In the latest case of leftists working to turn public schools into propaganda factories, four bills were recently introduced in the United States House of Representatives to push student activism under the guise of civic education.
These proposals would fund vaguely sounding programs like “civic action”, “applied civic education” and “service learning”. If adopted, they could turn civic education nationwide into activist training, encouraging students to hasty judgment and ideological peer pressure.
One of those proposals, introduced by Representative Jimmy Panetta, D.-Calif., Is the Inspire to Serve Act. Although the text of the 2021 bill has not yet been released, it will likely resemble the 2020 proposal of the same name. Ostensibly aimed at improving national service, both military and civilian, the 2020 bill aimed to allocate nearly half a billion dollars for civic action grants.
If the 2021 plan is the same, it would establish a $ 200 million “Civic Education Fund”, defining “civic education” broadly. It would provide grants for the development of “civic education, civic action and service learning programs”. These grants could go to colleges and universities, national and local education agencies, and even non-profit organizations.
The law provides an additional $ 250 million for a “Service Learning Fund”. The stated objectives of this provision are ambitious:
(A) All Kindergarten to Grade 12 students receive classroom service learning experiences;
(B) at least 1,000,000 students in grades 6 to 12 participate in a summer service program each year; and
(C) at least 1,000,000 students in grades 9 to 12 participate in a semester of service program each year.
It would also create an “Excellence in Civic Education” award for teachers and students, indicating that their civic education projects could be judged and recognized nationally. In other words, the bill would spend millions of dollars pushing millions of students each year into service learning and civic action projects. It might be nice if such projects were as harmless as they seem, but these new civic initiatives would politicize education more.
Other similar bills include the “Civics Learning Act”, the “Civics Secures Democracy Act” and the “Promoting Programming, Research, Education and Preservation (PREP) Civics and Government Act”, with prices up to $ 1. billion dollars to fund student activism. .
This new model of civic education, called either “applied citizenship” or “civic action”, was allegedly designed to teach students through projects and public engagement. Unlike the traditional civic education approach – which would teach basic lessons like the three branches of government – this “new civic education program” pushes students into the political fray.
The model often encourages and compels students to demonstrate for political causes and lobby for legislation. Such an approach rests on a long-standing premise of progressive education inspired by John Dewey: that students learn best by doing. Far from being politically neutral, the “application” of applied civics instruction and the “service” of service-learning often boils down to overt student activism.
While supporters of the Inspirer to Serve law and its counterparts claim to promote discourse, the bills would further politicize civic education, making such dialogue less likely. Students generally do not have well-formed political views. By pushing them straight into political action, the bill encourages hasty conclusions, forcing students to double down on their unexamined beliefs.
In addition, most “civic action” projects are ideologically oriented towards progressive causes. Bills like the Inspire to Serve law will work as partisan tools training students in left-wing activism and pushing them towards the Democratic Party. The Republicans who signed these bills are being fooled.
Conservatives should not be the only ones opposing civic action. Anyone who cares about depoliticizing education – and preventing children from becoming ideological pawns – should also eagerly oppose such propaganda.
John Sailer is an associate researcher with the National Association of Scholars. He previously worked as a college teacher in Harlem, New York and Mount Airy, North Carolina. He holds a BA from King’s College and an MA from Columbia University, Teachers College.
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