Every year on January 16, Washington public schools participate in Temperance and Good Citizenship Day (TAGCD) in accordance with Revised Code of Washington (RCW) 28A.230.150. On this day, Washington social studies teachers must provide instructional time for high school seniors to register to vote. The Office of Superintendent of Public…

Many scholars argue that the practice of educational tracking exerts a distinct effect on young people's political engagement. They point out that students in academic tracks are becoming more politically engaged than those than those in vocational ones, and suggest that this may be due to differences across tracks in the curriculum, pedagogy,…

Questions of how to support students in conversation across and about different perspectives regularly appear in discussions about civic engagement. Students with clear political positions and a desire to engage with political institutions, however, are themselves a rarified group on many campuses. The gulf between students who seek to engage…

In the 1930s, suffragist and women's rights activist Maud Wood Park "had the happy idea of dramatizing a series of episodes from Lucy Stone's life." This idea resulted in the publication, in 1938, of a 162-page nine-act play, "Lucy Stone: A Chronicle Play," based on a biography of the abolitionist and suffragist by her…

This article shares lessons from committed and inspirational educators from across the country with whom the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE) worked in 2020. Their experiences reinforce that nonpartisan teaching about democracy is possible (i.e., not teaching who to vote for, but rather how the system…

The concept of political justice is deeply tied to our professional Code of Ethics. Social workers are well suited to challenge political inequalities that keep clients and communities from political participation. Laws affecting access to voter registration, casting a ballot, and having that ballot counted vary widely across the United States,…

Meaningful source work is at the heart of social studies learning, but often a tall order for elementary-aged students. In this article, the authors describe the construction and implementation of a fifth grade inquiry on the Suffrage Movement using a focused version of the Inquiry Design Model (IDM) Blueprint. Using source analysis scaffolds…

This paper explores how PurpleState, a political simulation designed to foster skills and knowledge for informed civic participation, develops students' abilities to counter or resist the effects of political polarization and partisanship. Throughout the simulation, which has been implemented in Virginia and Wisconsin, students are asked to…

Over the course of three semesters spanning the 2016 primary and general elections, we conducted a series of quasi-experiments to evaluate the effects of prediction markets on undergraduate interest in the political process. We gave several classes in our institution's core American politics course the opportunity to collectively invest in…

As a contribution to the Teaching & Learning Symposium on Comparative Politics organized by APSA, this short article discusses the challenges in Introduction to Comparative Politics classes when comparative political behavior is examined. In the tradition of studying political participation, the discipline has witnessed the development of…

Hull-House was a unique social experiment by which Jane Addams realized her egalitarian vision for a shared civic life. Facing soaring social problems of the early twentieth century, Hull-House's most important mission was to help new immigrants learn the rule of self-government and become successful drivers of it. Hull-House was an unusual group…

Democracy is highlighted in the Norwegian school system. This article investigates how pre-service teachers in social studies understand the more theoretical concept of democracy, and in what ways they intend to operationalize it with future pupils. Three ideal types are used to locate perspectives in the data: pure liberalist, majority rule and…

Across democracies, education predicts electoral participation and political interest. Here, German students on the pre-vocational and pre-academic educational tracks are compared to show how these differences emerge, and thus indicate how they can be addressed. In a Preliminary Study, a large dataset (3747 participants) revealed that there is a…

Amid a devastating pandemic and increasing polarization, how can US colleges and universities help students bridge divides, make their voices heard, and understand their responsibilities to others in a democratic society? This article is an interview of Nancy Thomas, director of the Institute for Democracy and Higher Education (IDHE) at Tufts…

Ample research has noted a positive sense of political efficacy associated with increased civic engagement. In turn, the role of service-learning in boosting students' civic engagement has been well documented. As civic engagement is a desirable goal for strengthening communities and empowering citizens, the role of service-learning in directly…