reminder that the 4th Annual International Conference on Service-Learning Research is accepting research proposals - deadline is March 31, 2004. The conference will be held October 10-12, 2004 in Greenville, South Carolina and hosted by Clemson University and the International Center for Service-Learning in Teacher Education. The theme of the conference is "Theory to Practice: Advancing Research to Improve Service-Learning Outcomes." Topical strands include: theory methodology; community input and impact; pedagogy (i.e., technology, reflection); faculty (i.e., motivation, awards); students (i.e., impact); K-12 citizenship/civic engagement; service-learning and preservice and inservice teacher education: theory, pedagogy, and impacts; and empirically based "how-to's." In addition to paper sessions and interactive topical sessions, the conference will include invited speakers and symposia, roundtable discussions, debated forums, a graduate student program, special interest group meetings, resource sharing, and networking opportunities. For more information about submitting an abstract go to International Conference on S-L Research or contact RMC@RMCdenver.com. The conference is sponsored by RMC Research Corporation and The W.K. Kellogg Foundation.