Criminal Justice Majors’ Basic Knowledge of U.S. Constitutional Rights and Pedagogical Implications

Abstract

Criminal justice students preparing at the university level will be required to possess knowledge and understanding of applicable constitutional law, rights and responsibilities upon entering their profession to ensure the competent execution of the duties of which they will be entrusted to perform. Students majoring in the criminal justice field of scholarship at one university situated in the Great Lakes region of the United States participated in this study by completing a pre-instruction and post-instruction questionnaire designed to measure their confidence of Amendments I, IV, X, XIV, and XV of the U.S. Constitution. The intent of this study was to provide a mechanism in which to assess student understanding of basic ideas and examples of each of the amendments. The outcome of the survey study is to provide insight to the effectiveness of instructional pedagogy in a scholarship of teaching framework for undergraduate students majoring in criminal justice. The students participating this this survey were criminal justice majors and were surveyed over four academic semesters spanning two years. The results indicate a significant difference (p <.001) between pre-survey and post-survey questionnaire aggregate scores at the alpha = .05 level with a moderate effect size of .45. Individual pre-survey and post-survey questionnaire scores on confidence of individual amendments were also all significant at the alpha = .05 level but with small effect sizes. Implications of small effect sizes are interpreted with respect to program and pedagogical implications.

A Crisis in Civic Conscience in the United States? Knowledge and Understanding of the U.S. Bill of Rights among a Group of Undergraduate Students Citizens of the United States

“…However, with respect to the general population in the U.S. and American undergraduate student knowledge at regional, public colleges and universities in particular, a gap exists in the scholarly literature regarding knowledge of the Bill of Rights among undergraduate students at regional public universities. The few studies on college students include Call and O'Brien (2011), who reported First Amendment knowledge of preservice teachers, Heuer and Coggins (2017), who reported knowledge of undergraduate criminal justice students on a select number of constitutional amendments, and likewise Coggins and Heuer (2017), who reported knowledge of undergraduate education students on a select group of constitutional amendments. In each of those three research studies, knowledge of only specific amendments from select populations of undergraduate students were investigated and reported.…”