Good afternoon, friends. The 2018 NCSS Conference is now in the books, and it was an excellent opportunity to learn, network, collaborate, plan, and grow for those passionate about social studies. Happily, civics was a significant focus of the conference (perhaps no surprise considering it was in Chicago, Illinois, which has seen a rebirth of advocacy for civic education!) Over the next couple of days, we will share some highlights of the conference that we had the opportunity to attend, or were attended by others to rave reviews.

The Girl Scouts and the C3 Framework: Journey Taking Action Projects

I had the great pleasure to attend a session that featured a wonderful group of folks. It was exciting to meet Sylvia Acevedo, CEO of the Girls Scouts, and to hear from Geraldine Stevens, the troop leader of Troop 41369 out of Des Plaines, Illinois. She spoke about how the journey projects her troop have engaged in reflected key aspects across all four dimensions of the C3 Framework. It was an exciting and interesting session, and hearing both the troop leader and her incredibly accomplished Girl Scout daughter and troop member discuss ways in which they had engaged in action civics and used the approach seen in the C3 Framework to frame and guide their projects was exciting!

I leave a WT Grant Foundation grantees’ meeting on Reducing Inequality with a rough mental list of types of research that we need:

1. Descriptive research on what is unequal, for whom, where.
2. Causal research on what promotes inequality or inequality, and on the effects of various kinds of inequality.
3. Descriptive and interpretive research on the lived experience of the poor or the relatively poor–including research that challenges simple assumptions about deficits and suffering. (E.g., Annette Lareau’s research on ways that working-class kids live better lives than middle-class kids.)
4. Philosophical or other normative research that asks what should be equal for whom; how equality trades off against liberty, innovation, environmental sustainability, and other goods; and which interventions to enhance equity are ethically permissible–or obligatory–under various circumstances. (Cf. “we are for social justice, but what is it?”)
5. Conceptual research: how should we define and operationalize such relevant concepts as human capital, political influence, or social capital. (See, e.g., this post on different theories of social capital or this one on defining equity versus equality..)
6. Intervention research on programs and policies that improve the absolute or relative situation of the disadvantaged.
7. Research about scaling: when and why do successful programs expand, and when is scaling beneficial? (A program that helps at scale X can be inappropriate or even counterproductive at 10X).
8. Descriptive and interpretive research on the advantaged. What are their lives like, what deficits as well as advantages do they manifest, and how do they think about and treat the disadvantaged?
9. Intervention research aimed at the advantaged. What works to change their behaviors to improve equity?
10. Research on public opinion about inequality. Who thinks what, why, and how does that change?
11. Research on what changes political decisions relevant to inequality. What are the effects of social movements, leadership, public rhetoric, and organizations?
12. Research on when and why good research is used for policy or programming.
13. Research on phenomena that lie between individuals and the whole society, such as networks, communities, movements, and markets. (See against methodological individualism.)
14. Intellectual work that builds ideologies (in the good sense of that word): broad views that serve as heuristics. Think of the intellectual contributors to New Deal liberalism, Western European social democracy, libertarianism, or feminism.

(Thanks to Hiro Yoshikawa and Prudence Carter for stimulating some of these thoughts, but I’m responsible for omissions and mistakes.)

Democracy

Will the Left Go Too Far? (The Atlantic)
For the third time in a century, leftists are driving the Democratic Party's agenda. Will they succeed in making America more equitable, or overplay their hand? Continue Reading

How local journalism can upend the "fake news" narrative (Salon.com)
A recent survey found that Americans trust local media outlets far more than national ones. Continue Reading

The Democratic Caucus Nominated Its Leadership. Here's What It Means. (New York Times)
For the third time in a century, leftists are driving the Democratic Party's agenda.
Democrats ushered in their leadership on Wednesday for the 116th Congress, including more than 200 returning and incoming members signaling that come January, they want Representative Nancy Pelosi of California to reclaim the speaker's gavel. Here are some of the takeaways from the caucus's votes. Continue Reading

Opportunity/Inequality

The New Federal Domestic Workers Bill of Rights Would Remedy Decades of Injustice (The Nation)
America's 2 million domestic workers have minimal protections on the job. The bill announced today would fundamentally change their industry. Continue Reading

NYC's affordable housing agenda isn't doing enough for the city's neediest: report (Curbed New York)
Comptroller Scott Stringer's office says the current plan doesn't address the housing needs hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers. Continue Reading

How technological innovation could amplify income inequality (PBS NewsHour)
Technological advancement often brings the promise of increased efficiency in the workplace. But it also means apprehension about humans potentially being replaced by automation and artificial intelligence. In a new series, "The Future of Work," Paul Solman explores the concept of "creative destruction" and how innovation is poised to affect jobs, income inequality, mental health and more. Continue Reading

