Our Civics Duty

The title the students came up with for their proposed bill was “Re-entry of terrorist citizens.”

The co-authors would later regret their word choice, admitting as much to classmates in Legislative Semester at Middleton High School. Students in this semester-long class learn about government and politics by role-playing lawmakers in a simulated legislature.

“It would be tragic to fail a bill because of its title,” Philip Mackey, a Democratic co-author of the bill, tells his classmates. “I think the bill has a ton of merit. But I get why people might not like it. I can see both sides.”

Mackey and his co-sponsors nevertheless push for passage of the bill at the “floor session,” held in the high school auditorium as the spring 2019 semester is wrapping up. The room is packed with hundreds of students. Proponents argue that U.S. citizens who had left the country to join ISIS should be allowed back in the country after going through a rehabilitation program. “We are not letting in terrorists, we are letting in humans,” one student explains.

Others disagree. “We are living in a dangerous world,” one says. “What if one of these terrorists moved in next to you and committed a heinous crime?”

Mackey makes a final appeal. “It was our fault for poorly naming this bill,” he says. But, he adds, referring to the subjects of his bill, “they are citizens and they have rights.”

The measure fails 160-98.

Teacher Janel Anderson says the goal of Legislative Semester, which is a required course at Middleton High for all 10th graders, is to teach “engagement and citizenship.”

“There has been no more critical time in American history to re-engage kids in civics,” says Anderson, who has taught the course since 2013, a year after it was first offered in Middleton. “My main ambition is to make them feel entitled to this government,” adds Anderson, who gets teased by her students for swooning over the wonders of the U.S. Constitution. “I want them to fight for it, to love it and to be entitled to it. But also to know that it’s not something they are given, they have to earn it.”

Diana Hess, dean of UW-Madison’s School of Education, is a big fan of the approach used by Middleton’s Legislative Semester, which is a spawn of an innovative civics program developed by a former social studies teacher in a Chicago suburb. “I think it’s hard to teach people how to be engaged without giving people opportunities to be engaged,” says Hess, a national expert on civics education and the author of several books on the topic. “The analogy I often use is we would not teach people how to swim by lecturing them about various strokes. We would have them in the pool.”

But many Wisconsin students do not engage in civics this way. In fact, they might very well never take a single course in it. That’s because there is no state mandate for students to take a dedicated civics course — the study of government, the political process and the rights and duties of citizens in a democracy. Instead, the state requires that social studies be taught to K-8 students and that high school students complete “at least three credits of social studies, including state and local government” to graduate, says Kristen McDaniel of the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.

“There is no required course for graduation in any content area in Wisconsin,” notes McDaniel. “Local control is one of the foundational parts of education” in Wisconsin, she adds. “The majority of decisions are made at the local district level.”

Wisconsin is an “outlier,” says Hess. The state is one of just 10 that does not require that students take a dedicated high school civics course.

National polls consistently show that a majority of Americans know little about how our system of government works. In this year’s national survey of civic knowledge, sponsored by the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania, just two in five (39 percent) adults out of 1,104 polled could correctly name the three branches of government. Twenty-two percent couldn’t name any branch. Remarkably, this is an improvement — only 32 percent in last year’s poll could name all three branches. The pollsters say the survey “found a link between high school civics classes and civics knowledge.” People who took high school civics classes and who said they were greater consumers of the news were more likely to know such things as the three branches of government.

Why does it matter?

Critics say ignorance about and detachment from democratic governance play a role in everything from low voter turnout to the country’s growing political divide to the decline in media literacy.

A bill pending in the U.S. House of Representatives, the Civics Learning Act of 2019, authored by Rep. Alcee Hastings, a Democrat from Florida, would allocate $30 million in grants to schools for programs that strengthen “civics education and learning.”

According to the bill, “the dearth of civics lessons available to students across the United States has helped to foster a political climate that is deeply partisan and divided…. A lack of knowledge on the basics of the structure of our democratic republic creates an increasingly ill-prepared electorate which over time has, and will continue to, contribute to a weakened democracy.”

