Active Citizenship: Empowering America's Youth

John Minkler. Educators for Social Responsibility, 1998.

This curriculum introduces students to the knowledge, skills, and values of responsible citizenship in the context of analyzing and solving real school and community problems. Contains 17 lessons with extensions including a group project in which students identify a real political problem, research related issues, and propose a solution.

Resource Link: http://esrnational.org/Merchant2/merchant.mvc

Albany Park Theater Project

The Albany Park Theater Project utilizes the medium of theater to help teenagers recognize and achieve their potential, with an emphasis on nurturing their educational ambitions and sense of civic responsibility.

Resource Link: http://aptpchicago.org

Americans for Informed Democracy (AID)

Americans for Informed Democracy (AID) is a non-partisan 501(c)(3) organization working to raise global awareness on more than 500 U.S. university campuses and in more than 10 countries. AID fulfills its mission by coordinating town hall meetings on America's Role in the World, hosting leadership retreats, and publishing opinion pieces and reports on issues of global importance. Through these efforts, AID seeks to build a new generation of globally conscious leaders who can shape an American foreign policy appropriate for our increasingly interdependent world.

Resource Link: http://www.aidemocracy.org

Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania

The Annenberg Public Policy Center has been the premier communication policy center in the country since its founding in 1993. By conducting and releasing research, staging conferences and hosting policy discussions, its scholars have addressed the role of communication in politics, adolescent behavior, child development, health care, civics and mental health, among other important arenas. The Center?’s researchers have drafted materials that helped policy-makers, journalists, scholars, constituent groups and the general public better understand the role that media play in their lives and the life of the nation. The Policy Center maintains offices in Philadelphia and Washington D.C.

Resource Link: http://www.annenbergpublicpolicycenter.org

APSA-CIVED

APSA (the American Political Science Association).

Originally established by the APSA Task Force on Civic Education for the Next Century (1966-2000), CIVED is a public discussion list for scholars and pracitioners of civic education and civic engagement.

Resource Link: http://www.h-net.org/~cived/

Choices for the 21st Century Program

The Choices Program at Brown University's Watson Institute for International Studies offers deliberation-focused supplemental curriculum units for U.S. History, World History and Global Studies. Choices units feature historical background, a role play centered on alternative policies, primary source materials, detailed lesson plans and study guides. Units are affordable.

Resource Link: http://www.choices.edu

CIRCLE (The Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement)

CIRCLE promotes research on the civic and political engagement of Americans between the ages of 15 and 25. Although CIRCLE conducts and funds research, not practice, the projects that we support have practical implications for those who work to increase young people's engagement in politics and civic life. CIRCLE is also a clearinghouse for relevant information and scholarship. CIRCLE is based in the University of Maryland's School of Public Policy.

Resource Link: http://www.civicyouth.org

Citizenship and Education in 28 Countries: Civic Knowledge and Engagement at Age Fourteen

International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement.

This study explored what young people around the world think about democracy, what they know about how democratic institutions work, and to what extent they expect to get involved in civic activities once they are adults. The International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (www.iea.nl) released the study.

Resource Link: http://www.wam.umd.edu/~iea

Close Up Foundation

The Close Up Foundation is the nation's largest nonprofit, nonpartisan citizenship education organization. Since its founding in 1970, Close Up has worked to promote responsible and informed participation in the democratic process through a variety of educational programs.

Resource Link: http://www.closeup.org

Communicator e-newsletter

The Dirksen Congressional Center.

The Communicator is a web-based newsletter that provides educators with news and ideas to enhance civic education and improve the understanding of Congress.

Resource Link: http://www.webcommunicator.org

Congress.org

Congress.org, a free public service of Capitol Advantage (a non-partisan company that specializes in facilitating civic participation), is a 'one-stop-shop' where people can identify their Congressional representatives; research Congressional voting records; learn about the issues of the day; and send email directly to Congress. Constituents can even opt to have their email message hand-delivered to their Representative or Senator's office on Capitol Hill--all without ever leaving their computer. During election time, Congress.org provides constituents tools for learning about candidates and makes registering to vote a snap.

Resource Link: http://www.congress.org

Democracy as Discussion: Civic Education and the American Forum Movement

William M. Keith, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Lexington Books, 2007.