Engagement

Are Civics Lessons a Constitutional Right? This Student Is Suing for Them (New York Times)
Many see the lack of civics in schools as a national crisis. A federal lawsuit says it also violates the law. Continue Reading

Newark launches campaign to bolster civic engagement (NJTV Online)
The model has four components: civics in the schools; civics in the universities and online for all residents; associations of interested residents called civic trusts; and an embrace by City Hall of the concept of empowerment.
Continue Reading

What's New in Civic Tech: Ash Carter Calls for Tech to Align with 'Public Purpose' (Government Technology)
Former U.S. Secretary of Defense Ash Carter called upon America's innovators and technologists - in both the public and private sectors - to use their work "with a public purpose," in a written piece published by The Atlantic last week.
Continue Reading

K-12

The Digital Gap Between Rich and Poor Kids Is Not What We Expected (New York Times)
America's public schools are still promoting devices with screens - even offering digital-only preschools. The rich are banning screens from class altogether. Continue Reading

'If we don't learn from this one, shame on us': Lessons from a Detroit charter school that was set up to fail (Chalkbeat)
A review of hundreds of pages of documents, and interviews with key leaders involved in the school since its creation, show that the forces arrayed against every school in Detroit had pushed Delta Prep's chances of survival to nothing within a year of its opening, if not before. Continue Reading

When doctors say 'Read,' new parents listen (Hechinger Report)
A campaign to get parents talking, reading and singing to their infants and toddlers by sending the message through pediatricians is working, new report shows. Continue Reading

Higher Ed/Workforce

US manufacturing has a huge image problem (Quartz)
The way Americans look at manufacturing might help explain why 2.4 million jobs could go unfilled between this year and 2028. Continue Reading

PA Mention - Google retraining college-educated moms for tech jobs (Education Dive)
Just as MotherCoders participants want to improve their career prospects by re-skilling, so do most prospective college students over the age of 25 when weighing whether to pursue a degree or certificate, according to a May 2018 report from the nonprofit Public Agenda research group. Because they often balance commitments such as families, jobs and expenses in addition to their education, features such as childcare and financial aid programs are draws for them. Continue Reading

New Film 'Unlikely' Shows How Higher Ed Sets Up Low-Income Students for Failure - and How Some Educators Are Helping Them Succeed (The 74)
As an admissions officer at her alma mater, Columbia University, Jaye Fenderson used to spend every day deciding whether high school applicants were likely to be admitted to the prestigious Ivy League school, with its 7 percent acceptance rate. More often than not, Fenderson would mark applications with a large "U" - "Unlikely." Continue Reading

Health Care

Rate of children without insurance rises for first time since 2008 (Modern Healthcare)
For the first time since 2008, the number of uninsured children has increased, according to the report issued Tuesday by Georgetown University's Center for Children and Families. The number of uninsured children under the age of 19 nationwide increased by an estimated 276,000 to about 3.9 million in 2017. The rate of uninsured children ticked upward from a historic low of 4.7% in 2016 to 5% in 2017. Continue Reading

People with limited health insurance literacy more likely to avoid care (Healthcare Dive)
A new JAMA Network study found that lower health insurance literacy could be connected to people avoiding healthcare services, including preventive care. Continue Reading

CVS closes $69B acquisition of Aetna in a 'transformative moment' for the industry (Fierce Healthcare)
The two companies closed the $69 billion deal on Wednesday, finishing off a vertical merger that makes one of the largest healthcare giants even larger.
Continue Reading

(Washington, DC) I’m at a W.T. Grant Foundation grantees’ meeting on “reducing inequality” and currently listening to Tim Guetterman (University of Michigan) talking about mixed-methods research. Proponents and advanced practitioners of mixed-methods research form a community that is thinking hard about barriers and solutions to their research approaches. I’ve posted before about this community and its agenda. Meanwhile, I’m involved with colleagues on two fairly elaborate mixed-methods studies of our own: one on the effects of adolescents’ civic engagement on neighborhoods, the other on the role of an arts center in combatting the negative effects of gentrification.

One question is how to present qualitative and quantitative information together in an efficient format (fitting within journals’ word limits). Guetterman showed a nice example from Panda et al. (2015). These authors present findings by theme, with columns for the qualitative summaries and quantitative statistics. A third column could present reflections on divergences and convergences.

Panda, Samiran, et al. “Exploring stigma in low HIV prevalence settings in rural West Bengal, India: Identification of intervention considerations.” Journal of Mixed Methods Research 9.4 (2015): 362-385