While this Independence Day will certainly include the usual festivities— fireworks, cookouts, patriotic speeches and Americans dressed in red, white and blue— the meaning behind the celebration has not been lost on America’s next generation.
A new nationwide survey of nearly 3,000 high school students, released last week by the Bill of Rights Institute in Arlington, VA, provides a glimpse into what the nation’s future leaders think about American citizenship: what civic values they admire, who their political heroes are, and which of our founding documents inspire them the most.Â
The survey, based on an analysis of the top 3,000 essays submitted in the Bill of Rights Institute’s 2009-10 Being an American Essay Contest— the nation’s largest high school essay contest, with more than 50,000 entries this year— concentrated on three themes: civic values; Founding Fathers and American heroes; and founding documents.Â
The survey found:
Who are their heroes, past and present?
Making the top-five list, in order, were Thomas Jefferson (18 percent), Abraham Lincoln (14 percent), Martin Luther King, Jr. (12 percent), George Washington (10 percent) and Thomas Paine (9 percent).Â
Which founding document inspires them the most?
Students cited the Declaration of Independence (47 percent) and the Constitution (33 percent) as the two most important and inspiring founding documents, followed by Thomas Paine’s pamphlet Common Sense.
What civic values do American students value most?
“Perseverance” and “courage” were cited most often as the civic values essential to being an American, with each value being chosen by approximately 15 percent of participating students. Other civic values identified by large numbers of students included equality and respect (14 percent), entrepreneurialism (12 percent), responsibility (9 percent) and liberty (8 percent).Â
These results were consistent across all high-school grade levels, in all school settings (public, private and home school), with one exception: The majority of 10th graders identified President Lincoln, not Jefferson, as their top hero.
“It’s clear that students have strong opinions about what it means to be a modern American in light of our Founding Fathers and documents,” said Jason Ross, Ph.D., vice president of education programs for the Bill of Rights Institute. “Perhaps even more important— the students believe that American citizens have a responsibility to live by certain principles, or civic values, and understand the importance of perseverance and courage.” Â
More Information
billofrightsinstitute.org
