by Sarah Michels, Carolina Public Press
August 18, 2025

On a national stage, North Carolina often serves as a state to watch for its purple and swingy political nature. However, its own citizens are opting out of civic engagement at higher rates than most of the country, according to the 2024 Civic Health Index. Ineffective civics education could be part of the problem. 

Independence High School junior April Alonso knows this firsthand. She struck out the first time she tried getting her fellow students at the Charlotte school to pre-register to vote. 

For her AP Government & Politics class, Alonso had to do a service project. So, she enlisted a group of friends to walk around the cafeteria at lunchtime and get 16- and 17-year olds to pre-register. 

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They could not have been less interested, she said.

“They seemed pretty uncertain,” Alonso said. “It kind of felt like, if I were to make them register to vote, they would go down a drain or something. Like they acted like it was some kind of punishment.” 

The second time around, Alonso sweetened the deal. Anyone who pre-registered would get a few pieces of candy. Suddenly, she had buy-in. 

Brandon Rivers has also encountered his fair share of seemingly apathetic students in his time as executive director of the Charlotte Democracy Center, a nonpartisan organization focusing on voter education, specifically in marginalized communities. 

Rivers spends a lot of time giving classroom presentations on voting before offering pre-registration to students. 

Sometimes, students tell him they’re not interested. Rivers isn’t deterred; he asks them what they care about. Making money? Well, the state government sets tax policy and minimum wage, so they might want to pay attention to that. A safe neighborhood? The city council decides how much to pay local police officers and firefighters, as well as how much to budget for street lighting, so they may be interested in voting in that election. 

Bridging the connection between students’ interests and government policy is key to getting them motivated to vote, Rivers said. Making the lesson interesting is also imperative; he’s competing with students’ phones and friends for attention. 

Right now, the distractions and disconnect may be winning. According to the 2024 Civic Health Index, North Carolina lags behind most of the country on several key markers of civic engagement. 

Turnout in the 2022 midterm elections and voter registration fell short of the national average. North Carolinians regularly discussed political and social issues with friends, families and neighbors less often than in most states. In several areas — participation in public meetings, contacting public officials and frequent consumption of political news — the state placed in the bottom 10 in the nation. 

While there could be a host of reasons for North Carolina’s relative disengagement, one factor is at the center of it all: civic education, or the lack thereof. 

Civic education teaches students how their government works, and their place in it. If done well, it arms them with the knowledge, confidence and motivation to participate in their local communities, and demonstrates the influence they can have in governmental decision making. 

But too often, civic education is pushed to the side to make way for other priorities, and what instruction remains may be watered down to avoid conflict. 

This article is the first in Civics Unlearned, a three-part investigative series from Carolina Public Press that explores how, and to what extent, a deprioritization of formal civic education has led to a generation of disengaged and polarized North Carolinians. 

This article discusses the problem — civic engagement is relatively low in North Carolina, particularly among youth, and formal civic education doesn’t appear to be doing its part to bolster participation. As a result, public policy only represents a portion of the populace, and a generation of North Carolinians are growing up unprepared to work with each other and their government to solve community problems. 

The second article will explore how conflicting priorities and inconsistent delivery have hamstrung quality civic education. The final article will suggest ways to bolster civic education and engagement, both within and beyond the formal education system. 

‘It’s really just the Wild West’

In 1997, North Carolina public leaders sensed a looming crisis. They worried that North Carolina’s civic education was inadequate, and would lead to a generation of citizens unprepared to lead their communities. 

So they worked with the North Carolina Civic Education Consortium, within the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s School of Government, to develop a report on the state’s civic health. 

The report, published in 2003, centered around a phone survey of 800 teens and 800 adults, found that household income was the best predictor of civic engagement. Wealthier adults and students from high-income families were more likely to have worked with others to solve a community issue, discussed political issues at home, contacted public officials and showed interest in voting, among other civic activities. 

