Do You Dare Take the Civics Literacy Test?

[Annie]

First, did you take the test?

Second, who is it biased against?

Interesting it's the same one being used in the news.

 

[PoliticalChic]

Interesting it's the same one being used in the news.

Michael Medved had mentioned it on his radio talk show last Thursday.

What infuriates and saddens me at the same time is how people feel it is ok to be ignorant. Here's Kathianne's full story below. Take a look at what Thomas Jefferson (below) said centuries ago, but still resonates today.

However, you regard the outcome of the Nov. 4 election, it was heartening to watch 125 million Americans cast their ballots at precincts from coast to coast.

Unfortunately, they and the many millions more who skipped the whole thing collectively know frightfully little about the government we just reaffirmed, the principles that under-gird it, and the basic documents in which those ideas are enshrined. Thus, Americans slouch into the 21st Century - a free and confident people blissfully unaware of how we got here or how we shall continue our 232-year-old tradition of limited self-government.

Consider these staggering data:

-- Fully 71 percent of Americans flunked a 33-question civic-literacy survey conducted by the Intercollegiate Studies Institute. Among 2,508 respondents ISI randomly selected, 1,791 failed this test of U.S. historical, political, and economic basics. The average score was just 49 out of 100 - a solid F. While just 2.6 percent scored B's on this quiz, only 0.8 percent earned A's.

-- Just 49 percent of rank-and-file Americans can identify the legislature, executive, and judiciary as our three branches of government.

-- Forty percent of college graduates have no idea that corporate profits equal revenues minus expenses. (Thus, congressional demagoguery about "windfall profits" falls on sympathetic ears.) Only 24 percent of college grads realize that the First Amendment forbids the establishment of an official U.S. religion.

-- Amazingly enough, this sample's 164 self-identified elected officials know even less than laymen. They averaged only 44, as the blind lead the bland. Among office holders, 30 percent did not know that the Declaration of Independence heralds "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."

-- However, we the people closely follow popular culture here in the United States of "American Idol." Only 21 percent of respondents correctly identified Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg address as the source of the words "government of the people, by the people, for the people." But 56 percent properly named Paula Abdul as a judge on the karaoke sensation "American Idol."

God help us.

"Our study raises significant questions about whether citizens who voted in this year's landmark presidential election really understand how our system of representative democracy works," said Dr. Richard Brake, ISI's Director of University Stewardship.

Lt. General Josiah Bunting III, the chairman of ISI's National Civic Literacy Board, describes his initial reaction to these results as "somewhat short of despair, certainly one of depression." He adds: "These questions are designed to elicit answers to fundamental questions. A citizen should know that the president cannot declare war. A citizen should know the circumstances of the founding of the country."

Bunting calls our 24-hour news culture part of the problem:

"If you watch cable news channels, you see three or four streams of information," he says. "This has nothing to do with using your mind as a muscle."

Instead, Bunting and ISI hope to make "state legislators, governors, senators, and representatives active agents of change." With taxpayers underwriting some $114 billion annually for government university education, Bunting believes "every student should be steeped in Western culture, U.S. political, economic, military, and diplomatic history, and free-market economics."

Released Thursday morning at Washington's National Press Club, "Our Fading Heritage: Americans Fail a Basic Test on Their History and Institutions" is online at Civic Literacy Report - 2008-2009 College Test Scores and Rankings. Beyond a sobering analysis of this survey's findings, readers can test their own civic literacy.

The grim results of ISI's study reveal a crisis in this nation's defining concept. In 1776, America's Founding Fathers broke with Britain and established a country where men and women liberated from monarchic despotism would rule themselves, provided they were equipped with the requisite knowledge and wisdom. Will a people mesmerized by the televised humiliation of wannabe pop stars maintain this essential capacity for self-government?

Thomas Jefferson's warning remains as timely as ever: "If a nation expects to be ignorant and free...it expects what never was and never will be."

Deroy Murdock is a columnist with Scripps Howard News Service. E-mail him at [email protected]

 

[Annie]

I'm going to give it to my 8th graders today. I'll project it and have them vote the answers. I'll let you know how they do, (they've had very little econ).

 

[Ravi]

Not many people on this thread read the posts made on the thread.

 

[PoliticalChic]

I'm going to give it to my 8th graders today. I'll project it and have them vote the answers. I'll let you know how they do, (they've had very little econ).

Interesting idea. Can't wait to see what happens.

 

[Tech_Esq]

You answered 32 out of 33 correctly — 96.97 %

Average score for this quiz during November: 78.1%
Average score: 78.1%


Stupid Puritans anyway! I knew I gave them too much credit....LOL

 

[PoliticalChic]

You answered 32 out of 33 correctly — 96.97 %

Average score for this quiz during November: 78.1%
Average score: 78.1%


Stupid Puritans anyway! I knew I gave them too much credit....LOL

But you got the final tax question correct!

 

[Tech_Esq]

But you got the final tax question correct!

