Learning Civics through Digital Engagement: An Oxymoron?
Left far behind in the wake of No Child Left Behind has been the teaching of Civics. Once a ninth grade fixture in social studies since World War I–yes, a century ago in a surge of enthusiastic curricular change, educational progressives in the U.S. established Civics to prepare students to be responsible citizens. By the 1950s, U.S. students took Civics, Problems of American Democracy, and U.S. Government in high school. Since then, these courses have shrunk considerably.
The decline in course-taking has occurred over decades as policy elites have replaced the civic mission of public
