Forthcoming Book from Political Engagement Project

Posted by on June 18, 2007

[posted from Higher Ed S-L listserv]

In the June 2, 2006 issue of Inside Higher Ed, Carnegie Senior Scholars Thomas Ehrlich and Anne Colby consider the importance of promoting thoughtful inquiry on political issues and offer guidelines for fostering political understanding and engagement in campus life.
http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2006/06/02/ehrlich

The article draws on their work in the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching’s Political Engagement Project. The project is described briefly below, followed by a list of the courses and programs being described and assessed. Details at:
http://www.carnegiefoundation.org/programs/index.asp?key=25

In order to strengthen undergraduate education for responsible, engaged citizenship, the Political Engagement Project describes and assesses the impact of 21 undergraduate courses and extra-curricular programs designed to foster informed political engagement, broadly defined to include community engagement with a systemic dimension and other aspects of public policy, as well as electoral politics at local, state, and national levels. These courses and programs are located at a diverse set of institutions across the country and draw a wide range of students, including many racial/ethnic minorities and first generation college students.

The project documents the goals and pedagogies of the participating courses and programs, students perspectives on their experiences in the program, and the impact of these experiences on key dimensions of political development such as knowledge and understanding, active involvement, sense of political efficacy and identity, and skills of democratic participation. Students complete a survey before and after the course/ program, and a subset of students from each of the 21 is interviewed in depth. The faculty leaders were also interviewed and completed a survey.

Analyses of these data show that the courses and programs do succeed in increasing students political understanding, participation, skills, and action. This is so both for students who enter the courses and programs with little interest in politics and those who enter already very interested and engaged.

Given widespread charges of liberal bias on college campuses, it is interesting to note that students are entering these courses and programs with a broad spectrum of political beliefs, and their party identification and political ideologies (self-ratings of liberal-conservative) do not show significant change from pre to post.

The Political Engagement Project is also preparing a handbook for faculty and administrators who want to promote undergraduate political engagement. The handbook is structured around the key goals and pedagogies of education for political engagement — structured reflection, research and action projects, outside speakers, and external placements. The handbook spells out the specific purposes these pedagogies serve and offers guidelines for using them, warnings about challenges they present, and suggestions for overcoming those challenges. The handbook also addresses the importance of open inquiry and diversity of opinion in education for democratic participation, along with strategies for ensuring open-minded consideration of alternative perspectives. The handbook is now in draft form.

Rick Battistoni
“Ancients and Moderns: Democratic Theory and Practice”
Providence College

Alma Blount
Service Opportunities in Leadership,Hart Leadership Program
Duke University

Sue Briggs
CIVICUS Living-Learning Program
University of Maryland, College Park

Ross Cheit and Adam Reich
“Children and Public Policy”
Brown University

Jim Farr and Robert Hildreth
“Practicing Democratic Education” and Public Achievement program
University of Minnesota

Otto Feinstein
“Introductory American Government” and Urban Agenda/Civic Literacy Project
Wayne State University

Siegrun Freyss
“Government and American Society”
California State University, Los Angeles

Marshall Ganz
“Organizing: People, Power, and Change”
Harvard University

Joe Kahne, Ajuan Mance, and Kristen Shutjer Mance
Institute for Civic Leadership
Mills College

Arthur Keene, John Reiff, and David Schimmel
Citizen Scholars Program
University of Massachusetts, Amherst

Kristy Khachigian
Engalitcheff Institute on Comparative Political and Economic Systems
The Fund for American Studies
Held at Georgetown University

Meta Mendel-Reyes
“Introduction to Service, Citizenship, and Community”
Berea College

Douglas F. Morgan and Craig Shinn
“Civic Initiative: The Ethics of Leadership” and “Civic Engagement: The Role of Social Institutions” and Leadership for Change Cluster
Portland State University

Brian Murphy
“The Politics of San Francisco”
San Francisco Urban Institute, San Francisco State University

Richard Reitano
“The National Model United Nations”
Duchess Community College and Vassar College

Phil Sandro
Metro Urban Studies Term
Higher Education Consortium for Urban Affairs (HECUA)

Richard Semiatin
Washington Semester Program
American University

Gerald Shenk and David Takacs
“Social and Environmental History of California”
California State University, Monterey Bay

Dick Simpson
“The Future of Chicago”
University of Illinois at Chicago

Adam Weinberg
Democracy Matters
Colgate University and other campuses

Greg Werkheiser
Virginia Citizenship Institute – College Leaders Program
Held at George Mason University, the University of Richmond, and other venues