Two decades later, these patterns persist. White North Carolinians report greater engagement than their Black counterparts in every indicator of civic health besides participation in public meetings. College-educated citizens also surged ahead of citizens with less formal education, and North Carolinians 30 and older reported significantly higher involvement than younger generations. 

Education in civics should level the playing field, in theory. But, it isn’t. 

North Carolina’s civic education is inconsistently taught, said Burke Middle College civics and personal finance teacher Timothy Barnsback.

“It’s really just the Wild West,” he said. “You have either great civics teachers or not-great civics teachers, and there’s not a whole lot of middle ground. It takes being passionate about it to actually make it a really meaningful course for students.” 

Barnsback has been teaching social studies since 2000. He started with middle school, where the curriculum was more about rote knowledge and less about active civic engagement. But now that he teaches high school seniors, he makes an effort to make his instruction more interactive and student-focused. 

He doesn’t have to do that. North Carolina’s standards are very flexible — it comes down to how much each individual teacher is willing to invest in their students. Not every teacher has the desire or resources to do so.

There’s some truth to the stereotype that coaches with minimal background in the subect matter are often also assigned the social studies class, Barnsback said. In his years of helping create professional development resources for social studies teachers, he’s noticed a trend of male teachers not specifically trained to teach social studies who bounce between history and civics on the one hand and physical education on the other, depending on where they can get a coaching job. 

To exacerbate matters, the state does not designate funding for civic education or service-learning projects, according to an open records request. 

While a $120,000 character education budget exists, professional development competes with various other priorities for the relatively small pool of money.

In practice, professional development is “do it yourself and handle it at the local level,” Barnsback said.

“So there’s not a depth of knowledge, and to be honest, there’s not a real investment in teaching it properly,” he added. 

Vague state standards 

When Rockingham Early College High School social studies teacher Valencia Abbott gets to the lesson about the roles, powers and functions of different types of local governments, she conducts a special assignment called, “Who represents me?”

She divides her students into groups based on their addresses, and has them search for their mayor, town council and other local representatives. Then, she shows them how they can contact these officials if they ever want to bring up an issue or offer their input. 

Regardless of whether her students stay in Rockingham County, the lesson will stick with them, Abbott said. 

“These are the things that we do in our system that we have, and they know the steps, and then they’ll be less hesitant next time with that,” she said. 

While Abbott chooses to connect the standard to real-life civic engagement, she could just as easily present a Powerpoint on the various levels of local government and call it a day. Teaching is very personal, she said; everyone will approach it differently, and trying to enforce any level of uniformity is likely to be a futile exercise. 

“I’m going to do my job to the best of my ability, despite my little paycheck every month, but I also know that there are teachers who come in and do the bare minimum every day,” she said. 

That doesn’t mean the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction doesn’t try to develop effective content standards. 

In 2021, DPI revised the standards, which serve as a guide for local educational authorities as they develop curriculum for their districts. 

While North Carolina’s standards integrate civics into broader social studies instruction beginning in kindergarten, no stand-alone civics course exists until high school.

By second grade, students are supposed to be able to “exemplify ways individuals and groups shape communities and contribute to the making of rules and laws,” according to the state standards. In fourth grade, students should be preparing to be “responsible and informed citizens” by studying the state Constitution and separation of powers. 

In eighth grade, North Carolinians delve into the founding documents and ideals of the state and nation, and should be able to “use a range of civic approaches to address problems being investigated.” 

If this all seems vague to you, you’re not alone. 

After the 2021 standards were released, North Carolina earned a failing grade from the conservative educational think tank Fordham Institute, which found the content, rigor, clarity and organization of the standards lacking. The report pulled no punches. 

“Grades three and four target state and local government, but not in a way that is likely to promote understanding.” 

“…the civics standards for (fifth) grade provide dubious guidance.”

“Here, again, the standards tease big concepts… but offer nothing concrete.” 

“Finally, although the inquiry strand includes a category on ‘taking informed action,’ it is thoroughly uninspiring.” 

The STEM-first mentality

When Nicole Clarke, a social studies teacher at Vance County’s Clarke Elementary school, came to the U.S. from Jamaica to teach, she quickly realized social studies played second fiddle to math and reading. There was more small group time and interventions in those prioritized subjects.  

