Joseph Kahne

• PhD
• Professor at University of California, Riverside

We recently reviewed the existing research into digital citizenship, focusing specifically on educators’ efforts to help students use digital tools for civic and political engagement. Such efforts primarily cluster around preparing youth in three important areas: civility, information analysis, and civic voice. This work shows much promise, especia...

The increasingly partisan politics of education make it vital to conceptualize why and to empirically assess how current partisan pressures threaten public schools’ efforts to educate toward a diverse democracy. We examine these dynamics, drawing on a survey of a large and diverse sample of high school principals, weighted to reflect national demog...

Adolescents’ heavy engagement with digital news and social media brings them considerable exposure to race-related content, especially during election cycles. We assess how well young people navigate that kind of digital content, using a nationally representative longitudinal study in which baseline data was collected during and after the 2020 elec...

Warning signs for the health of the American democracy abound. These challenges have multiple manifestations and multiple roots, but media and the Internet, more broadly, are implicated in prominent ways. Schools, the institutions charged with educating current and future generations, have a role to play in supporting the preparation of an informed...

We need a new and different kind of classroom conversation about free speech—one that not only considers the legal and aspirational dimensions but also weighs the practice and impact of speech in daily life.

Context School-based student protests have received little scholarly attention, yet they have the potential to impact the school community, students’ civic development, and larger social movements. Principals are key actors in responding to school-based student protests. As school leaders, principals’ actions affect the outcome of student protests...

Social studies education and research can and must play a central role in sustaining democratic societies. As we commemorate the 50th anniversary of this vital journal that aims to strengthen social studies education, democratic societies face numerous serious challenges. Although today’s circumstances are unique, many of our current challenges hav...

A study of high school principals that examines ways that political pressures influence the degree to which schools support education for a diverse democracy.

This article shares lessons from committed and inspirational educators from across the country with whom we at the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE) worked in 2020. Their experiences reinforce that nonpartisan teaching about democracy is possible (i.e., not teaching who to vote for, but rather how the sys...

A survey reveals four responses school leaders typically take toward conflict—but one rises above the rest for success. https://www.ascd.org/el/articles/responding-to-intolerance-leadership-for-a-multiracial-democracy

Purpose Drawing on relevant literature, we conceptualize three pathways through which responsiveness to student voice may promote academic goals. Then, we analyze panel data of students in the Chicago Public Schools to examine this relationship. We focus on the “responsiveness” of teachers and administrators to student voice, because prior work has...

Teachers need new instructional strategies and systemwide support to educate students about the threats that racism, hyper-partisanship, and disinformation pose to democracy. Nicole Mirra, Sarah McGrew, Joseph Kahne, Antero Godina Garcia, and Brendesha Tynes explore the three major elements of digital citizenship education — safety and civility, me...

Amid hyper-partisanship, increasing critiques of civic education reform priorities from conserva-tives, and growing signs of democratic backsliding, can schools provide foundational support for democratic norms, commitments, and capacities? Drawing on a unique national survey of high school principals conducted in 2018, we examine how political con...

A healthy democracy requires informed citizens on all sides of the political spectrum but extreme political polarization creates significant challenges. This study examines how teachers conceptualize civic education in an ideologically and racially diverse school district. Embedded within a research-practice partnership, this case offers timely ins...

It is time to reclaim the democratic purposes of public education in California. The recent national election signals heightened in- terest in politics as well as deep fissures in our civic community. Further, the current moment—a global pandemic, the urgent need to address racial injustice, and wildfires up and down the West coast—highlights compl...

This study examines the effects of online and offline civic learning opportunities on offline civic engagement and online political activity. It draws on panel data for high school students in Chicago Public Schools (N = 10,254). Youth who receive digital engagement learning opportunities (opportunities to learn how to create and share digital medi...

Online environments are now central to political life, especially for young people. They are prominent contexts for activities that include: fundraising, political debate, sharing political perspectives, mobilizing individuals and groups to act, and applying pressure to governments, corporations, and nonprofits. Much of this online politically focu...