Eve Galanter remembers learning back in 2016 that all three Madison school board incumbents at the time were running unopposed. She says she was disappointed by the lack of interest in public service. “It spurred me to look at other elected offices in Madison and around the state,” says Galanter, who served on the Madison Common Council, is a former aide to U.S. Sen. Herb Kohl, and is the host of District Reports on Madison City Channel. “It appeared to me that in most instances — towns, villages, county board races — incumbents were rarely challenged and that, in some cases, even if an incumbent retired only one person ran for that seat.”

Later that year the League of Wisconsin Municipalities released a report that confirmed Galanter’s hunch. The 2016 State of Wisconsin’s Cities and Villages notes that “civic engagement” was an area of concern for the state’s local governments — “specifically, the number of candidates for village boards and city councils over the past three years. Regardless of population, only 4 percent to 5 percent of municipalities reported two or more candidates for each board seat. In 52 percent of communities, there was one or no candidate for each seat. That percentage was 21 percent in the larger municipalities but a troubling 64 percent in those with fewer than 15,000 residents.”

Galanter sensed this lack of interest in public office might have something to do with a lack of exposure to civics. “I thought ‘what can I do?’” she says. “I feel this passion about public service.”

She pitched the idea of a high school civics competition to the Wisconsin Newspaper Association Foundation, where she is a board member. In February 2019, regional competitions for the first Civics Games were held around the state. Cory Forbes and Alex Blue were at Union South, representing Memorial High School, along with their coach David Olson, social studies department chair at Memorial High.

Forbes and Blue took AP U.S. Government and Politics with Olson and are keenly interested in public policy. “To change things you have to understand them,” says Blue. “I think our government could use a lot of reform and change. It’s important to understand what doesn’t work and what works and how to piece together something that is more equitable.”

Olson says that a number of courses, including American history, might cover civics principles but that the only class that directly covers the topic is the AP course. “Civics or government is not a required course anywhere in the Madison school district for high schoolers,” he says. “I think it’s definitely a deficit.

“I think every student by the time they graduate high school should understand how they can be involved in their own civic life, understand how they connect to their government and the people in their community,” he adds. “We don’t require that. Personally, I think the state of Wisconsin should.”

Forbes and Blue came into the games well prepared for questions about the federal government, but had to do some last-minute homework on state and local government issues. “The AP government course is almost exclusively federal government-focused,” says Olson. “I think that is another area where students are often missing information. I would imagine very few high schools around the state offer specific education in state and local government.”

Forbes and Blue won their regional competition and went on to compete at the state finals, held at the state Capitol in late March. Gov. Tony Evers, the former schools superintendent for the state, dropped by mid-morning to offer some remarks. “It’s more and more difficult to be a citizen in this country,” he noted. “Having this competition is a good reminder to make sure that our young people are ready to be good citizens in the state of Wisconsin and in our country.”

The Memorial team did not make it all the way. That honor went to Platteville, which beat out 10 other teams including Muskego, whose members were the most fashion-forward of all teams, wearing matching scarves in their school colors.

This year’s games are scheduled for the spring. The regionals will be held around the state on April 24, and the finals May 15 at the state Capitol. The deadline for teams to sign up is Nov. 5.

DPI’s McDaniel, a former social studies teacher from Fort Atkinson, helped develop the state’s new guidelines for social studies instruction that were adopted last year. She says the standards are a “huge improvement” over the old ones, which were 20 years old, and will strengthen social studies instruction across the state.

“We have seen a national, documented, researched loss of social studies time, not just in Wisconsin, but everywhere, over the last 20 to 30 years,” says McDaniel, “and it has caused problems.”

The new standards put an emphasis on “inquiry practices” — teaching students how to question and evaluate sources — and, for the first time, state that students will be “civically engaged.”

