In a guest editorial in the New York Times on September 5 Dean Debra Satz of Stanford and the faculty director of a civics curriculum, Dan Edelstein, deplore the lack of civic virtues, particularly in college undergraduates. They illustrate the effects of intolerance by students and public figures expressed in lack of civic hospitality to guest speakers and the new restrictions on academic freedom by Governor Ron DeSantis, to cite examples of failure to appreciate diverse points of view.
They propose, and have instituted, a new required course at Stanford called Civic, Liberal and Global education as a way to address intolerance and improve listening skills for undergraduates. “All students read the same texts, some canonical and others contemporary. Just as important, all students work on developing the same skills.”
Three issues are not addressed in such a curriculum. First the varied interests in subject matter of first-year students . Second the development of writing skills, which integrate understanding with effective expression of points of view. Third, the ability to imagine the diversity of opinion about subjects of civil urgency, although this is implied in the article.
Allegedly Stanford students have superior writing skills and therefore should not be subject to the fundamentals of First-year writing. However writing skills for first-year students do not always include the ability to imagine opposing viewpoints. They are only one year removed from high school where self-centeredness reigns in writing and speaking.
As an English major I once taught an undergraduate mini-course to Advanced Placement students at an exclusive college. Although they were expert in developing and proving a thesis in the basic expository essay, they were very bad at imagining opposing arguments. Frequently they developed “straw man” arguments, which involved defining an extreme counter-argument and shooting it down with over-simplified arguments of their own. I reflected that defining legitimate opposition was a primary objective we had not anticipated in our improvised curriculum.
So a required writing course that involved intelligent pro and con arguments would not be beneath the skill and dignity of most first-year writing students. Likewise the interest of first-year students needs some provocation to make them engage seriously with a controversial topic. Finally the skill of locating authoritative source material could be integrated in such a course.
At the risk of sounding like a mouthpiece for conservative complaints, I suggest an argumentative writing class on the Bill of Rights would be an effective method to promote civic responsibility. Conservative think tanks have long argued this should be added to the social studies curriculum in high school without accounting for the superficiality of many secondary school imaginations. However, I would not be opposed to introducing high school juniors and seniors to a basic version of this course.
The important component of all undergraduate writing is modeling the approach you want students to take in subsequent writing. A good introduction would be the ramifications of the First Amendment: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of people to peacefully assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”
Although the First Amendment is complex and applied to audiences as elevated as the Supreme Court, there are ways to make it relevant to student audiences. For example the right of extreme speakers to promote their positions on college campuses, the right of student newspapers ( especially high school) to publish without administrative regulation, the right of religious groups to hold meetings in public schools and all the related expressions of religion in a publicly-funded setting. These issues are confronted in student life and bring the expertise of students to bear on an argument.
Student choice is important in argumentative writing. Subsequent assignments could give students a choice of addressing the Second Amendment (Right to bear arms), the Fourth Amendment (Rights Against Unreasonable Search and Seizures) the Eighth Amendment (Right to a Speedy Trial and Trial by Jury) the Tenth Amendment ( restrictions against unreasonable Bail and cruel and unusual punishment) and the Twelfth Amendment (the delegation of rights to the states). These rights have been in the news recently and their complexity would be a way for students to brainstorm the pro and con arguments. In the course of a semester class, students could explore three of these amendments.
What could be more important to civic literacy than the written exploration of four amendments (including the First) to the Constitution? This class would explore the limitations as well as the extent of the rights of an American citizen. It would deconstruct the false claims of attorneys who seek to stretch the interpretation of those rights. But most importantly it would demonstrate the significance of opposing arguments to the opinions expressed by students and stretch their ability to listen. That is a lesson for adult citizens as much as teenagers.