ERIC ED572047: Making Citizens: How American Universities Teach Civics. With Case Studies of the University of Colorado, Boulder; Colorado State University; University of Northern Colorado; and the University of Wyoming

8.5 MB·English

by  ERIC

Making Citizens: How American
Universities Teach Civics
With Case Studies of the University of Colorado, Boulder; Colorado State University;
University of Northern Colorado; and the University of Wyoming
DAVID RANDALL
DIRECTOR OF COMMUNICATIONS,
NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF SCHOLARS
JANUARY 2017
MAKING CITIZENS: HOW AMERICAN
UNIVERSITIES TEACH CIVICS
With Case Studies of the University of Colorado, Boulder;
Colorado State University; University of Northern Colorado;
and the University of Wyoming
A REPORT BY THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF SCHOLARS
January 2017
DAVID RANDALL
WITH CONTRIBUTIONS BY ASHLEY THORNE
Cover Photo: William Meyers, Times Square souvenir shop, September 15, 2010,
www.williammeyersphotography.com
© 2017 National Association of Scholars
ABOUT THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF SCHOLARS
Mission
The National Association of Scholars is an independent membership association of academics
and others working to sustain the tradition of reasoned scholarship and civil debate in America’s
colleges and universities. We uphold the standards of a liberal arts education that fosters intellectual
freedom, searches for the truth, and promotes virtuous citizenship.
What We Do
We publish a quarterly journal, Academic Questions, which examines the intellectual controversies
and the institutional challenges of contemporary higher education.
We publish studies of current higher education policy and practice with the aim of drawing attention
to weaknesses and stimulating improvements.
Our website presents a daily stream of educated opinion and commentary on higher education and
archives our research reports for public access.
NAS engages in public advocacy to pass legislation to advance the cause of higher education reform.
We file friend-of-the-court briefs in legal cases, defending freedom of speech and conscience, and
the civil rights of educators and students. We give testimony before congressional and legislative
committees and engage public support for worthy reforms.
NAS holds national and regional meetings that focus on important issues and public policy debates
in higher education today.
Membership
NAS membership is open to all who share a commitment to its core principles of fostering intellectual
freedom and academic excellence in American higher education. A large majority of our members
are current and former faculty members. We also welcome graduate and undergraduate students,
teachers, college administrators, and independent scholars, as well as non-academic citizens who
care about the future of higher education.
NAS members receive a subscription to our journal Academic Questions and access to a network
of people who share a commitment to academic freedom and excellence. We offer opportunities to
influence key aspects of contemporary higher education.
Visit our website, www.nas.org, to learn more about NAS and to become a member.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The National Association of Scholars is deeply grateful to the Daniels Fund and the Anschutz
Foundation, which provided major support for the making of Making Citizens. We are also grateful
to many NAS members and donors who provided further support—too many to name, but to each
of whom we are also grateful.
Many people in Colorado, Wyoming, and elsewhere in the nation responded generously to our
requests for information, provided counsel, or agreed to be interviewed. Among them, we are
grateful to Vanessa A. Baird, Matt Cook, Pamela Duncan, Kelly Fox, Andrew Garner, John Griffin,
Catherine E. Hicks, Tobi Jacobi, Jason McConnell, Vincent McGuire, Nicole Ann McManus, Tyler
Miller, Maggi Murdock, William Saxby, Rasha Tejada, Oliver Walter, and Bradley C. S. Watson. We
are also grateful to Mark Bauerlein, K. C. Johnson, and Mary Grabar for reading and commenting
on an early draft of this report. Space limits forbid listing everyone who helped this report to appear,
we are thankful to many, many people around the country.
I personally am deeply grateful to the people at the NAS offices who have read and contributed to
this report—Peter Wood, Rachelle Peterson, and Ashley Thorne. Ashley deserves special thanks—
because she did far more than is indicated by the phrase “with contributions by.” She wrote the
first draft of this report, and did enormous amounts of research. I could not have written Making
Citizens without her work.