LOL....of course, the quiz was trivial, well except for me not recalling that the puritans thought all mankind was shit....my bad.

I do agree with Editec's comment that the quiz was politically slanted to the right. However, I see so few things politically slanted to the right that I found it refreshing.

 

[Care4all]

You answered 32 out of 33 correctly — 96.97 %

Average score for this quiz during November: 78.1%
Average score: 78.1%


Stupid Puritans anyway! I knew I gave them too much credit....LOL

that's the question i missed as well!

so, on the question about what gvt should do in a recession you answered tax cuts and increased gvt spending, as the correct answer?

care

 

[Tech_Esq]

that's the question i missed as well!

so, on the question about what gvt should do in a recession you answered tax cuts and increased gvt spending, as the correct answer?

care

Yeppers. It would provide a double stimulus. A Keynesian boost from the increased government spending which government could use to support the ideals of the current administration. For instance in the Recession of 1982, Reagan increased government spending to repair a badly broken military. In the instant case, Obama will probably spend to fix a badly broken infrastructure.

On the other side, you cut taxes to provide a supply-side boost to the economy. By providing increased money in the hands of the people you get two effects. On the non-wealthy side you get consumption. On the wealthy side you get investment in business, expansion and entrepreneurship. Of course you are more certain to get the former than the latter, but you hope that you get enough of the ladder to provide jobs. Remember that jobs are always a lagging indicator of recovery and you can see why from the solution.

 

[PoliticalChic]

LOL....of course, the quiz was trivial, well except for me not recalling that the puritans thought all mankind was shit....my bad.

I do agree with Editec's comment that the quiz was politically slanted to the right. However, I see so few things politically slanted to the right that I found it refreshing.

I disagree; it's slanted toward the educated.

 

[Annie]

I disagree; it's slanted toward the educated.

LOL! That was my thinking as well. I believe the econ questions are what is currently being taught in universities. It seems Obama is aware of the trend, as he's backed off of raising taxes on the 'rich' and is going for spending before addressing the deficit.

 

[Annie]

I've yet to give the test to my 8th graders, the day I was hoping to there was a fire inspection. My cords aren't taped down so I had to disconnect them. Perhaps next Monday or Wednesday.

 

[Tech_Esq]

I disagree; it's slanted toward the educated.

Most of it, true. But, in the areas where economics is discussed, it could be said that their are multiple answers that were not provided as options. A purely Keynesian approach could have been offered. That would probably have been an answer more in line with what Dems would want.

 

[Tech_Esq]

I've yet to give the test to my 8th graders, the day I was hoping to there was a fire inspection. My cords aren't taped down so I had to disconnect them. Perhaps next Monday or Wednesday.

I was giving the test to my wife and my 8th grader wandered in. I asked him one of the questions and he got it right. Not an easy one either. Maybe I'll give him the whole thing and see how he does.

 

[Cecilie1200]

LOL....of course, the quiz was trivial, well except for me not recalling that the puritans thought all mankind was shit....my bad.

I do agree with Editec's comment that the quiz was politically slanted to the right. However, I see so few things politically slanted to the right that I found it refreshing.

It's rather a fundamental tenet of Christianity in general that mankind is essentially evil. And when you look around you, it's not usually hard to see why.

 

[Remey688]

answered 29 out of 33 correctly — 87.88 %.

 

[Tech_Esq]

It's rather a fundamental tenet of Christianity in general that mankind is essentially evil. And when you look around you, it's not usually hard to see why.

I fundamentally associate my thinking more with Locke than Hobbes, so that's really not top of mind for me. I'm also Pagan and not Christian, so that puts me farther away from that point of view.

 

[editec]

LOL....of course, the quiz was trivial, well except for me not recalling that the puritans thought all mankind was shit....my bad.

I do agree with Editec's comment that the quiz was politically slanted to the right. However, I see so few things politically slanted to the right that I found it refreshing.

I don't think it was slanted to the right so much as it was slanted to a particular economic viewpoint which is debateable.

It asked questions which economics debate precisely because there is no absolutely correct answer. There are opinions at best that answer these questions.

Most the test had answers that were irrefuatable since they are historic facts.

Then suddenly they're asking questions about economics which do not have answers which cannot be debated.

Based on the so called "correct" answers, I'd have to say that whoever designed this test did so with a political agenda.

 

[Tech_Esq]

I don't think it was slanted to the right so much as it was slanted to a particular economic viewpoint which is debateable.

It asked questions which economics debate precisely because there is no absolutely correct answer. There are opinions at best that answer these questions.

Most the test had answers that were irrefuatable since they are historic facts.

Then suddenly they're asking questions about economics which do not have answers which cannot be debated.

Based on the so called "correct" answers, I'd have to say that whoever designed this test did so with a political agenda.

True. I was using shorthand. IMO the "correct" answers economically on the quiz are those most often advanced by the right, or conservatives, if you like. But you are are correct, they are debated between the various economic schools. Although as I explained in an earlier post, the final answer had both Keynesian and Supply-side components.