“It is an expectation for every student in the state,” says McDaniel.

Marty Moe, social studies teacher leader for the Madison school district, is pleased with the new standards’ emphasis on critical thinking and civic engagement.

“I want kids to ask questions about anything they’re seeing or hearing. And sourcing their information — Who said it? Why? What is their bias? We need to get students to question what they’re reading, seeing, hearing and figure out for themselves what it means.” This includes anything on social media, adds Moe: “It’s a great opportunity to get students engaged in school if you can tap into these topics they’re reading about and care about…. We want students to be civically active and know that their voices matter.”

Moe points to the district’s Project Soapbox as a good example of action civics. Students have to come up with a two-minute speech that includes a call to action. In the 2019 contest, about 1,800 students participated in their classrooms, addressing such topics as mental illness, racism, the environment and perceptions about women. Later at the Overture Center, 115 students read their essays at a district-wide event. “It was really good and powerful,” says Moe. “Students liked adults listening to their voice.”

Moe says the exercise taught students the steps for civic action. “If you care about an issue you need to research it; you need to know people in power who have control over it; and you need to know what you can do to potentially impact things.”

Aaron Kaio, a social studies teacher at Shabazz City High School, takes a similar tack in his course called “Civics Through Games.” Kaio’s pitch to students goes this way: “This course is for all students who have ever wondered if they will have what it takes to be a thriving citizen in a democratic society.”

Most students at the district’s alternative high school lean left, says Kaio, so he assigns them political parties rather than leaving them to choose. He says students quickly see how influence works in political systems. “The kids get really good at the political side — ‘How much power can I capture?’” Harder is working with people with whom you might not agree. “People have to come to some agreement if they want a piece of legislation to go through,” he says.

Kaio says that ability to discuss issues “with the other side” is where many of his students find their voice. “They have this agenda they have to speak up for, and the only way they can get credit is if they’re willing to engage in these political discussions.” That often takes them out of their comfort zone. “A lot of my students hadn’t engaged, or only engaged with people of their own philosophies.”

Hess, of UW-Madison’s education school, has focused her scholarship on how young people learn to engage politically. Her books include Controversy in the Classroom: The Democratic Power of Discussion and The Political Classroom: Evidence and Ethics in Democratic Education, which she wrote with Paula McAvoy. In September 2018, the education school hosted a conference attended by more than 200 Wisconsin K-12 teachers and teacher education students. “Teaching About the 2018 Elections: Preparing Students for Political Engagement” was designed to give educators the “tools and confidence” they need to teach electoral politics in a way that is “engaging but respectful to differing points of view,” according to a UW news release.

Hess later reflected on the experience in an introduction to a special edition of Social Education that she guest edited. It was “sobering,” she wrote, “to hear a number of teachers express concerns that in their schools and communities, support for teaching young people about the very issues that are animating contemporary politics and governance is thin at best, and non-existent at worst.

“When schools fail to teach students how to engage with controversial political and constitutional issues — or worse, suppress, ignore, or exclude such issues from the curriculum — they send a host of destructive and misguided messages,” she added. “One is that it’s not important for young people to examine and analyze the contemporary political realm, especially in comparison to other content on which schools have traditionally focused. Another is that controversial issues — ranging from access to health care, to voting rights to gun control to abortion and the death penalty — are simply too hot to handle in schools, and may even be harmful for students.”

In an interview, Hess describes what she calls the “civic education” paradox.

“On the one hand, we want to prepare young people to participate in a very partisan and polarized climate. Not because we want to reinforce that climate, but because that’s the climate that they are in. So we need to prepare young people to participate in that climate,” she says. “On the other hand, we want civic education to be nonpartisan. We don’t want public schools to be Republican schools or Democratic schools or Libertarian schools. We want public schools to be schools where all students are learning how to engage politically, but we’re not suggesting there is a particular point of view that they should be ascribing to.”

She says there are many teachers in Wisconsin who are good at figuring out how to do this. But they are teaching in trying times.

