The Importance of Civics

Those who fought for Freedom

When Sandra Day O'Conner left the Supreme Court Bench, primarily because of the poor health of her husband, she did not walk away from her sense of responsibility to the nation.  Instead, she launched the Sandra Day O'Conner Institute for American Democracy.  She loved her country and was concerned for it, and she focused her Institute's attention on the children.  

She saw the time devoted to civic education in public schools declining significantly in the 1960's, with the shift being other educational focus, such as STEM and No Child Left behind.  In addition, civic education itself was becoming controversial.  Teachers had begun to feel unprepared to teach civics.  O'Conner could see that young Americans were less knowledgeable about civics than past generations.  Her Institute was formed to reverse that trend.  

Yet the problem continued.  While educators recognized the problem, and eventually all 50 states included civics in their social studies standards, the quality was not universal.  Less than half of the states required a one semester civics high school course.  Many elementary and middle schools focus instead on reading and math.  The old issues remain:  Teachers feeling ill prepared to teach civics and the demands of other courses prioritized.

Kansas Legislators were not unaware of the civics problem.  However, they were also aware of research showing that some "Americans ages 18-29 say they have a 'favorable view' of communism, and a rising number of Gen Z and Millennials who believe the "Communist Manifesto guarantees freedom and equality better than the Declaration of Independence."  (f.n.  Quote from Kansas Reflector and other news reporters.)

Concerned as much about the positive view of Communism as knowledge of civics, the Kansas State Senate combined the two concerns.  Beginning with the 2022-2023 school year, Kansas requires students in accredited public, private, and parochial high schools to pass a civics test to graduate, consisting of 60 questions selected from the 100 questions Naturalization test for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration, including information concerning communism.  

While the students must pass that test before high school graduation, they can take it any time between 7th grade and H.S. graduation, and they can take it as many times as necessary.  The percent necessary to pass is not stated, left to be determined by local school boards.  

It seems that something that began about civics turned into a new educational requirement to teach students about communism and other concerning ideologies, at a time when teachers are already struggling with teaching reading, writing, and math.  

How can teachers and students manage all of this?  Longer School days?  Shorter Summer breaks?   Limits on extracurricular activities?  I do not know, but I do believe that respect for American Democracy and the understanding of civics are important parts of the glue that holds the Nation together.  When history and civics in public schools were neglected or omitted entirely, we lost something important.  

When young Americans favor communism over the Declaration of Independence, we have a problem.  Memorizing answers to the required test seems like a band aid on a broken leg.  Memorizing answers without the full experience of learning about the history of the precious rights we have in America seem unlikely to awaken the pride and since of responsibility we need to have if civics means anything to Americans of all ages.  Sandra Day O'connor thought so.