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- All Subjects: Education
- All Subjects: United States
- Creators: School of Politics and Global Studies
Description
In recent years, it has become evident that American civic literacy is in a sharp decline. Many scholars agree that young adults are becoming increasingly less engaged in activities involving the application of civics and that this may hinder the democratic process. This thesis will focus on how historical perspectives can improve contemporary application of civics in order to solve the civic literacy crisis. The report will evaluate different approaches to improving civic engagement in order to gauge their effectiveness and the potential for their use in the United States. In analyzing the decline, we will look at work from the American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA) like A Crisis in Civic Education and A Crucible Moment. Subsequently, we will provide a review of Megan McClure’s Tackling the American Civics Education Crisis and Robert D. Putnam’s Bowling Alone: America’s Declining Social Capital. We will present historical perspectives from the 19th and 20th century such as Thomas Jefferson, Alexis De Tocqueville and John Dewey in order to apply them to contemporary solutions for the decline. The contemporary perspectives of Harvard scholar Danielle Allen and various professors in the School of Civic and Economic Thought and Leadership (SCETL) at Arizona State University will be analyzed and critiqued. The results of our research prove that historical perspectives, when applied to contemporary solutions, are an effective way to bout the civic engagement crisis in the United States. This information can be used to alter the curriculum in the classroom to encourage and prepare students to become civically literate and engaged in order to protect the democratic process.
Keywords: civic decline, civic literacy, civic engagement, contemporary, historical
Keywords: civic decline, civic literacy, civic engagement, contemporary, historical
ContributorsBoering, Avery Loren (Co-author) / Giambanco, Niccolo (Co-author) / Seagrave, Adam (Thesis director) / Voboril, Jakub (Committee member) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor, Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2020-05
Description
This short documentary on the Equal Rights Amendment features attorney Dianne Post and State Representative Jennifer Jermaine, and it examines the fight for passage at the federal and state level. This film attempts to answer the following questions: What is the ERA? What is its history? Why do we need it? How do we get it into the Constitution of the United States of America?
The text of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) states that “equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.” The amendment was authored by Alice Paul and was first introduced into Congress in 1923. The ERA did not make much progress until 1970, when Representative Martha Griffiths from Michigan filed a discharge petition demanding that the ERA move out of the judiciary committee to be heard by the full United States House of Representatives. The House passed it and it went on to the Senate, where it was approved and sent to the states for ratification. By 1977, 35 states had voted to ratify the ERA, but it did not reach the 38 states-threshold required for ratification before the 1982 deadline set by Congress. More recently, Nevada ratified the ERA in March 2017, and Illinois followed suit in May 2018. On January 27th, 2020, Virginia finalized its ratification, making it the 38th state to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment.
Supporters of the ERA argue that we have reached the required goal of approval by 38 states. However, opponents may have at least two legal arguments to challenge this claim by ERA advocates. First, the deadline to ratify was 1982. Second, five states have voted to rescind their ratification since their initial approval. These political and legal challenges must be addressed and resolved before the ERA can be considered part of the United States Constitution. Nevertheless, ERA advocates continue to pursue certification. There are complicated questions to untangle here, to be sure, but by listening to a variety of perspectives and critically examining the historical and legal context, it may be possible to find some answers. Indeed, Arizona, which has yet to ratify the ERA, could play a vital role in the on-going fight for the ERA.
The text of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) states that “equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.” The amendment was authored by Alice Paul and was first introduced into Congress in 1923. The ERA did not make much progress until 1970, when Representative Martha Griffiths from Michigan filed a discharge petition demanding that the ERA move out of the judiciary committee to be heard by the full United States House of Representatives. The House passed it and it went on to the Senate, where it was approved and sent to the states for ratification. By 1977, 35 states had voted to ratify the ERA, but it did not reach the 38 states-threshold required for ratification before the 1982 deadline set by Congress. More recently, Nevada ratified the ERA in March 2017, and Illinois followed suit in May 2018. On January 27th, 2020, Virginia finalized its ratification, making it the 38th state to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment.
Supporters of the ERA argue that we have reached the required goal of approval by 38 states. However, opponents may have at least two legal arguments to challenge this claim by ERA advocates. First, the deadline to ratify was 1982. Second, five states have voted to rescind their ratification since their initial approval. These political and legal challenges must be addressed and resolved before the ERA can be considered part of the United States Constitution. Nevertheless, ERA advocates continue to pursue certification. There are complicated questions to untangle here, to be sure, but by listening to a variety of perspectives and critically examining the historical and legal context, it may be possible to find some answers. Indeed, Arizona, which has yet to ratify the ERA, could play a vital role in the on-going fight for the ERA.