“It’s interesting to me that in the last couple of years I think there is more partisan debate about what the content of civic education should be than we’ve seen since I’ve been in the field,” says Hess, who began teaching high school in 1979. “And I’m really worried about it. I think it’s a really negative trend.”

Hess points to the “huge debate” in Wisconsin a few years back over whether the Legislature should require high school students to pass the U.S. citizen test in order to graduate. “Some people were highly supportive. Others were not supportive and thought that essentially memorizing answers to questions is not high-quality civic education.”

The requirement was tucked into the 2015-2017 state budget by Republican legislators. “I thought it was ironic that a state that didn’t require students to take a civic education class would require them to pass a test on information related to civics. It would be like requiring students to pass a math test but not offering math classes.”

Anderson has little patience for the civics test and maybe even less for people who talk about how students are less knowledgeable than their elders. “The civics exam is such an insult, to be frank,” says Anderson, who left teaching this year and is now a full-time doctoral student in educational leadership and policy analysis at UW-Madison.

If lawmakers were really concerned about teaching students civics, she says, they would help fund programs like Middleton’s Legislative Semester.

“It’s not magic — there’s a reason it works — but it’s magical.”

“I think that kids are so capable of grappling with these really tough issues and with understanding party politics and so we should not simply seek to have them memorize the constitutional amendments to prepare for a civics exam,” says Anderson. “Because that says nothing about them as citizens. It says nothing about your engagement or willingness to participate in campaigns or do what is necessary to keep our democracy from dying.”

Mackey, the Middleton High student whose ISIS repatriation bill went down to defeat, says that the classroom provides a needed outlet for students to discuss things they care about.

“A lot of people have stances that are really important to them,” he says. “Teachers shouldn’t be afraid to talk about these things, because we talk about them in the real world all the time.”

Mackey says he came up with the idea for his bill after reading about an American-born ISIS wife who wanted to return to the U.S. but was barred from doing so. Mackey thought that was unfair.

He says he left the class with a greater understanding of what it takes to pursue change and pass legislation. “I think I definitely have a greater respect for our governmental system.”

And about that title, Mackey has learned his lesson. “The name is truly important. It’s the first thing that everybody sees.” 

[Editor's note: This article was updated with the correct spelling of Cory Forbes' first name and to note that Kristen McDaniel previously taught school in Fort Atkinson.]

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Test your knowledge of civics! 

(answers below)

1) How many amendments to the U.S. Constitution are there?

1. 33
2. 21
3. 27
4. 19

2) Who vetoes bills?

1. Congress
2. The Supreme Court
3. The states
4. The president

3) Who is the current chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court?

1. Clarence Thomas
2. Ruth Bader Ginsberg
3. John Roberts
4. William Rehnquist

4) What did the 19th amendment do? 

1. Forbid states from denying women the right to vote
2. Abolished slavery
3. Lowered the voting age to 18
4. Legalized hemp 

5) How many votes in the Electoral College are needed to win the presidency?

1. 538
2. 270
3. 300
4. 291

6) Which of the following founding fathers was not a president?

1. George Washington
2. Alexander Hamilton
3. Thomas Jefferson
4. John Adams

7) Prior to the Civil War, which state enslaved the largest number of people, about 500,000?

1. Virginia
2. South Carolina
3. Texas
4. Tennessee

8) How many alders are on Madison’s Common Council?

1. 15
2. 10
3. 20
4. 9

9) Who is the speaker of the Wisconsin Assembly?

1. Mark Pocan
2. Robin Vos
3. Fred Risser
4. Tammy Baldwin

10) How many times have Wisconsin residents voted to amend the state’s constitution?

1. 95
2. 21
3. 49
4. 142

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Answers:

1. 27

2. The president

3. John Roberts

4. Forbid states from denying women the right to vote

5. 270

6. Alexander Hamilton

7. Virginia

8. 20

9. Robin Vos

10. 142