Assessing the Civic-Building Capacities of Schools: Early Findings from a Survey of Parents and Students

• Published date: 01 January 2023
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/00027162231179825
• Author: Ashley berner,Crystal Spring,Andrea Ochoa
• Date: 01 January 2023
• Subject Matter: Classroom Climate for Civic Development

118 ANNALS, AAPSS, 705, January 2023

DOI: 10.1177/00027162231179825

Assessing the

Civic-Building

Capacities of

Schools: Early

Findings from a

Survey of

Parents and

Students

By

ASHLEY BERNER,

CRYSTAL SPRING,

and

ANDREA OCHOA

1179825ANN The annals of the american academyAssessing the civic-building capacities of schools

research-article2023

Schools in the U.S. have long been charged with the

work of preparing young people for engaged citizen-

ship. Do they, in fact, accomplish this work? Using

survey data from 164 schools, we find mixed perfor-

mance of schools in terms of their civic-building capac-

ity, with striking disconnects between rhetoric and

reality. We show that although students rate citizenship

as a strong school priority, they are infrequently exposed

to activities that support community engagement.

Similarly, parents expect classrooms to have open cli-

mates in which students are free to discuss and disagree

about controversial topics, but students report that

such environments are a rarity. Additional findings

indicate that lower-socioeconomic-status, female, non-

binary, and public/charter school students are signifi-

cantly less likely to perceive their classrooms as open,

and Black students perceive more open climates than

their White counterparts.

Keywords: civic formation; school mission; academic

rigor; open classroom climate; school cul-

ture

“The desire to suppress speech and behavior one

finds offensive is instinctive. Restraining oneself

from doing so goes against the grain and requires

training and indoctrination.”

—Galston (2018)

Correspondence: ashley.berner@jhu.edu

Ashley Berner is director of the Johns Hopkins Institute

for Education Policy and associate professor of educa-

tion. Dr. Berner has published widely on citizenship

formation, academic outcomes, and pluralism, in differ-

ent national contexts.

Crystal Spring is a postdoctoral fellow at the Johns

Hopkins Institute for Education Policy and leads

research efforts related to School Culture 360

™

.

Andrea Ochoa is a PhD candidate at the Johns Hopkins

School of Education. She is interested in identifying

policies and practices that empower historically margin-

alized students to achieve their highest potential.

ASSESSING THE CIVIC-BUILDING CAPACITIES OF SCHOOLS 119

Political knowledge, skills, habits, and attachment are interrelated—and mostly

learned, not innate. They must be cultivated through young people’s interactions

with family, civil society, and, most fundamentally, the nation’s schools. Or so we

hope.

In the U.S., school systems do not, as a regular matter, assess the civic-building

capacities of schools (Darling-Hammond and McGuire, this volume). Although

there are many reasons for this neglect, it sits uncomfortably with our long-

standing national aim of nurturing the next generation of engaged citizens

through schooling (Berner 2017). To help fill this gap of knowledge, the Johns

Hopkins Institute for Education Policy included several civic-capacity and

school-climate indicators in its School Culture 360™ survey, which was launched

in the spring of 2020. The survey has been administered in district, charter, and

private schools across the country, and most participating schools are in systems

that vary in size from 2 to more than 100. In this article, we explore the civic

capacity of schools by examining how students and parents report on the mission,

goals, and classroom climate of 164 sample schools, and we analyze potential dif-

ferences by race, gender, socioeconomic status (SES), and school type. By

schools’ “civic capacity,” we mean those practices that promote political knowl-

edge (knowing history, geography, national political processes and structures),

civic skills (being able to analyze legislation, writing elected officials), civic

engagement (voting, volunteering, engaging in philanthropic giving), and politi-

cal tolerance (respecting the civil liberties and opinions of others) (Campbell

2008a, 489–90).

School mission and stakeholder alignment matter to schools’

civic-building capacity

Clarity of mission matters to institutional success. When students study in

schools that have “distinctive educational communities in which pupils and

teachers share a common ethos,” the odds increase that those students will

acquire academic and civic knowledge, skills, and sensibilities (Wolf and Macedo

2004). This is true in differentiated district schools (Chenoweth 2007), charter

schools (Seider 2012), and private—and particularly, Catholic—schools (Bryk,

Lee, and Holland 1995; Coleman, Hoffer, and Kilgore 1982). The same qualities

also make political and civic engagement in adulthood more likely (Berner 2021).

Schools with a highly articulated and enacted ethos can even have a positive

effect upon parents’ civic involvement, as Sikkink’s (1998) study of urban Catholic

high schools found. The means that connect a school’s internal coherence (shared

mission and vision) to positive, long-term civic outcomes include the creation of

social capital (Bryk, Lee, and Holland 1995), a shared sense of belonging (Seider

2012), and the presence of clear ethical vocabulary and habitus (Hunter 2000).

In short, schools with a clear focus on mission are likely to proffer academic and

civic benefits to their students and parents alike (Glenn 2005).

Similarly, Hess and McAvoy (2015) found a positive civic effect of “like-

minded schools,” defined as schools in which there is significant ideological