CONTENTS
ABSTRACT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
PREFACE BY PETER WOOD . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
PROGRESSIVE POLITICS: A NOTE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
PART ONE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
CIVICS EDUCATION IN AMERICA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Traditional Civics Education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
What Civics Education Should Be . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
What Universities Actually Teach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
The Old Civics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
The New Civics’ Origins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
Service-Learning: Institutional History . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
Service-Learning: Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
Service-Learning: Goals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
Service-Learning: Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
Public Achievement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
The New Civic Pedagogy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
Civic Engagement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
Goals and Techniques . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
Civic Studies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
Global Citizenship . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
The New Civics Now . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
A Crucible Moment (2012) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
The New Civics Infrastructure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
Finances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
Ambitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
Mission Statements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156
The Disciplines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156
Faculty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .157
Students . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160
The World Beyond . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162
PART TWO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166
CASE STUDIES: COLORADO AND WYOMING . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166
Why Have Case Studies? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166
Why Study These Universities? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166
Biographies: Campus Compact of the Mountain West . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
Sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
Method . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168
UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO, BOULDER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169
The Hollowed-Out Core Curriculum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170
There’s No Civics but New Civics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170
Splinters of the Old Core . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172
The Effect of Distribution Requirements: No One Needs to Take a Civics Course . .173
Crowding Out the Old Civics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174
Hardly Anyone Gets a Civics Education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .175
Sneaking in a New Core . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176
“CU Engage,” How CU-Boulder Organizes Leftist Activism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179
Investing in Personnel: Training Radical Cadres . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180
Community Leadership Training: Progressive Activism 101 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
Activism for Everyone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183
Leading to the Left . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184
Public Achievement: Boyte-Bots at Boulder . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
Puksta Subsidizes Progressive “Scholars” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187
Something Is Missing from this Picture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188
Service Learning: Here, There, and Everywhere . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189
I’m From CU Dialogues and We Need to Have a Conversation . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190
I’m From CU Dialogues and We Need to Have Another Conversation . . . . . . . .191
Service-Learning Where You Sleep . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 192
You Can Never Leave . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193
Research for Ready Money . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194
Civic Engagement with a 401 (a) Retirement Plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195
The New Civics Summed Up: A Perpetual Money-Grabbing Machine . . . . . . . 196
Next We Take Over the University . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197
How Much Does It Cost? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198
COLORADO STATE UNIVERSITY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203
The Bored-Out Core . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .204
Nothing But New Civics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .204
The Ragged Old Core . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205
“Distribution Requirements” Mean “Get Out of Civics Free” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 206
Civics Sinking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 206
Civics Education: For the Few who Bother . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .209
Preparing the Way for a New Core . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 210
Civic Engagement Is Progressive Advocacy, No Matter How You SliCE It . . . . 210
Radical CELS at CSU . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211
Cheer-Leaders for the Left . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211
Radical Rhetoric . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 212
PACT with Harry Boyte . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213
Dollars for “Scholars” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214
Honoring Advocacy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
Service-Learning TILTed to the Left . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217
On to Alinsky, at All Deliberate Speed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
Martín’s Minions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220
New Civics Workout: Stepping Up and Getting in LeaderShape . . . . . . . . . . . . 221
Service-Learning Is the Key to Leadership . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 222
No Break from New Civics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223
When We’re Older, We’ll Be Boulder . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 224
The New Civics in Dollars and Cents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225
UNIVERSITY OF NORTHERN COLORADO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 228
Coreless in Colorado . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229
University of Northern Colorado, University of New Civics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229
The Old Core Fades Away . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 230
Dismantled Civics in the Distributed Curriculum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
Civics, Interrupted . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
Civics for Some . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232
The New Core Curriculum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233
UNC’s New Civic Hydra: A Body with Many Heads . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236
Community Engagement Is a Social Science . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237
Progressives Do the Honors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237
