Still the slow summer season. Here are bits of news for August. Next Resolute probably after Labor Day. We will be hard at work for education policy reform … in a little while …

New Resources

Cardinal Institute: Reviving the American Civic Tradition in West Virginia. This is a model report arguing for reforming state civics education. We need policy institutes in every state to work to reform civics standards (and social studies standards, and standards for science, mathematics, and English Language Arts). Tiffany Hoben and Cardinal Institute show how that should be done. I hope the report persuades West Virginia citizens and policymakers—and I hope that Hoben and Cardinal’s peers in other state policy institutes take their work as a template for reports of their own.

Civics Alliance: State Information Packets. We started this project a few years ago; now it is completed. We now have information on how precisely the standards adoption process works in every state, as well as the District of Columbia.

Defending Education: International Students in US Higher Education. A good, data-rich report on the numbers and role of international students in American higher education.

Liberty Common School: Archimedes Standards video. This is a wonderful video explaining what our model mathematics standards do. This sort of video is a model for how to publicize and argue for social studies/civics materials.

Testimony

Would you like to be on a list of people prepared to give testimony in favor of a state bill to reform civics education? If so, please get in touch with me: randall@nas.org. We need people ready to testify in all 50 states—ideally, with some personal tie to the education system, but testimony from any citizen would be good.

Civics Alliance Now Has Eleven State Affiliates 

The Civics Alliance is building a network of state affiliates—groups dedicated to removing action civics in their states, whom we will list on our website. We now have eleven affiliates, in Alabama, Colorado, Georgia, Idaho, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Texas. If you would like to form such an organization, or suggest an existing organization, please get in touch with David Randall (randall@nas.org).

Monthly American Birthright Zoom Meeting 

The Civics Alliance will have its monthly Zoom session devoted to social studies standards reform on Monday, August 18, at 2:00 PM Eastern Time. Please email randall@nas.org if you would like to join these monthly Zoom meetings.

Social Studies Standards Revision Schedule

2025/Current: Arizona, Kentucky, Montana, Nebraska, Ohio, Texas, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming

2026: Colorado, Maryland, North Dakota, South Carolina

2027: Hawaii, Kansas

2029: Louisiana

2030: Minnesota

2031: Illinois

No Revision Currently Scheduled: California, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, New Hampshire, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington.

Please email David Randall (randall@nas.org) if you are interested in further information about your state’s social studies revision process, and what you can do to participate.

Continuing Priorities: Federal Legislation 

At the federal level, the Civics Secures Democracy Act threatens to impose action civics nationwide.

The Civics Bill Tracker 

Civics Alliance supporters may now use the Civics Bill Tracker to track all proposed federal and state legislation related to civics.

Public Action 

We encourage Civics Alliance supporters to inform the public and policymakers about the stakes and consequences of action civics bills.

David Randall is the Executive Director of the Civics Alliance, and Director of Research at the National Association of Scholars

Photo by Khachik Simonian on Unsplash