This article investigates the factors that shape the circulation of political content on social media. We analyze an experiment embedded within a nationally representative survey of U.S. youth that randomly assigned participants to see a short post designed to resemble content that circulates through social media. The post was experimentally manipu...

This paper examines panel data from two waves of the Youth Participatory Politics Survey, a nationally representative sample of young people in the United States. It employs a cross-lagged design to investigate the extent to which common forms of online activity create pathways to online and offline forms of political activity. Specifically, we exa...

Rather than focusing on whether a statement is accurate, youth—like adults— often focus on whether a statement supports their prior beliefs. These problems are exacerbated by (a) the growth of the Internet which makes it easier to circulate such content, (b) increasing partisanship, which means people are even more likely to focus on what their “te...

Facing Facts in an Era of Political Polarization: Young People’s Learning and Knowledge about Economic Inequality - Volume 50 Issue 4 - Benjamin Bowyer, Joseph Kahne

This article investigates the extent to which young people are able to comprehend the political messages contained in satirical videos that circulate online. We do so through an analysis of responses to videos embedded within an online survey of 15- to 25-year-olds (N = 2070) conducted in 2011. Respondents were randomly assigned to view one of two...

Special symposium on Teaching and Learning About Inequality (Journal of record of the American Political Science Association, mailed to all 15,000 members)

This article investigates youth judgments of the accuracy of truth claims tied to controversial public issues. In an experiment embedded within a nationally representative survey of youth ages 15 to 27 (N = 2,101), youth were asked to judge the accuracy of one of several simulated online posts. Consistent with research on motivated reasoning, youth...

In light of evidence that the Internet, participatory media, and online communities are increasingly central to civic and political life, this article investigates online political discourse as a context of youth civic development. Drawing on a national survey of 2,519 youth, ages 15 to 24, we find that exposure to conflict in online discourse is c...

Examinations of civic engagement in digital culture—the technologies, designs, and practices that support connection through common purpose in civic, political, and social life. Countless people around the world harness the affordances of digital media to enable democratic participation, coordinate disaster relief, campaign for policy change, and s...

The digital revolution has enabled important changes in political life. Opportunities to engage in participatory politics have expanded significantly. Participatory politics differ from institutional politics in that they are peer-based, interactive, and not guided by deference to traditional elites and institutions. These changes require a respons...

New media have come to play a prominent role in civic and political life. Social network sites, web sites and text increasingly serve as both a conduit for political information and a major public arena where citizens express and exchange their political ideas; raise funds; and mobilize others to vote, protest, and work on public issues. This chapt...

Service-Learning, a popular approach to citizenship education in the US, provides youth with opportunities to define and address public needs while reflecting on the knowledge, skills, and relationships needed to do such work. This approach assumes education for democratic citizenship must help youth understand themselves as part of a larger commun...

Using data from an original two-wave panel survey of California high school students and a two-wave panel survey of high school students in Chicago, we find that different pedagogical approaches influence different forms of civic and political engagement. Specifically, controlling for prior levels of engagement and demo- graphic factors, we find th...

Will those who Tweet vote? Social media clearly create new opportunities for voice, for agency, and potentially for influence. But they create risks as well, because there is no reason to assume that engagement with participatory politics will inevitably or organically develop in positive ways. That's where schools come into the picture, playing th...

To rigorously consider the impact of new media on the political and civic behavior of young people, The MacArthur Research Network on Youth and Participatory Politics (YPP) developed and fielded one of the first large-scale, nationally representative studies of new media and politics among young people. The two principal researchers for the survey...

Some see the internet as a means of exposure to divergent perspectives, while others believe that it is likely to foster echo chambers. We agree that it is important to attend to these possibilities, but we find that this discussion is often framed inappropriately. Drawing on a unique panel survey of the online practices and civic and political eng...

Much scholarship has examined how accessing news and other civic and politically oriented online activities can influence offline civic and political behaviors. Much less is known about the influence of nonpolitical online activity on civic and political practices. We found that youth engagement in some forms of nonpolitical online activity can ser...

Judged by many indicators, the quality, quantity, and equality of youth participation in civic and political life are lower than desirable. At the same time, youth participation with the new digital media is extensive, broad based, and growing. This paper examines ways to leverage desirable dimensions of youth participation with the new digital med...

