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Library Resources by Series: "CIRCLE Working Paper"
Total number of Library Resources: 21
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The Corporation recognizes that racial and ethnic minorities, immigrants, low-income youth, non-college educated individuals and the disabled may be underrepresented in service and volunteering programs as well as in other civic engagement activities. In response, the Corporation has decided to make increasing access to service and volunteering for individuals from disadvantaged circumstances one of its strategic focus areas. In order to pursue...
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Well-designed volunteer and service opportunities, such as those that the Corporation for National and Community Service supports, offer at least two sets of benefits. One set accrues to the individuals and communities served by these programs through the provision of valued and needed services and supports at no- or reduced- cost. The second set accrues to the individuals who volunteer and provide the service. That experience can play an...
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The Corporation for National and Community Service recognizes that racial and ethnic minorities, immigrants, low-income youth, non-college educated individuals and the disabled may be underrepresented in service and volunteering programs as well as in other civic engagement activities. In response, the Corporation has decided to make increasing access to service and volunteering for individuals from disadvantaged circumstances one of its...
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The purpose of this project was to gain a better understanding of dimensions of trust and their inter-relationships during the adolescent years. Drawing from survey data collected at the beginning and end of a semester in eighty middle- and high-school social studies classes, the authors assessed the relationships between the following dimensions of trust: social trust, trust in elected officials, trust in the responsiveness of government to...
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In our study of high school civic opportunities, the authors found that a student's race and academic track, and a school's average socioeconomic status (SES) determines the availability of the school-based civic learning opportunities that promote voting and broader forms of civic engagement. High school students attending higher SES schools, those who are college-bound, and white students get more of these opportunities than low-income...
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This working paper is the result of a project whose goal was to produce a set of civic measures with good psychometric properties that are appropriate for use with young people ages 12-18. These measures tap aspects of adolescents civic behaviors, opinions, knowledge, and dispositions. These measures are easy to administer and can be used by educators, staff of community-based organizations, program evaluators, and scholars. The data used to...
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Using panel data from the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 (NELS), this study empirically analyzes the relationship between two forms of civic engagement--student government and community service--and educational progress made after the eighth grade by addressing the following questions. Does civic engagement affect academic progress in mathematics, reading, history, and science? Does voluntary community service differently...
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This paper presents the School Citizenship Education Climate Assessment and examines its implications for the social studies. The assessment tool was developed from a variety of research fields and disciplines related to school and classroom climate and educational practices including civic education, educational psychology and service-learning. We begin with a brief examination of several key concepts underlying our assessment including school...
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Over the past decade, public attention on the importance of the civic development and education of youth has grown. To address these concerns, the East Bay Conservation Corps (EBCC) Charter School opened in 1996 with the explicit mission to prepare and engage students grades K through 12 as caring citizens who are capable and motivated to fully participate in our democracy. While content standards and assessments readily exist to articulate the...
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This study explores the relationship between national service and civic education through an examination of the Civilian Conservation Corps and VISTA, and how to apply lessons learned from the past to the AmeriCorps program. The author looks at citizenship from five perspectives: constitutional citizenship, critical citizenship and citizenship as patriotism, service and work. The author concludes with three lessons gleaned from the past programs...
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While the proximate causes of AmeriCorps’ current troubles can be found in a complex array of administrative practices and budget decisions unique to the program itself, the larger question of why the program, after 10 years, is still struggling to be institutionalized can only be answered by looking at the history of national service programs more broadly. While all very different, America’s main domestic civilian national service...
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This report represents an initial inquiry into the effect that these relatively new and convenient voting procedures have on electoral participation among those who are least likely to vote-- young citizens. Results originating from this analysis reveal that easier voting methods increase youth turnout.
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This literature review is specifically interested in empirical research addressing the relationship between adolescent participation in extracurricular activities and adult political engagement. It includes a table detailing the findings of relevant research, studies with relevant findings tangential to the central question, and full citations for all items in the bibliography.
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Most researchers to date have theorized that programs to promote positive citizenship should begin with an opportunity for adolescents to participate in positive citizenship activities, such as community service or political volunteering. In the present study, the authors hypothesize that programs and policies to promote positive citizenship may need to begin by first focusing on informal interactions in youths' lives, such as with parents and...
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Previous research on youth civic engagement has focused on the direct association between previous civic behaviors and future civic participation. However, as with most activities, adolescents will not continue to participate if they do not derive fulfillment, enjoyment and meaning from the activity. To explore this, this paper examines the relation between civic engagement in adolescence and in adulthood, and also whether being engaged and...
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Researchers have theorized that programs to promote positive citizenship should begin with an opportunity for adolescents to participate in civic activities, such as community service or political volunteering. In this report, the authors expand this theoretical perspective by arguing that programs to promote positive citizenship may need to begin by focusing on: social interactions in youths' lives, such as interactions with parents and peers;...
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The idea of a set of skills, usually called civic skills, which are required to effectively participate in civic and political life, is integral to many concepts of political participation. This literature search is designed to investigate what is known about civic skills empirically and theoretically including how they are defined and measured, and what relationship they have to political participation.
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The influence of Kids Voting USA, an interactive civics curriculum taught during election campaigns, is assessed in the context of three field experiments that took place during the fall of 2002. The research sites are Maricopa County, Arizona; El Paso County, Colorado; and Broward/Palm Beach counties, Florida. Presented are findings from the first wave of a panel study on the long-term effects of the curriculum on high school juniors and...
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Political scientists generally support the view that education is effective at promoting the quantity and quality of civic participation. This study attempts to construct less ambiguous empirical evidence on this issue by identifying the causal effects of additional schooling on civic behaviors and knowledge. The research designs adopted here essentially parallel the extensive, empirical literature on the labor-market returns to schooling. More...
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There is relatively little evidence on how private and public schools compare with regard to the promotion of civic engagement, and the limited evidence that does exist generally suggests that private schools (Catholic schools, in particular) are often better at promoting civic participation and political tolerance than public schools. However, the contemporary empirical evidence is based on youth, not adult, behaviors. Furthermore, a widely...
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This paper describes the results of a field experiment aimed at increasing turnout among young Latinos in Fresno, CA conducted in the fall of 2002. Canvassers went door-to-door during the final two weekends before Election Day to urge registered young people to go to the polls. Young people of all races/ethnicities were targeted. In addition to testing the effectiveness of personal contact and how this varies among registered voters of various...
