HB 535 is good first step for KY civics education. But as a state, we need to do more. | Opinion
Last November, I wrote about how Kentucky youth should be empowered to be more active in politics and reflected on the infrequent conversations about politics I’ve had with my peers and how some of us feel unprepared to engage with state politics.
House Bill 535, which has had some traction in the current legislative session, would require public high school students to complete a half credit course in civic literacy before graduation. Among the course’s instruction areas are learning about America’s history and the U.S. government, including state and local roles, the U.S. and Kentucky constitutions, international relations, and much more.
The conditions of education in Kentucky are driven by legislative action, or lack thereof.
In 1989, the state Supreme Court detailed a series of “Rose Capacities,” which defined standards for a quality education for all students. It followed the court’s decision that Kentucky’s educational system failed to meet constitutional standards. Among the seven capacities specified in the decision is one stipulating that Kentucky students should have “sufficient knowledge of economic, social, and political systems to enable the student to make informed choices.”
However, three decades later, in 2019, a report from the Center for American Progress noted that Kentucky is the only state without a civics course requirement, despite the mandate that students complete a civics exam. Furthermore, preliminary results from the Kentucky Student Voice Team’s State of Schools Survey found that out of over 1,200 mainly high school students who responded, fully one quarter disagreed or strongly disagreed with the statement that their school prepares them to participate as citizens of a democracy.
It may be true that voter turnout among youth is low in Kentucky and there are racial inequities in civics education that further contribute to the problem. But voter turnout is not the sole indicator of young people’s willingness to partake in public discussion about issues that affect us; rather, it is a symptom of a larger problem that we can address, at least in part, through intentional civics education.
Research from Tufts University’s nonpartisan CIRCLE about youth voice and civic engagement recognizes a positive relationship between political participation and opportunities for students to express their voices about current events and real-world issues. “Among students who strongly agreed that they had high school experiences in which they felt their voices and opinions mattered,” CIRCLE researchers note, “81% said they are extremely likely to vote in the 2024 election.”
It is not a stretch to assume that an unreliable civics education system can produce unreliable voters. So it makes sense too that, if students are supported to be civically engaged in schools and supported to understand the voting process, voter turnout could improve as student awareness evolves beyond high school.
Teaching youth how to navigate the current political climate, engage in productive conversations, and use our beliefs to make a difference are all essential to building our democracy. HB 535’s instructional sections related to ensuring students learn about “political parties and interest groups” and “major issues facing government” offer us the promise of a more substantial understanding of pressing issues and the political climate.
When HB 535 passed through the House Education Committee, it was amended to allow two civic literary options: “a one-half credit in Civics Literacy OR a score of 70 percent on a 100-question civics test.” The amendment allows school districts to neglect the civics course stipulations and maintain typical civics test standards, removing the half-credit requirement in the original bill. But simply requiring a civics exam to evaluate students’ knowledge of the subject is not enough. Researchers from Penn State College of Education found definitively that civics tests alone did not increase youth voter turnout. The changes to the original bill mean that while HB 535 is a good starting point for civic education to be implemented in our public schools, benefiting students and the future of our commonwealth, for Kentucky to improve our “civic health,” more robust legislation is needed.
Fortunately, the floor amendment filed for the bill would make completing a one-half credit course in civic literacy and passing a civics exam both a graduation requirement. These changes to the original bill would allow our public schools to better reap the rewards of civics education and bolster Kentucky’s overall “civic health” as Secretary of State Michael Adams recently helped define and measure.
For me as a first-generation American student, civic engagement offers the most direct way I can strive for positive change and help support my community. However, as a high school student who has never had a formal civics course, I see HB 535 as a beacon of opportunity that can do much to bolster my understanding of democracy and what it means to be an involved citizen and active contributor in Kentucky’s–and the country’s–civic life.
Luisa Sanchez is a sophomore at Boyle County High School and a facilitator of the Kentucky Student Voice Team’s Rose Revival Campaign, an initiative to engage school stakeholders in conversations about the extent to which the state is living up to its constitutional promise to provide Kentucky students with an adequate education.
This story was originally published March 26, 2024 at 10:14 AM.