Can media literacy education promote and improve youth engagement in civic and political life? Unfortunately, to date, there have been almost no quantitative assessments of the frequency of media literacy education, nor of any possible subsequent impacts. This study draws on a unique panel data set of a diverse group of youths in high school and co...

Acknowledgements: We are enormously grateful to the MacArthur Foundation and to the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Education (CIRCLE) for funding and support that enabled this work. Namjin Lee, Jessica Timpany Feezell, and Chris Evans were all central to the collection and analysis of the findings presented here. Of cours...

This report focuses on the civic aspects of video game play among youth. According to a 2006 survey, 58 percent of young people aged 15 to 25 were civically "disengaged," meaning that they participated in fewer than two types of either electoral activities (defined as voting, campaigning, etc.) or civic activities (for example, volunteering). Kahne...

The primary purpose of this chapter is to examine whether and how online communities might function as democratic communities and as gateways to broader engagement in democratic life. It also considers implications of the increasing amount of online activity for democratic education. In the first section, we highlight four qualities of local commun...

If Congress passed a law saying that those who earned less than $35,000 a year no longer had the right to vote or influence who gets elected to the U.S. Senate, most of us would be outraged. With such a law, some would ask, "Can we still call ourselves a democracy?" Unfortunately, according to recent research by Larry Bartels of Princeton Universit...

Video games provide a diverse set of experiences and related activities and are part of the lives of almost all teens in America. To date, most video game research has focused on how games impact academic and social outcomes (particularly aggression). There has also been some exploration of the relationship between games and civic outcomes, but as...

This study examines 4 years of small school reform in Chicago, focusing on schools formed by converting large traditional high schools into small autonomous ones. Analyzing systemwide survey and outcome data, the authors assess the assumptions embedded in the reform’s theory of change. They find that these schools are characterized by more collegia...

The notion of democracy occupies a privileged place in our society. Educators and policymakers are increasingly pursuing a broad variety of programs that aim to promote democracy through civic education, service learning, and other pedagogies. The nature of their underlying beliefs, however, differs. “What Kind of Citizen?” calls attention to the s...

This study of 4,057 students from 52 high schools in Chicago finds that a set of specific kinds of civic learning opportunities fosters notable improvements in students’ commitments to civic participation. The study controls for demographic factors, preexisting civic commitments, and academic test scores. Prior large-scale studies that found limite...

In a study of high school civic opportunities, the authors found that student 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...

Adapted from 2006 Political Science and Politics article

From their 2005 survey of 2,366 California high school seniors, Mr. Kahne and Ms. Middaugh conclude that, if educators wish to foster a strong and committed sense of democratic patriotism in their students, they have some serious work to do.

Justin is not alone. In a recent study of high school seniors from California, for example, only 28% agreed that “I think people in government care about what people like me and my family need” (Kahne and Middaugh 2005). Related findings are common. A survey by the National Association of Secretaries of State, for example, revealed that two-thirds...

Increasingly, researchers, policymakers, school leaders, and concerned citizens are recognizing that high schools in the United States are in need of major reform. Current research shows that high schools are not preparing students for college, work, or life, and that they are leading to increased alienation among students. In a much-noted speech t...

We employed a quasi‐experimental design using pre/post surveys and comparisons with control groups to examine the impact of the Constitutional Rights Foundation’s CityWorks (U.S.A.) curriculum. In particular, we assessed its ability to further democratic aims by supporting the development of three forms of social capital: norms of civic participati...

There is widespread concern in many US cities about student alienation, dropout and under-achievement in large urban high schools. Chicago, with support from the Gates Foundation and other agencies, has embarked on a major reform involving the establishment of new small schools and the division of larger schools into smaller ones. This article repo...

The Campaign commissioned Professor Joseph Kahne of Mills College to construct and administer a survey to exam- ine the civic knowledge, skills, and commitments of graduating high school seniors throughout the state and to assess the prevalence and impact of various educational practices as identified in The Civic Mission of Schools report. In 2005...

