Posts filed under 'adviser conversations'
If we may depart from our usual theoretical discussions for a moment, let’s have a look at the web-based curriculum profiled in our recent CLO report. This blogging curriculum, entitled Blogistics, is currently available as an interactive Flash presentation. Here are some questions to think about while navigating through it:
- What works well and what could be improved upon? How effective is this presentation likely to be overall?
- What do you think of format (interactive web-based slideshow) as a delivery vehicle for civic lessons? Might it work better for presenting some learning material than others?
Of course, feel free to comment on any other salient aspect of the presentation.
Entry Filed under: adviser conversations, digital learning skills
August 8th, 2008 at 10:05am
Deen Freelon
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CLO has just released a new short report outlining an evaluative framework for civic curricula based on the learning categories developed in our previous report, Young Citizens and Civic Learning. Here is the abstract:
This report introduces the work of the Civic Learning Online Project in developing digital media learning tools. The need for identifying specific online learning goals and opportunities is discussed first. This is followed by the introduction of an online curriculum unit, Blogging in Public, which is evaluated in terms of the civic learning opportunities it offers.
After perusing this report, we would appreciate your input on the following questions, as well as any general feedback:
- Do you see any major categories of civic learning which our evaluative framework would exclude? If so, what?
- Do you think civic practitioners are likely to find our framework useful? What can we do to make it more useful for them?
Entry Filed under: adviser conversations, civic learning goals, participatory media
August 8th, 2008 at 10:01am
Deen Freelon
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We’d like to get a discussion started on our latest report, a literature review/think piece on generational differences in civic engagement practices. Here’s the abstract:
How can civic education keep pace with changing political identifications and practices of new generations of citizens? We examine research on school-based civic education in different post-industrial democracies with the aim of deriving a set of core learning categories. Most school-based approaches reflect traditional paradigms of dutiful citizenship (DC) oriented to government through parties and voting, with citizens forming attentive publics who follow events in the news. While this model may appeal to some young people, research suggests that it produces mixed learning outcomes, and may not capture the full range of learning and engagement styles of recent generations of citizens. We expand upon these conventional learning categories by identifying additional civic learning opportunities that reflect more selfactualizing (AC) styles of civic participation common among recent generations of youth who have been termed digital natives. Their AC learning styles favor interactive, networked activities often communicated with participatory media production such as videos shared across online networks. The result is an expanded set of learning categories that can be used to design, document, and compare civic learning in different environments from schools to online communities.
If possible, please have a look at the full paper. But even if you don’t have time to read the whole thing, I’ve included a couple discussion questions that should make sense based solely on the abstract:
- Have you seen the AC and DC styles reflected in your own research or anecdotal observations of school civics programs or young people themselves? If not, how would you characterize the new brand of civic engagement popular among youth? Are there other conceptualizations of youth civic engagement not mentioned in the paper we should be aware of?
- The authors mention Obama very briefly in the paper, suggesting that the youth enthusiasm for his campaign (particularly as expressed through participatory media) defies the typical AC/DC distinction. Would it be more accurate to conceptualize the Obama campaign as an exception to the rule or as a hybrid of the two styles (AC methods in pursuit of DC ends)? Looking toward the future, do you expect that digital media will continue to occupy the AC end of the civic spectrum, or will they diffuse evenly across AC and DC as they becomes more integrated into everyday life?
Entry Filed under: adviser conversations, conceptions of citizenship
July 15th, 2008 at 03:02pm
Deen Freelon
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CLO is a bit late to this particular conversation, but I wanted to spotlight the ongoing dust-up in the civic/political blogosphere over a recent Christian Science Monitor op-ed by Sally Kohn, a youth civic practitioner. The piece, titled “Real Change Happens Offline,” makes a number of controversial claims, some more defensible than others:
. . . Internet activism is individualistic. It’s great for a sense of interconnectedness, but the Internet does not bind individuals in shared struggle the same as the face-to-face activism of the 1960s and ’70s did. It allows us to channel our individual power for good, but it stops there.
This is great for signing a petition to Congress or donating to a cause. But the real challenges in our society – the growing gap between rich and poor, the intransigence of racism and discrimination, the abuses from Iraq to Burma (Myanmar) – won’t politely go away with a few clicks of a mouse. Or even a million.
