Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, Jon Kyl: How to revive a shared dream for America's future

When Martin Luther King, Jr. called Americans to undertake fundamental civil rights reforms in 1963, he invoked a common “American dream.” Americans today seem very far from sharing such a common hope.

Intersecting crises in public health, race relations and the economy have afflicted our nation at a time when political polarization and the breakdown of civil dialogue had already weakened our civic strength. As schools reopen or adapt to remote learning across the U.S. this year, all of us must help them to revitalize their crucial role in cultivating the civic bonds our nation needs to sustain this republic for ourselves and future generations.

As we move on from a particularly contentious national election, there is an urgent need for students to be educated in the foundations of American politics: our shared principles, our deep commitments to freedom and equality, the design of our governing institutions, the amendments we have made to our Constitution along with other major political reforms, and the importance of civil dialogue and compromise to reach common ground. 

With this kind of education, the next generation will be better equipped to engage in constructive debate about our future.

This urgency stems both from the importance of the goal and from the troubling distance that separates us from achieving it today. A 2018 study found that 32% of young Americans think that “non-democracies can be preferable” to democracy, compared with only 11% of older Americans.

Only 55% of these young Americans thought that “democracy is always preferable,” compared with 84% of older Americans. A 2019 survey by the Annenberg Public Policy Center found that only 39% of Americans could name all three branches of our government; 22% couldn’t even name one.

As co-chairs of the Board of Counselors for the School of Civic and Economic Thought and Leadership at Arizona State University, we have helped to shape the school’s bipartisan approach to improving civic education in Arizona and across the U.S.

As political leaders we have long valued the importance of civil dialogue, including with those across the aisle. This spirit animates the school's approach in its discussion-centered classroom pedagogy and in its attention to teaching the great debates of American history as an essential component of civic education today.

Promote better civics education

In Arizona, SCETL has helped lead the development and implementation of Sandra Day O’Connor Civics Celebration Day — a day of school instruction dedicated entirely to civic education. In 2015, Arizona became the first state to pass legislation requiring graduating high school students to pass the U.S. Citizenship Test.

This measure has since been adopted in some form by more than 30 other states. We hope that many other states will similarly adopt their own versions of Civics Celebration Days as a signal of the importance they place on education for effective citizenship.

Teachers should be encouraged and empowered to teach American civics and history to their students. With all of the required emphasis on STEM, math, and reading, there is often little time left for learning in civics. State standards on civics are in many cases unwieldy laundry lists of topics to be covered, with little organization or guidance regarding best practices for teaching to these standards.

Nine states have no civics standards at all. Students in underrepresented and disadvantaged populations are affected most severely by these problems, receiving even less civic education than their peers.

Study will help guide educators

These are some of the problems that spurred the launching of a national study of civic education funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the U.S. Department of Education in August. Led by a cross-partisan team including SCETL and iCivics, along with centers at Harvard University and Tufts University, this study aims to provide much-needed guidance to teachers, superintendents, state boards of education, textbook publishers and others to achieve system-wide change in the quality of civic education offered to all school students.

The product of this study, "Educating for American Democracy: A Roadmap for Excellence in History and Civics Education for All Learners," will be released in February at the Smithsonian.

The road to improved civic debate and participation is through civic knowledge. Effective civic education is a prerequisite for more productive civic participation and a functioning constitutional order. If we work now to achieve large-scale renewal of how our children learn about their role in America’s tradition of self-government, there is hope that we may emerge from our current crises better able to disagree in civil ways and find governing compromises.

Just as Thomas Paine’s words roused American patriots to rise from defeats to victories in 1776, and just as King inspired all Americans to truly share in the “majestic words” and pledges of the Declaration and the Constitution, we must rouse ourselves to resuscitate the prospects of America’s democratic republic today. Improving and strengthening civic education throughout the U.S. is a vital place to start.

Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, a Democrat, served as lieutenant governor of Maryland. Jon Kyl, a Republican, represented Arizona in the U.S. Senate.