Building Social Capital for Civic and Political Engagement: The Potential of High-School Civics Courses

Abstract

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 participation, social trust, and knowledge of social networks. Our evaluation indicates that this curriculum and several of its curricular features (use of simulations, role models, service learning, learning about problems in the community, learning how local government works, and personal relevance) have the potential to further the democratic purposes of education. Key words: democratic education, simulations, role models, service ‐ learning. Se servant d’un design quasi ‐ experimental faisant appel a des sondages en pretest et post ‐ test et a des comparaisons avec des groupes ‐ controles, les auteurs analysent dans cet article l’impact du programme americain Constitutional Rights Foundation’s CityWorks . Ils se penchent notamment sur son aptitude a promouvoir davantage des objectifs democratiques en appuyant le developpement de trois formes de capital social : les normes de la participation citoyenne, la confiance sociale et la connaissance des reseaux sociaux. D’apres les auteurs, ce programme et plusieurs de ses caracteristiques (recours a des simulations, modeles de comportement, apprentissage du service, analyse de problemes communautaires, etude du mode de fonctionnement du gouvernement local et pertinence pour les eleves) sont susceptibles de promouvoir l’education a la democratie. Mots cles: education a la democratie, simulations, modeles de comportement, apprentissage du service.