ContributorsSchroder, Jude Alexander (Author) / Adelman, Madelaine (Thesis director) / Mitchell, Kathryn (Committee member) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor, Contributor, Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2020-05
Description
"The rights of every man are diminished when the rights of one man are threatened".
- John F Kennedy
For over a century now, the United States has publicly professed a commitment to upholding human rights around the world, yet to this day economically supports numerous dictatorships and undemocratic regimes that flout human rights on a daily basis. The rhetoric of American politicians would imply that human rights and democracy are a priority in America's foreign policy, yet given US support for autocracies, both of these principles seem forgotten. If not respect for democracy and human rights, what is truly influencing America's relationship with these countries? I hypothesize that a country's resource availability will be the best predictive factor for its economic relationship with the US, followed by its military involvement with the US, and finally, human rights records will be the least predictive factor. The study found that a country's military cooperation with the US is the best predictive factor regarding our economic relationship, resource availability comes with a weak correlation, and human rights abuses very rarely substantively impact our economic relationships.
- John F Kennedy
For over a century now, the United States has publicly professed a commitment to upholding human rights around the world, yet to this day economically supports numerous dictatorships and undemocratic regimes that flout human rights on a daily basis. The rhetoric of American politicians would imply that human rights and democracy are a priority in America's foreign policy, yet given US support for autocracies, both of these principles seem forgotten. If not respect for democracy and human rights, what is truly influencing America's relationship with these countries? I hypothesize that a country's resource availability will be the best predictive factor for its economic relationship with the US, followed by its military involvement with the US, and finally, human rights records will be the least predictive factor. The study found that a country's military cooperation with the US is the best predictive factor regarding our economic relationship, resource availability comes with a weak correlation, and human rights abuses very rarely substantively impact our economic relationships.
ContributorsPlummer, Gage (Author) / Hanson, Margaret (Thesis director) / Ripley, Charles (Committee member) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2020-05
Description
Over the years from 2009 to 2017, the people of Arizona witnessed the state consistently defunding the schools, its students academically underperforming, and as a result, the poverty achievement gap widening. Even with the efforts in recent years to re-invest in education, Arizona’s education funding falls below its level at 2008 and the national average. Among Arizona’s funding sources is the Public School Tax Credit, a unique legislation for the state that allows for taxpayers to donate money to certain programs at Arizona public schools and reduce their state income tax liability dollar-for-dollar. Because of the already severe achievement gap in Arizona, this funding source which relies on surrounding neighborhoods’ income raises the concern that, instead of helping Arizona students, it is exacerbating the existing achievement gap. The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between income and donations received by schools to determine the validity of this concern. To ensure a comprehensive examination of the relationship between income and donations received, regression tests are run on both the aggregate level and individual level. The tests find that, although income does have a statistically significant correlation with the donations received, it is only positive for the effect of total income on total donations, negative for the effect of average income per return on average donation per donor, and negative for average income per return on total donations. The results imply that to garner high donations, it matters less to be located in a high-earning neighborhood and more important to be located in a moderate-earning neighborhood with a lot of people donating using this credit. Therefore, the concern of income’s effect on donations is valid, but perhaps not in the straightforward way that we would expect.
ContributorsChen, Vivian Young (Author) / Kenchington, David (Thesis director) / Brown, Jenny (Committee member) / Department of Finance (Contributor) / School of Accountancy (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2020-12
Description
Following the Russian Federation’s illegal invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the world has once again found itself in a time of crisis. President Vladimir Putin has chosen to rewind the clock and restore the Cold War-era divide between Russia and the United States. The European Union, while still divided internally on numerous issues, has seemingly chosen to rise to the occasion in the wake of Russia’s invasion and assert itself as an equal party to both Cold War-era rivals. All the while China, the pacing, ever vigilant threat, continues to keep its cards close to its chest, and it remains to be seen whether a new Sino-Soviet split will emerge just as before or if the adage “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” still rings true. However, 2022 is not 1962, at least not yet. The global nuclear non-proliferation regime, the culmination of sixty years of constant effort between adversary and ally alike, exists to save the United States and Russia from themselves. Despite the breadth and authority of the regime there are threats abound to its existence, particularly in this time of deep uncertainty. It is incumbent upon the nuclear powers of the world, and Russia especially, to ensure that it does not become a casualty of this age. The world must therefore look back to the early days of the Cold War when crises were abundant, and the United States and the Soviet Union repeatedly brought humanity to the edge of the nuclear abyss. What we learn from doing so is that, while difficult, the global nuclear non-proliferation regime can be supported through unilateral, bilateral, and multilateral actions such as novel weaponry moratoriums, a return to adversarial arms control, and achieving the universality of export control regimes, respectively.