Daily Kos, the Nation, and CLO adviser Allison Fine have all articulated thoughtful objections to these and other arguments and assumptions embedded in the piece, and Kohn’s response to her critics highlights some of the deep-rooted philosophical differences between partisan Democrats and leftists steeped in critical theory. But I want to sidestep that debate for the time being to focus on an implicit question running through the entire discussion: what, in civic and political terms, is digital media good for? And what projects are better left to the non-digital world?
Kohn’s critics were as quick to dispute the notion that online politics is somehow inherently atomistic as they were to acknowledge the fact that it will never be sufficient to fulfill the goals of most civic and political projects of any significance. Kohn herself seems to view new media as little more than a narrowly helpful supplement to “real” political activity, the vast majority of which plays out offline. But in light of current theoretical understandings and empirical findings, what ought we to expect the internet to do well, and at what point should we begin to curb our enthusiasm? I think we can all agree that new media has made political contributions, petition-signing, and self-expression easier than ever before, but what about changing hearts and minds, civic participation in the legislative process, engaging the disengaged, and hedging against gross concentrations of power (political, economic, cultural, and other)? This question is so basic that we as scholars run the risk of incorrectly assuming that we all agree on the answers, which is why addressing it directly is crucial.
Entry Filed under: adviser conversations, participatory media
July 15th, 2008 at 03:01pm
Deen Freelon
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What determines whether attempts at online youth civic engagement succeed or fail? Eszter Hargittai tackles a question very similar to this one in her recent contribution to a discussion of Clay Shirky’s latest book, Here Comes Everybody. But you don’t need to have read the book to apply Hargittai’s core insight to the issues we’ve been discussing on this blog:
While it is certainly the case that new technologies, tools and services are leveling the playing field, existing societal position and resources still matter. The question is: when do they matter more or less? Under what circumstances do people with less resources still manage to benefit from the new tools in ways that would have been difficult earlier? What are the examples of mobilization that do not involve people with PhDs, ones with noteable techie know-how or one’s with considerable financial resources either themselves or among those in their networks? There are such examples, certainly, but it would be interesting to see systematically what it is that unites them. What commonality is there among such cases that suggests a true leveling of the playing field that goes beyond allocating more opportunities to those who are already considerably privileged? (On a sidenote, these issues are similar to the ones I raised while discussing Yochai Benkler’s book The Wealth of Networks.)
What is important to understand from a youth civic engagement perspective is that not all youth are equally proficient at using digital media. Terms such as “digital natives” and “DotNets,” used by scholars and civic practitioners alike, imply the opposite when applied broadly to the current generation of adolescents and young adults. A better conceptualization of online youth engagement might begin by observing that only some youth fit the tech-savvy “digital native” archetype, and continue by asking how the digitally disadvantaged can best be brought to the virtual table. As a local example illustrating this divide, members of the CLO team have anecdotally observed alarmingly low levels of email proficiency among some of the low-income youth with whom they have come into contact. Instead of maintaining consistent email addresses, they seem to be caught in a ongoing cycle of email address registration, abandonment, and re-registration fueled by chronic password forgetfulness. Reaching these young people via participatory civic sites will remain a Sisyphean endeavor until they learn to master this most fundamental of online skills.
Much of the breathless internet triumphalism effusing forth from the popular press tends to downplay the strong possibility that preexisting inequalities will, in the absence of action to redress them, persist in online contexts (this is not to imply that Shirky’s book falls into this category; I haven’t read it). This holds true for youth civic sites no less than for any other type of participatory media. In addition to Eszter’s general questions, then, I would like to pose a few of my own:
- What can be done to make online civic spaces more appealing to diverse groups of youth? What are some effective ways to avoid falling into the trap of simply placing a piece of technology into the world and expecting an energized, diverse user base to emerge autonomously?
- What offline structures need to be constructed to ensure that youth civic sites attract more than just the “usual suspects,” i.e. young people who have already bought into the value of civic engagement?
- What other online exemplars devoted to youth engagement can we look to that have managed to navigate these issues with a relative measure of success? What can we learn from them?
Edit: According to a recent report from Scientific American, a new University of Minnesota study has found that
even the least privileged kids have profiles on MySpace and Facebook. And they’re on the internet all the time. That finding goes against past studies that have found a ‘digital divide’ between rich and poor kids.
This looks like a pretty egregious non-sequitir to me, as the fact that poor kids have social network profiles is not evidence of the absence of a digital divide. Eszter, I’d be particularly interested to see what you have to say about this. (Can’t find the actual study write-up, but here’s an interview with the PI.)