As Americans worry ever more about the effects of media on the quality of public deliberation, they have developed a renewed interest in public discussion, especially face-to-face public discussion. Over a century ago, public forums - organized and widespread - provided a place where citizens could discuss the political issues of the day, and they became a means of adult civic education. In this 378-page book, Keith documents the college course developed by the new field of Speech to teach the skills of discussion, as well as the forum movement, which culminated in the Federal Forum Project.

Democracy Dispatches (email newsletter)

Democracy Dispatches is Demos' bi-weekly issue briefing that tracks and analyzes legislative and political developments on democracy issues in the states. Demos is a non-partisan, non-profit public policy research and advocacy organization which seeks to bring everyone into the life of American democracy and to achieve a broadly shared prosperity characterized by greater opportunity and less disparity.

Resource Link: http://www.demos-usa.org/page60.cfm

Democratic Education in an Age of Difference: Redefining Citizenship in Higher Education

Richard Guarasci and Grant Cornwell. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1997.

This book addresses the need for colleges and universities to design educational experiences that promote the objectives of a free society while recognizing and embracing difference. The authors detail some of the experiments taking place across American campuses and reveal how each approach fosters the development of democratic sensibility, citizenship skills and multicultural appreciation.

Dialogue as Pedagogy: Deliberative Learning with Democracy Lab in High School and College Classes

James T Knauer, PhD and Paul Alexander, PhD.

This 10-page document was distributed during Jim Knauer and Paul Alexander's workshop of the same name at the 2006 NCDD Conference in San Francisco. Deliberative dialogue can be used across the curriculum to integrate civic education without sacrificing disciplinary content or traditional learning objectives. The document not only outlines Democracy Lab (an online deliberation program for college students) and where it is headed, it also outlines existing research on dialogic pedagogy, describes William Perry's Scheme of Intellectual and Ethical Development, and explores the relationship between deliberative dialogue and learning.

Resource Link: http://www.thataway.org/exchange/files/docs/Dialogic_Pedagogy_Handout.doc

Dirksen Congressional Center

The Dirksen Congressional Center is a non-partisan, not-for-profit organization in Pekin, Illinois, that seeks to improve civic engagement by promoting a better understanding of Congress and its leaders through archival, research, and educational programs. The Dirksen Congressional Center conducts programming in four areas: historical collections, research, education, and community service.

Resource Link: http://www.dirksencenter.org

Discussion as a Way of Teaching: Tools and Techniques for Democratic Classrooms

S. D. Brookfield and S. Preskill. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1999.

Includes a variety of practical ideas, tools and techniques for creating democratic classrooms. The authors suggest exercises to get discussion started, strategies for maintaining its momentum, ways to elicit a diversity of views and voices, ideas for creative groupings and formats, and processes to encourage student participation. In exploring the role of the teacher in discussion, they address the tensions and possibilities arising from ethnic, cultural, social class and gender differences.

Educators for Social Responsibility

ESR's mission is to make teaching social responsibility a core practice in education so that young people develop the convictions and skills needed to shape a safe, sustainable, democratic, and just world. ESR's largest program, the Resolving Conflict Creatively Program (RCCP) is a comprehensive, K-12 school-based program in conflict resolution and intergroup relations that provides a model for preventing violence and creating caring learning communities.

Resource Link: http://www.esrnational.org

ESR Journal: Educating for Democracy

Educators for Social Responsibility, 1992.

Filled with thoughtful articles on education for democracy, this volume offers insights and strategies that highlight what works and why. Articles address issues of democratic participation, diversity, the dynamics of power and empowerment, and more. Article authors include: Paul Martin Du Bois, Laurie Olsen, Seth Kreisberg, and Deborah First.

Resource Link: http://esrnational.org/Merchant2/merchant.mvc

Facing History and Ourselves National Foundation, Inc.

Facing History and Ourselves is an international educational non-profit organization that engages middle and high school teachers and their students in an examination of racism, prejudice, and antisemitism by relating the past to the world today. Facing History helps students find meaning in the past and recognize the need for participation and responsible decision making. Based in Brookline, Massachusetts and with branches in six U.S. cities, Facing History and Ourselves provides a range of resources (printed, network-based, speakers' bureaus, videotapes) to confront racism, prejudice and anti-Semitism in schools and the wider society.

Resource Link: http://www.facing.org