Leadership at UNC: Straight-Up Left Activism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238
What’s Studied Abroad Won’t Stay Abroad . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .240
Engaging Money . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242
Scads of Service-Learning at UNC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 244
Co-Curricular Catalyst . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245
All Your Campus Is Belong to Us . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245
The New Civics: What’s in Your Wallet? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246
UNIVERSITY OF WYOMING . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
A Remnant Core . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
Old Civics vs . New Civics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253
The Dead Weight of the Distribution Requirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253
Meet the New Core, It Ain’t Like the Old Core . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 254
New Civics at UW: Small, but Growing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257
SLCE of Wyoming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257
Civic Honors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258
Courses in New Civics: Kernels of Programs to Come . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 259
New Civics Here, New Civics There . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 260
You’ll Find New Civics Everywhere . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
I’m Growing Bigger and Better in Every Way . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262
UW Still Spends on New Civics, Even as It Tightens Its Belt . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262
THE CLASSROOM EXPERIENCE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265
University of Colorado, Boulder . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265
Colorado State University . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269
University of Northern Colorado . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 270
University of Wyoming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273
BIOGRAPHIES: CAMPUS COMPACT OF THE MOUNTAIN WEST . . . . . . . . . . . . . 276
Board of Directors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 276
Staff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 278
Advisory Committee . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .280
RECOMMENDATIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 286
Declare Principles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 287
Model Declaration of Principles: Civics Education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 287
Restructure and Set Standards for the Civics Curriculum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .288
High School Civics Curriculum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 289
College Civics Curriculum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 289
College Civics Curriculum: Structure and Content . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 290
The Best Solution: Civic Literacy in a Core Curriculum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .290
The Second-Best Solution: A Civic Literacy Distribution Requirement . . . . 291
The Characteristics of College-Level Civics Classes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 292
Freeze Funding for Service-Learning and Civic Engagement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 292
Legislative Initiatives: Containing and Eliminating the New Civics . . . . . . . . . 294
What about Academic Freedom? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 296
Fund Small Civic Literacy Classes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 297
Provide a Supportive Professional Environment for Civic Literacy . . . . . . . . . 298
Foster a Genuine Culture of Volunteerism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 298
Unite Non-Progressive Civics Organizations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 299
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 300
APPENDIX 1: THE NEW CIVICS INFRASTRUCTURE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 302
APPENDIX 2: SAMPLE CIVICS SYLLABI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 315
APPENDIX 3: CIVIC LITERACY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 333
APPENDIX 4: ALTERNATE CIVIC ACTIVITY AND COMMUNITY PARTNERS . . . 338
APPENDIX 5: GLOSSARY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 342
APPENDIX 6: UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO, BOULDER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 361
APPENDIX 7: COLORADO STATE UNIVERSITY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 437
APPENDIX 8: UNIVERSITY OF NORTHERN COLORADO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 469
APPENDIX 9: UNIVERSITY OF WYOMING . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .486
Index
The Appendices of this report appear in the electronic version of Making Citizens, at
www.nas.org/makingcitizens. Readers who wish to follow the references in both the Table
of Contents and the Index to material in the Appendices should consult this webpage.
9 | MAKING CITIZENS: HOW AMERICAN UNIVERSITIES TEACH CIVICS
ABSTRACT
A new movement in American higher education aims to transform the teaching of civics. This report
is a study of what that movement is, where it came from, and why Americans should be concerned.
What we call the “New Civics” redefines civics as progressive political activism. Rooted in the
radical program of the 1960s’ New Left, the New Civics presents itself as an up-to-date version of
volunteerism and good works. Though camouflaged with soft rhetoric, the New Civics, properly
understood, is an effort to repurpose higher education.
The New Civics seeks above all to make students into enthusiastic supporters of the New Left’s
dream of “fundamentally transforming” America. The transformation includes de-carbonizing the
economy, massively redistributing wealth, intensifying identity group grievance, curtailing the
free market, expanding government bureaucracy, elevating international “norms” over American
Constitutional law, and disparaging our common history and ideals. New Civics advocates argue
among themselves which of these transformations should take precedence, but they agree that
America must be transformed by “systemic change” from an unjust, oppressive society to a society
that embodies social justice.
The New Civics hopes to accomplish this by teaching students that a good citizen is a radical activist,
and it puts political activism at the center of everything that students do in college, including
academic study, extra-curricular pursuits, and off-campus ventures.
New Civics builds on “service-learning,” which is an effort to divert students from the classroom
to vocational training as community activists. By rebranding itself as “civic engagement,” service-
learning succeeded in capturing nearly all the funding that formerly supported the old civics. In
practice this means that instead of teaching college students the foundations of law, liberty, and
self-government, colleges teach students how to organize protests, occupy buildings, and stage
demonstrations. These are indeed forms of “civic engagement,” but they are far from being a
genuine substitute for learning how to be a full participant in our republic.
New Civics has still further ambitions. Its proponents want to build it into every college class
regardless of subject. The effort continues without so far drawing much critical attention from the
public. This report aims to change that.
In addition to our history of the New Civics movement and its breakthrough moment when it
was endorsed by President Obama, we provide case studies of four universities: the University of
Colorado, Boulder (CU-Boulder), Colorado State University in Fort Collins (CSU), the University of
Northern Colorado in Greeley (UNC), and the University of Wyoming in Laramie (UW).