High School Students' Knowledge and Notions of Citizenship

Defining the Good Citizen: Online Conceptions of American Members of the Yahoo! Answers Community

“…The findings show that the conception of the good citizen in the Y!A community, as reflected in its members" responses, is similar to that found among American high school students (Doppen et al 2014;Feinberg & Doppen, 2010;Martin & Chiodo, 2007) and among pre-service teachers (Martin 2012;O'Brien & Smith, 2011).…”

“…The image of the good citizen in the eyes of American high school students has been found to reflect passivity and conformity (Conover & Searing, 2000;Doppen et al 2014;Feinberg & Doppen, 2010;Martin & Chiodo, 2007;Sherrod, 2003). These worrying results motivated scholars to look into the sources of this conception, such as educational programs (Westheimer & Kahane, 2004), and citizenship conceptions among pre-service teachers (Martin, 2012;O'Brien & Smith, 2011).…”

“…Moreover, interestingly, in studies conducted in recent years, being patriotic -a prevalent characteristic in the republicanism view of citizenship -was rated as being of moderate importance only, and was not very frequently mentioned by high school students (Doppen, Feinberg & Arrowood-Schultheis, 2014;Feinberg & Doppen, 2010), although an earlier study (Conover and Searing 2000) found high prevalence of patriotism (together with being respectful for others).…”

“…Apart from these two dominant responses, some of the students mentioned the good citizen as being patriotic, respecting others, honest, kind to others, working hard, staying out of others' business, and serving in the military. A comparison of rural and urban American high school students undertaken by Feinberg and Doppen (2010) show no noticeable differences between the two groups; Interviews with Ohio and Georgia high school students (Doppen et al, 2014) convey a similar description of the good citizen as respectful, law abiding, honest, helpful (serving others, the community or the country), exercising the right to vote, and paying bills and taxes, with the addition of being informed of constitutional rights. By and large, these studies show that American youth going through the educational system during the first two decades of the twenty-first century view the good citizen mainly as a self-reliant, disciplined, and conformist person, whose more socially active qualities, such as offering a helping hand, are limited to her/his local community and to performing this help through the local community"s organizations (such as church or boy/girl scouts).…”

The Historical Memory of American Presidents in the Mass Public

“…Thus, school children are likely to know the names of many of the founders who became president, as well as something about them, for instance, the honesty and heroism of George Washington, that James Madison wrote much of the Constitution, that Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence and purchased the Louisiana territory, that James Monroe gave us a foreign policy approach (the Monroe doctrine) that lasted for over a century, and that during Andrew Jackson's time the franchise expanded, but Native Americans suffered. As a result of civics and presidency education in American high schools, students will possess limited knowledge and understanding of the political system, how it operates, and its political history (Feinberg and Doppen 2010).…”