Educators and policymakers increasingly pursue programs that aim to strengthen democracy through civic education, service learning, and other pedagogies. Their underlying beliefs, however, differ. This article calls attention to the spectrum of ideas about what good citizenship is and what good citizens do that are embodied in democratic education...

At the level of rhetoric, most educators, policymakers, and citizens agree that devel- oping students' capacities and commitments for effective and democratic citizenship is important. When we get specific about what democracy requires and about what kind of school curricula will best promote it, how- ever, much of that consensus falls away. For so...

Virginia Journal of Education (February)

Proceedings of the Conference on Lifelong Citizenship Learning, Participatory Democracy, and Social Change

Which of the following headlines never appeared in a daily newspaper? (a) Capital City Students Show No Gain in Reading, Math- Governor Threatens Takeover (b) Middletown Schools to be Taken Over by State for Failure to Develop Democratic Citizens If you answered (b), you not only answered correctly, your response also reflected an important challen...

The notion of democracy occupies a privileged place in our society. Educators and policymakers are increasingly pursuing a broad variety of programs that aim to promote democracy through civic education, service learning, and other pedagogies. The nature of their underlying beliefs, however, differs. "What Kind of Citizen?" calls attention to the s...

Special issue on Democracy and Education

While the benefits of arts involvement are increasingly clear, policies and practices consistent with this recognition are not proceeding apace. Nearly half the schools in the United States have no full-time arts teachers and emphases on “standards” have led to the elimination of the arts in many urban schools.This case study of a multi-year after-...

Proceedings of the American Political Science Association

Proceedings of the American Political Science Association

Educators and policymakers are increasingly pursuing a broad variety of programs that aim to promote democracy through civic education, service learning, and other pedagogies. Their underlying beliefs, however, differ. For some, a commitment to democracy is associated with liberal notions of freedom, while for others democracy is primarily about eq...

Chapter 7,

This study assesses the first 4.5 years of an effort by a foundation in Chicago to promote children and adolescents’ social and academic development as part of a comprehensive community initiative. The authors examine the potential and challenges associated with the foundation’s strategy of developing social capital within a network of schools and...

Educators, policy makers, and funders increasingly argue that structured afterschool activities can provide youth with valuable supports for development. Studies assessing the impact of particular programs and strategies, however, are rare. This study presents a method of assessment that enables evaluation of varied youth programs in accordance wit...

If teacher educators are to prepare teachers to become leaders who work together toward reform in newly restructured schools, schools of education must change the curriculum and design of their teacher education programs. Drawing on a study of an experimental teacher education program, the authors recommend changes that prepare new teachers to assu...

This study examined the “opportunities to learn” related to the democratic purposes of schooling that students receive in eighth, ninth, and tenth grade social studies classrooms. We identified five prominent frameworks linking curricular strategies to the preparation of citizens for a democratic society. We then created rubrics that reflected thes...

After studying community service programs, one lesson is clear: Not many people agree on what a good citizen does.

Highlights three areas of research on the relationships between college service learning and citizenship. Discusses the need to: understand relationships between different approaches to service learning and conceptions of good citizenship; connect service learning research to scholarly issues and frameworks from related disciplines; and examine rel...

As urban school systems experiment with new governance and organizational structures, many political leaders point to high-profile initiatives in Chicago as a model of reform. Rather than interpreting Chicago school reform as being motivated simply by a desire to promote student learning, this article sees the past 10 years of reform in Chicago as...

This paper presents findings from a 2 ½-year study that focused primarily on two “I Have a Dream” (IHAD) programs. To better comprehend the implications of bringing this youth development strategy model to scale, we also collected more limited interview, focus group, and student performance data from the 10 other IHAD sites in Chicago. Each IHAD sp...

The I Have a Dream (IHAD) program provides financial, academic, and social support to randomly selected classes of youth throughout the country. Each program is sponsored by a philanthropist who becomes personally involved with the youth he or she supports. This personalized philanthropic approach aims to forge relationships that bridge social clas...

C. Wright Mills Middle School uses a project-based curriculum and service learning to prepare students for participatory democracy. Two challenges are to develop academic skills through experiential education and to avoid indoctrination. (SK)