Teachers take note of the hierarchy. 

“Because it’s not a tested subject, and much focus is not placed on it, then people don’t tend to put their all into it like they would do for literacy and math and science,” Clarke said. 

Rowan-Salisbury Middle School social studies teacher Eric Shock has heard the same from his peers teaching younger North Carolinians. They tell him that “the STEM mentality” pushes subjects like social studies to the side. 

“Elementary teachers will tell me, ‘Oh, well, we include social studies when we’re doing reading activities and we incorporate it that way,’” Shock said. “ But it’s not direct, purposeful social studies instruction. It is reading instruction with a social studies article.”

As a result, Shock’s eighth-graders often have wildly different starting points when they arrive in his class; some are beginning at zero, while others have been extensively taught and tested on their civic knowledge. 

Even when they get there, sometimes the class is not their main concern. 

“I’ve had students who have come in and said, ‘Well, I’ve got to get my math grade up because I’ve got the (end-of-grade exam),’ or, ‘I’m not feeling really good in science right now, and, that’s a tested subject,’ and I’ve heard parents say that before too,” Shock said, 

He feels like social studies has become a “glorified exploratory class,” in line with music or P.E. Meanwhile, robust civics instruction is as important as ever, he said. It teaches students how to critically think. 

“With the rise of social media, my classroom, social studies teachers’ classrooms, we are the front line in the war against misinformation,” Shock said. “We’re the front line in the war against bias.”

Broken civic education

Civic education is broken, and has been for decades, according to a book co-authored by Duke political science professor Sunshine Hillygus. 

The goal of civic education is to develop civic-minded adults, but her research found a very small relationship between civic education and voting turnout from the 1950s to the 2000s. 

That doesn’t mean civic education is a waste of time, Hillygus said. Rather, it means civics needs an overhaul to meet its full potential. 

Too much of civic education is focused on historical facts and figures, memorizing dates and recalling key events, at the expense of more practical knowledge like how to register to vote, cast a ballot and participate in the current political environment, she said. 

Schools also need to instill political motivation and perseverance into students who may face an uphill battle their first time navigating the voting system. Studies show that voting is a habit; once someone votes once, they tend to repeat the practice. The opposite is also true; each year someone goes without voting, the less likely they are to start participating. 

UNC Charlotte political science professor and researcher Jason Giersch found similarly lackluster connections between civic education and turnout in a 2018 study. 

Alongside his co-author, Giersch determined that social studies and civics course requirements didn’t consistently correlate with higher youth voter registration or turnout. 

Giersch wouldn’t read too much into it, he said. The results are likely skewed by the degree of variation in civics instruction across classrooms. 

“When you don’t have an exam, if all you have is a list of a curriculum, in the classroom, that could be taught any one of 1,000 different ways,” he said. “So some will be ways that lead towards people being civically active, and some will lead towards students not becoming civically active. And because it’s going in so many different directions, you end up with an insignificant result.” 

Sometimes, civics is just plain boring. At least that’s what Alonso hears from her classmates in Mecklenburg County. 

Since COVID, people have stopped participating in class discussions, either because they don’t find the subject matter interesting or don’t feel comfortable sharing their opinion. Sometimes, it’s obvious the teacher isn’t passionate about the subject, which leads to bland instruction, but other times, her teachers have tried to make class engaging to no avail, Alonso said. 

Kids are distracted by social media, video games and friends. Their attention spans have shortened. And after COVID, they tend to hide away behind their phone or computer screens, she added. 

Teachers shy away too, for the most part. 

“Most of them are extremely careful with what they say, just because they do not want to offend anyone,” Alonso said. “…The majority of them, I’ll say, are pretty well reserved when it comes to that, and know how to pick out topics where they aren’t as controversial.” 

North Carolina student Shrutav Deshpande said none of his teachers want to start a classroom debate; so, instruction is mostly centered on facts and history, with few projects or interactive lessons. 

