Recommendations to increase knowledge of American history and of the rights and responsibilities of citizens among public school students in Massachusetts are outlined and discussed. The recommendations made by the special study committee were based on two state-wide surveys (one of secondary teachers and social studies directors or chairpeople and one of elementary principals and teachers), visits by several of the committee members to school systems, the experiences of the committee members themselves, and the additional information supplied by the constituencies the committee members represented. The first group of recommendations deal with the formal curriculum, discussing ways to build a solid, comprehensive K-12 program. The second group of recommendations focus on the informal curriculum, defined to include all experiences, influences, groups, actions, and interactions of individuals which occur outside the classroom and, in conjunction with formal instruction, inside the classroom. The study committee believes that students' attitudes toward citizenship and participation in our society are largely based on the informal curriculum. The last group of suggestions for improvement deal with teacher education. The committee believes that in the long term, improvements in citizenship education are dependent on the preservice and inservice training of teachers. (RM)