ContributorsErjavic, Spencer (Author) / Hoogenboom, Hilde (Thesis director) / O'Donnell, Edward (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / Historical, Philosophical & Religious Studies, Sch (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor)
Created2022-05
Description
Textbooks are crucial in classrooms when it comes to developing lesson plans and curriculum for the classroom. They serve as a way for students to learn more about a certain topic in depth and can improve reading comprehension skills. However, as past studies have shown (Grever and van der Vlies), textbooks can be one-sided and leave out stories and perspectives from marginalized groups, such as African Americans and Indigenous peoples. Multiple perspectives in textbooks allow students to use historical consciousness to reflect how these historical events have an impact on modern society. Arizona has been in a unique political position over the past decade. In 2011, the state legislature passed a bill banning ethnic studies to be taught in schools. This was eventually reversed by the Court in 2017. Recently, the Governor signed two bills regarding education, which are improving curriculum on the Holocaust and banning critical race theory from being taught in schools. Because of Arizona’s geographic diversity, textbook content might vary since Arizona holds the most federally recognized tribes and borders Mexico. To analyze those differences, the 15 counties of Arizona are grouped into five regions, and from each region, one textbook will be analyzed. The textbooks will be coded for each racial community, which will be Asian American, Hispanic American, Black American, and Indigenous American. It is concluded that there is a direct relationship between the textbooks chosen and the racial groups that are covered in these books. Counties that had a larger Indigenous population tended to have a textbook that would cover more Indigenous history.
ContributorsNatarajan, Anusha (Author) / Kappes, Janelle (Thesis director) / O'Donnell, Catherine (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / Historical, Philosophical & Religious Studies, Sch (Contributor) / School of Civic & Economic Thought and Leadership (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning (Contributor) / School of Social Transformation (Contributor) / School of Human Evolution & Social Change (Contributor) / Sanford School of Social and Family Dynamics (Contributor)
Created2022-05
Description
Using a dataset of ASU students from the 2016-2017 cohort, we interact gender and parent education level to observe gaps in academic achievement. We see a statistically insignificant achievement gap for males across parent education level, but a statistically significant achievement gap for females across parent education level. We also observe dropout gaps among these interaction groups. We see the widest dropout gap being between males across parent education level, with the smallest dropout gap being between females across parent education level. So with males we see an insignificant achievement gap but the widest dropout gap across parent education level, and with females we see a significant achievement gap but the smallest dropout gap across parent education level. What is driving these gaps and causing more similarly performing students to drop out at wider rates? At the aggregate level, we see larger gaps in grade- associated dropout probability across parent education level for males which may be able to explain the larger difference in overall proportions of dropouts between males. However, when predicting dropout probability of the semester with the most first generation and non-first generation dropouts, we see that females have the largest differences across parent education level in grade-associated dropout probability. This suggests that our model may be best suited in using college achievement data to predict overall dropout probabilities, not next-semester dropout probabilities using current semester data. Our findings also suggest that first generation students’ dropout probability is more sensitive to the grades they receive than non-first generation students.
ContributorsHartman, Ryan (Author) / Aucejo, Esteban (Thesis director) / Larroucau, Tomas (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor)
Created2022-05
Description
A growing body of research suggests that there is more to course assessment than homework scores and test performance. This paper contributes to the empirical literature in economics and education by evaluating the impact of racial and gender congruency on the performance of ASU students. Expanding on previous research which only covered elementary and high school, we are able to draw conclusions and policy recommendations to solve the racial achievement gap in the USA.
ContributorsAlmeida, Alexander (Author) / Aucejo, Esteban (Thesis director) / Larroucau, Tomas (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor)
Created2022-05
Description
Since their inception in 1997, Arizona policymakers have debated the merits of Arizona’s income tax credits for contributions to certified school tuition organizations (STOs), though the programs have grown year over year. This study aims to answer lingering questions about the beneficiaries of STO scholarships. First, using publicly available reports from the Arizona Department of Revenue, the Arizona Board of Education, and American Community Survey 5-year estimates, multiple regression analysis indicates a weakly negative relationship between scholarship dollars and family income but no statistically significant effect of public-school quality on scholarship dollars. Second, using data from a survey of parents whose students’ attend Arizona private schools, logistic regression suggests a weakly negative relationship between scholarship utilization and family income, with public school quality having no statistically significant effect on STO scholarship utilization. Moreover, multiple regression analysis again shows a weakly negative relationship between scholarship dollars and family income but no statistically significant relationship between public school quality and scholarship dollars. This paper concludes by offering policy suggestions to improve the accountability of these programs.
ContributorsBurruel, Fausto (Author) / Kuminoff, Nicolai (Thesis director) / Lennon, Tara (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor)
Created2022-12