Commentary: Why We Need Civics
Thoughtful Teacher Podcast host Scott Lee shares a commentary regarding civics and the recent NEAP civics assessment.
Sources and further reading
NEAP Civics Assessment highlights webpage from the US Department of Education
Center for Educational Equity, Teacher’s College Columbia University research summary cited in commentary
National Council for the Social Studies advocacy webpage
Episode full transcript
Greetings friends and colleagues, welcome to The Thoughtful Teacher Podcast the professional educator’s thought partner-a service of Oncourse Education Solutions. I am Scott Lee. I have already started planning and recording conversations to share this fall, but today I want to discuss a problem that has been building for years but publicly gained traction in April when the US Department of Education released the scores from the latest National Assessment of Education Progress assessment in civics. Many policymakers and elected officials seemed to be surprised at the drop in civics scores, but if you are like me, the only surprise from the scores was that the scores did not decline even further then they did.
First and foremost, while likely the Covid pandemic was a contributing factor, this is one decline that was bound to happen. The reason is simple, there is not enough emphasis on civics in schools and often when civics is taught it is not taught in a way that allows students to practice and apply civic concepts. And this is not a teacher problem it is a policy problem.
Civic life is so much more than voting and contacting legislators, while these are important a robust civic life is one where people are engaged in sharing common values, disagreeing and dissenting peacefully, building relationships that are respectful and kind, and habitually taking ethical public actions. As The Center for Educational Equity at Teachers College, Columbia University correctly points out: there is a broad connection between civics and social emotional learning. The main difference being that social emotional learning is focused primarily (but not exclusively) on our more immediate and interpersonal relationships, while civics is focused more primarily on how we interact in larger human organizations where our relationships are not necessarily interpersonal. When I was teaching full time as a civics teacher, I used tell my students democracy is not just voting- it is a set of shared values and norms and actions.
Interestingly, we face similar problems when we don’t teach and practice social emotional learning as we face if we do not teach civics at all or even well enough. If we don’t teach and practice social emotional learning students exhibit many undesirable behaviors such as bullying behaviors rather than standing up for each other or demeaning others instead of showing kindness. If we don’t teach and practice civics people do not practice listening to others with empathy, working together to solve problems or we can sometimes even see others who are perceived as different as less then human. Friends, our schools are supposed to be engines of democracy, but without civics the engines will rust and freeze up from a lack of use.
Let’s take a deeper dive at what the data can show us. For the 8th grade assessment, which has a potential range from 0 to 300, the mean score was 150 in 2022 which was a statistically significant drop from the 153 of the 2018 assessment. This means that the score essentially dropped to the same level as when civics was first assessed in 1998. To me it is even more concerning that the average eighth grade score dropped significantly in the 10th, 25th, and 50th percentiles, while the 75th and 90th percentiles showed lower scores but were not statistically significant drops. This means that the higher performing students maintained their level of civic knowledge whereas lower performing students backtracked compared to lower performing students in 2018. Not surprisingly, there was a similar trend in US history scores. In practicality this plays out big in student perception of the world around them; and we know this because there were questions about civic agency on the assessment. When asked if students felt like they could make a difference in their communities, 31% of students scoring below the 25th percentile believed that they could affect change in their communities while among the students at or above the 75th percentile, 43% believed that they could affect change in their communities. When asked about civics and/or history helping students understand happenings in the world 30% of the lower performing quarter of students felt they were learning to understand what is happening in the world, while 62% of the students in the highest performing quarter believed that they did. Both of these differences are statistically significant. This means not only do the lower performing students believe they are disempowered by poor civics knowledge-they understand that they are being disempowered and potentially disenfranchised.
In a similar finding, among students scoring in the lowest quarter of the assessment only 27% could tell why it is important for individuals to participate in the political process, while 66% of the students who scored in the highest quarter could. This also was statistically significant. So not only do the lowest scoring students run the risk of being disenfranchised, fewer of these lower scoring students see any reason or hope regarding the need to be engaged in political or civic processes. The low performing students are literally learning to be less civically active.
Of course, there are additional qualifiers to consider. Only about half of the students who took the assessment reported actually taking a civics class, although another third took a social studies class that had some civics content. The students who reported taking a civics-specific class scored noticeably higher as a group. Significantly fewer students rated themselves as having a high degree of civic knowledge compared to 2018, but the students who did rate themselves as being highly knowledgeable continued to score much higher on the assessment. Taken together, we can see that students will achieve better and gain civic agency if they have the opportunity to learn and practice civic skills.
The National Council for the Social Studies has noted that over the last 20 years 44% of school districts have reduced the amount of time for social studies instruction. The NCSS recommends 45 minutes of social studies instruction at the elementary level. Though I suspect that the overzealous testing culture in the US interferes with this recommendation. I have personally observed while visiting schools that social studies and science instruction is the time that is sacrificed in the many weeks leading up to state mandated testing and instead used for daily test preparation. The NCSS also recommends various civic oriented activities including service learning, student led organizations, providing serious opportunities for student voice in schools, simulations of democratic processes and discussion of current events and controversial issues. In the same way that social emotional learning should not be relegated to a specific class, some civic learning can and should take place in multiple academic contexts.
Unfortunately, the reality is that in many states, legislatures have taken active steps to prevent teaching of civics because some legislators are apparently opposed to civic discourse. Commonly referred to as “divisive concepts” many civically rich lessons supposedly have been designed by teachers to make students feel quote “discomfort” because of a student’s ancestry. I would remind these elected charlatans that the writers of the US Constitution specifically noted that our society and legal system was lacking in serving all citizens when the republic was founded. The framers of the Constitution stated that one of their primary purposes was “in order to form a more perfect union” and they expected the Constitution to be amended as needed. In other words, they understood that there was still civic work to be done in our society. Now more than ever educators in all content areas need more support to help our students develop a stronger civic understanding and responsibility, not less. That means more opportunities for civics and less restriction on teaching truthful civic discourse.
While legislative change is needed in many states, teachers can still infuse civics within instruction just like we do with social emotional learning. Connecting civics to other content areas often is not a stretch. Many of the things that educators do throughout the day involve developing classroom community, helping students make the connection to civic practice is something that can be accomplished regardless of the specific content.
Let’s remember the words civics and civility come from the same Latin root, meaning citizenship and membership in the community. Let’s find ways to promote civic learning every day. Even when the tools may be lacking.
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This has been episode 7 of the 2023 season. If you enjoy this podcast, please tell your friends and colleagues about it, in person or on using social media. We also greatly appreciate positive reviews on the podcast app you use. The Thoughtful Teacher Podcast is hosted and produced by R. Scott Lee and is a copyright of Oncourse Education Solutions LLC. Episode notes, links and transcripts are available at our website thoughtfulteacherpodcast dot com where you can also sign up to receive notices when new episodes are released. Theme music is composed and performed by Audio Coffee. Please follow me on social media, my handle on Twitter and Instagram is @drrscottlee and on Mastodon @drrscottlee@universedon.com