Entry Filed under: adviser conversations, digital learning skills, participatory media
June 25th, 2008 at 03:39pm
Deen Freelon
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Here at CLO, it perhaps goes without saying that we spend the majority of our time thinking about how digital media can facilitate civic engagement among young people. But focusing on digital media in isolation may ignore some of the ways in which youth view their online and offline worlds as fundamentally continuous. Scholars are increasingly finding that many people (particularly youth) tend not to differentiate sharply between what they do online and in real life (Miller & Slater, 2001; Livingstone, 2003; Freelon, 2008). This perspective raises the possibility that young people may not see the value of online civic engagement efforts if they do not include substantial links to unmediated life.
Youth civic engagement practitioners have already begun to think about and address this challenge. One successful example comes from Dan Pacheco, senior manager of digital products at the Bakersfield Californian, the monopoly paper in Bakersfield, CA. He created Bakotopia, a locally-focused youth portal that integrates an event calendar, classifieds, social networking, blogging and more. Over the course of two years the site accrued a solid user base, and Pacheco decided to supplement it with a print magazine that would reprint the best user-contributed content. Somewhat counterintuitively, he found that the magazine began to drive online content production, as content authors enthusiastically jockeyed for a limited number of print column inches.
Although Bakotopia’s mission is not specifically civic, there is much we can learn from its successes. First, by integrating offline and online aspects of everyday life through its primary content (blogs, classifieds, photos, etc.), the site has drawn together a young public around the shared experience of living in Bakersfield. Further, by promising to publish the strongest online content in the print magazine, it has managed to inspire many members of that public to communicate publicly with one another. However, not much of Bakotopia’s content would be considered “civic” under most scholarly definitions. Content authors and commenters appear to be concerned predominantly with the latest news about music, fashion, local entertainment events, and gossip.
This brief look at a thriving local youth site raises several discussion questions for us as scholars of youth civic engagement:
- How can youth civic sites (YCSs) best connect the offline and online interests of their audiences? Do you agree that this is a major priority for online youth engagement?
- What role should local institutions such as schools, community centers, civic organizations, etc. play in reinforcing the skills and attitudes learned on YCSs? Are they necessary or can YCSs get along fine without them?
- How can YCSs leverage the allure of entertainment and other non-civic topics and allow youth to express themselves relatively freely without devolving into a completely non-civic space like Myspace or Digg?
Entry Filed under: adviser conversations, conceptions of citizenship
June 25th, 2008 at 11:08am
Deen Freelon
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We are currently developing PSO media skills curricula at both our partnering organizations, such as the YMCA, and through the CCCE’s Becoming Citizens program (http://depts.washington.edu/ccce/civiceducation/citizens.html). However, we would love to hear our project advisor’s ideas on the following:
What are some of the programmatic pieces you feel we might want to be sure to include to go along with the PSO website?
What are some of the media pieces that you think we should teach?
Finally, what kind of youth development philosophy would you encourage?
Entry Filed under: adviser conversations, digital learning skills
June 10th, 2008 at 12:19pm
Toby Campbell
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When discussing how digital media can best support civic engagement among youth, it is important to distinguish between the technical capacities necessary to navigate and manipulate various forms of digital media and the civic skills that allow young people to connect with shared issues. Howard Rheingold offers a helpful starting point with his digital skills curriculum, which attempts to demonstrate how technology can serve as an attractive vehicle for what he calls “public voice.” Public voice, as distinct from private voice, comprises all communicative acts that seek to “inform publics, advocate positions, contest claims, and organize action around issues that [young people] truly care about” (Rheingold, 2008). Positioning public voice within the context of digital media harnesses the latter as a tool to teach young people about the former. Because this specific form of communication does not come naturally to most youth, learning it is presumed to require some direct instruction.
We on the CLO team believe that Howard’s approach shows much promise, but wonder if many of its recommendations are more suited for college students than for teens in high school. For example, might the concept of a “public” be too subtle for some teens to grasp, particularly if said public does not immediately emerge to respond to their attempts to address it? Further, given the undifferentiated epistemological landscape of the internet, in which Google results place paranoid cranks shoulder to shoulder with accredited experts, might some digital natives experience difficulty in critically analyzing web content? How often are these young people asked to articulate and defend their own opinions? The answers to these questions may recommend that the public voice curriculum be revised somewhat for younger learners.
