First-Year Civic Engagement: Sound Foundations for College ...

CHAPTER 1Preparing Undergraduates to Be Citizens:The Critical Role of the First Year of CollegeGeorge Mehaffy, Vice President for Academic Leadership and Change,American Association of State Colleges and Universities; Director, American Democracy Project“ The aim [of education] must be the training of independentlyacting and thinking individuals who, however, see in the serviceto the community their highest life achievement.”— Albert Einstein, address at a convention at the StateUniversity of New York in Albany, October 15, 1936.In School and Society 44 (1936). Published as “OnEducation,” in Out of My Later Years, 36.IntroductionWhether students are 18 or non-traditional, older students, thefirst year of college is a significant point of demarcation. For the18-year-old, the first college year represents a break from homeand family, as well as a dramatic break from the K-12 school routine.For the non-traditional college student, the first year oftenmeans a departure from (or often, an addition to) a previous lifeof work and/or family obligation. For both types of students, however,the first year of college offers both experimentation and discovery,and sometimes loneliness and introspection. It is, for manystudents, a tumultuous time.Because the first year is so fraught with change, many institutionsdevote specific attention to helping students adjust andadapt to the new and sometimes bewildering context of college.First-year initiatives typically focus on students’ adjustment, studyskills, relations with roommates, campus activities, and alcoholand drug education. These and other topics common to first-yearprograms can be framed as learning to be a good citizen. Suchfocus makes the first year of college the perfect time to addressthe critical issues of civic engagement.This is a critical time, both for students and for the institutionsthey attend, to begin the often complex work of becoming knowledgeable,engaged citizens. Students have moved beyond familiarsurroundings and become members of a new community, yet theirrole in their new community is not yet established. What a marveloustime to talk about community, about rights and responsibilities,in the college community and the larger society. A focuson civic engagement during the first year offers students a way tobuild connections to communities and helps them practice theskills required of citizens in a democracy.Why Focus on Civic Engagement?Thomas Ehrlich described civic engagement as: “. . . workingto make a difference in the civic life of our communities anddeveloping the combination of knowledge, skills, values, andmotivation to make that difference. It means promoting thequality of life in a community, through both political and nonpoliticalprocesses.” 1Civic engagement is the lifeblood of our democracy. Withoutknowledgeable citizens willing to be active participants in civiclife, our communities and our democracy are threatened. For theseto remain strong, the principles of democracy and the ways thatordinary Americans should act as citizens must be taught to andpracticed by each new generation of Americans.Certainly the times we live in demand greater citizen engagement.We must be knowledgeable about an increasingly complex,and sometimes ominous, set of issues, including pandemics,global warming, terrorism, and the viability of the nation-state.The national problems we confront are more insistent: politicalpolarization, capitalism v. democracy, health care, the growingdivide between rich and poor, the role of science v. religion. Notonly must we be more knowledgeable about these issues; we mustalso be willing to become engaged in those issues as we vote forcandidates, participate in advocacy groups, contribute time andfinancial resources to support organizations, and engage in otheracts of citizenship. In a democracy, we must have an educated andengaged citizenry if we are to address these issues effectively.Yet as John Dewey noted, “. . .we have taken our democracy forgranted; we have thought and acted as if our forefathers had foundedit once and for all. We have forgotten that it has to be enacted anewin every generation.” 2 And Americans are less involved today in thework of citizenship than ever before. In the past 10 years, a series ofreports have documented declining levels of participation. The CivicHealth Index, released in September 2006, noted “steep declines overthe past 30 years” in indicators of political participation. 3 In 2000,the Saguaro Seminar noted: “Without strong habits of social andpolitical participation, (America is) at risk of losing the very norms,networks, and institutions of civic life that have made us the mostemulated and respected nation in history.” 4 The National Commissionon Civic Renewal lamented that America was turning into anation of spectators. 5