Political and Legal Dimension of Civic Education

What this example shows can be generalized, not only to the fact that students should be able to exercise other human rights, but also to learning and education in general. To be relevant and broaden a person`s skills, learning must unfold in these three mutually supportive dimensions – knowledge, concepts and understanding; Capabilities; and parameters and values. For several decades, educators and teachers have agreed on this concept of learning. The second organizational question, “What are the foundations of the American political system?” involves an understanding of the historical, philosophical, and economic foundations of the American political system; the characteristics of American society and political culture; and the values and principles that underpin American constitutional democracy, such as individual rights and duties, concern for the common good, the rule of law, justice, equality, diversity, truth, patriotism, federalism, and separation of powers. This question deepens the examination of the values and principles expressed in foundational documents such as the Declaration of Independence, the United States Constitution, the Federalist Papers and landmark Supreme Court decisions. The study of the nation`s basic documents is now commissioned by several states, including California, Ohio, South Carolina, Florida and Kentucky. The U.S. Commission on Immigration, in its 1997 report to Congress (U.S. Immigration Commission, 1997), strongly recommended paying attention to the nation`s founding documents: This study examines the impact of online and offline citizen learning on offline citizen engagement and online political activity. It is based on panel data for Chicago Public School high school students (NA = 10,254). Young people who benefit from learning opportunities on digital engagement (ways to learn how to create and share digital media related to societal issues) are more likely to engage in participatory politics online, while young people who benefit from civic learning opportunities for digital consumption (ways to learn how to assess the credibility of online content) are less likely to do so. Learning opportunities for digital consumption are positively linked to social engagement in the offline sector.

Offline civic learning opportunities have positive relationships with both offline citizen engagement and online participatory politics. These results demonstrate the importance of these diverse learning opportunities and the extent to which these opportunities differ in their relationship to offline and online forms of participation. In the hope of ensuring both equity and excellence, the National Governors Association and the United States Congress have moved forward and paid special attention to civic education. The text of the Statement of Objectives, adopted by the National Governors Association in March 1990, stated: We can look at civic education from the following aspects of our lives: The objective of this unit is to introduce students to the challenge of living sustainably within planetary boundaries. Climate change, biodiversity loss and conflicts between disparate social groups raise complex and interrelated issues. Universities play an important role in developing critical and creative thinking on such important issues – the meta-narrative of the supposed epoch of the Anthropocene. Intellectual skills in civics and government are inextricably linked to content. For example, to think critically about a political issue, one must have an understanding of the subject, its history, its contemporary relevance, as well as a mastery of a number of intellectual tools or considerations useful for dealing with such a subject. Formal education in civic education and government should pay no less attention to the responsibility of citizens in a constitutional democracy. Understanding the meaning of individual rights must go hand in hand with an examination of personal and civic responsibility. For American democracy to flourish, citizens must not only be aware of their rights, they must exercise them responsibly, and assume the personal and civic responsibilities necessary for an autonomous, free, and just society.

These tasks are: In addition to the official curriculum, good civic education pays special attention to the informal curriculum. The informal program includes the management of the school community and the relationships between school members, as well as the “extracurricular” or extracurricular activities that a school offers. Teaching offline civic engagement is positively related to offline civic engagement and online political activity.