“Sadly, instead of benefiting America, politics has split us in two,” Deshpande said. “Every classroom has members from both sides, and any actual depth into politics could be dangerous.”

The importance of civic education

Civic education begins even before the first day of school. 

The way students are raised by their parents and their communities is an early determinant of their eventual civic engagement. For example, if a student’s parents talk about voting, they’re more likely to follow in their footsteps. If there’s no community culture around participating in local politics, it may feel less important. 

But formal education plays a significant role, too. 

Civic education may be particularly impactful among certain groups who have fewer opportunities to develop civic skills outside of the classroom. Nearly 30% of students learn about civics only or mostly in schools, according to a 2022 report by the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement. 

White rural youth and Black and Latino men are overrepresented in these groups. On the other hand, urban teens tended to receive higher quality civic education, including media literacy lessons, classroom discussions and service learning opportunities. 

Civic education builds a student’s concept of the world and their place in society outside of family, said Bryan Proffitt, former high school social studies teacher and vice president of the North Carolina Association of Educators. It is crucial that it doesn’t take shortcuts, he said. 

If students are able to pass a civics class by reciting the roles of the three branches of government, they’re probably not going to be prepared to understand what it means to vote, follow a debate or participate in a school board meeting, Proffitt said. The world isn’t “uncomplicated” or “uncontroversial,” he said; effective civic education needs to encompass all of its nuance. 

“There is an incredibly consequential political decision that is up in the next election,” he said. “Do we have a set of people who are able to think for themselves, versus a set of people who are just going to believe whatever propaganda someone foists on them?”

But the impact of lagging civic education goes beyond voting and participation, Clarke said. If done properly, it teaches kids to solve problems together, to feel heard and valued and to be informed and respectful adults, she said. 

“There are some values that kids need to learn and take with them wherever they go, and if civics is not being taught, then I don’t see how they will make good choices in their everyday life,” Clarke said. 

Less civics, more polarization

Catawba College political science professor Michael Bitzer is worried. While citizens under 45 make up the largest group of registered voters, they turn out to the polls at the lowest rates of all generations, he said. 

Older North Carolinians won’t be around forever, and when they’re gone, they’ll leave behind a less engaged electorate to make the decisions. 

“How will those decisions be made and who will be making them?” Bitzer asked. “Are they the most extreme voices, or are there folks that are more representative of our society broadly?” 

It’s political gospel: the fewer people who show up, the more extreme the outcome. The more extreme outcomes, the more polarized a society will become. The more polarized a society, the less trust people have in the government and each other. 

Civic education, while seemingly not working at the moment, is uniquely positioned to alleviate the issue. After all, education is the one space that captures nearly all Americans at some point. 

If nothing changes, youth will continue to be underrepresented in the electorate. 

“The reason that Social Security is the third rail of politics, rather than education spending, is because old people vote and young people don’t,” Hillygus said. 

Civic education doesn’t just teach people how to vote. It is also supposed to raise the next generation of leaders by teaching students how to disagree civilly — something not often represented in today’s contentious political world, youth civic organization GenerationNation executive director Amy Farrell said. 

“It’s how to disagree about something and not be horrible to each other; to have conversations about things and to listen to the other side,” she said.

This article first appeared on Carolina Public Press and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

The post Civics education gaps promote lack of NC democratic engagement appeared first on carolinapublicpress.org

Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.

Political Bias Rating: Center-Left

This article primarily focuses on the challenges and shortcomings of civic education in North Carolina and its impact on civic engagement, particularly youth participation. It emphasizes the importance of comprehensive and well-supported civics education, critiques the lack of funding and inconsistent standards, and highlights systemic inequities related to race and socioeconomic status. The piece advocates for educational reforms and greater investment in civic learning, often aligning with typical center-left concerns about equitable education, inclusive participation, and the need for government-supported public services. However, it maintains a largely nonpartisan tone by including multiple expert perspectives and by avoiding partisan framing, reflecting a moderate progressive viewpoint focused on strengthening democracy through education.