- How could the public voice curriculum for a high-school age demographic? What is it reasonable for youth of that age to be able to understand and accomplish, civically speaking?
A second question that has arisen for us relates to the long-term sustainability of the skills learned in these types of curricula. Decades of education research has concluded that students retain only a small fraction of what they learn, particularly if the lessons are not practiced. Therefore, we are strongly interested in suggestions regarding ways to ensure that the civic skills we teach “stick,” as it were, as opposed to beginning and ending in the classroom.
- What can be done to ensure that the skills that youth learn in your curriculum become self-sustained habits, rather than one-time lessons?
Entry Filed under: adviser conversations, civic learning goals, digital learning skills
April 24th, 2008 at 05:13pm
Deen Freelon
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Considerable research suggests that while schools are still a major predictor of civic engagement, youth do not gain nearly the civic skills we might hope from their experiences at school. Scholars point to a number of reasons for this:
- Recent trends in education policy have reduced the time devoted to arts, music, and civic education, in favor of math, reading, and assessment.
- A lack of resources often prevents schools from offering programs that enable youth to develop and work on their own civic and political concerns and connect classroom learning with extracurricular activities.
- A disconnect in citizenship styles has schools emphasizing a duty-based style of citizenship to young people who are much more accustomed to using expression tools to craft individual identities.
- Political pressures lead many teachers and school administrators to limit political discussions and debates, despite evidence suggesting that open classroom and school atmospheres greatly enhance civic learning and engagement.
If young people are not developing civic skills at school, are they doing so elsewhere in their lives? An important question is what role online activities may play in civic learning for the millions of young people online—but most young people only occasionally pursue civic information and activities online, preferring to devote their time to social networking, gaming, and entertainment.
This produces something of a Catch-22: when they offer civic skills, most schools emphasize traditional modes of interacting with government and politics, and they present it in a dry manner. The online world is much more attractive to young people, but only occasionally offers civic learning opportunities.
This situation has us at the CCCE thinking about the potential of the new world of online youth engagement projects, especially as we prepare Puget Sound Off for its upcoming launch. The overarching question we ask ourselves is:
Can online projects create spaces for civic learning that engage young people?
And, more concretely: What functions and features should an online environment have to both hold the attention of young citizens and foster the development of important civic skills?
Entry Filed under: adviser conversations, civic learning goals, digital learning skills
April 24th, 2008 at 04:11pm
Chris Wells
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In developing our digital youth commons, Puget Sound Off, we have striven to make it attractive both to already-engaged youth as well as to those who are not yet quite as involved in civic affairs. It is certainly much easier to facilitate the goals and preferred methods of those who come to civic sites knowing what issues they care about and how to address them than it is to convince relatively disengaged teens that civics is worth their time. Nevertheless, we feel that it is essential to probe the limits of what digital media can do not only to encourage preexisting civic instincts, but also to inspire new commitments to community involvement.
To that end, I would like to raise two issues that might bear on a youth civic site’s ability to attract more than just the usual suspects. First, our informal and anecdotal interactions with youth have revealed that not all of them share the “digital native” orientation so frequently attributed to their generation. Our team has observed, for example, many young people (particularly those from disadvantaged economic backgrounds) experiencing difficulty with skills often taken for granted in discussions of online civic engagement. These include such fundamental competencies as possession of a regular email address and the ability to format blog posts and comments so that they can be easily read. We would like to compile a working list of potential obstacles like these with a rough sense of their relative importance that can help drive the development of training modules aimed at moving disadvantaged youth closer to par with their more empowered peers.
- What common technical features that youth civic sites might use pose the most significant obstacles for digitally disempowered youth?
Second, apart from technical considerations, we are concerned that certain elements of youth civic sites—the design scheme, the language used in official communications to visitors, the featured content—may signal to some youth that it is not “for” them. To preempt this possibility, we have already decided to take steps to ensure that minority viewpoints (for multiple definitions of “minority”) are represented on the front page. But are there other steps we might be able to take to make our site more inclusive? And are there any findings that suggest steps we definitely should avoid taking?
- What can site creators do to make their sites more inviting to diverse youth demographics?
Entry Filed under: adviser conversations, digital learning skills
April 24th, 2008 at 03:50pm
Deen Freelon
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