Five years ago, Diana Hess was teaching a graduate seminar called "Democratic Education." The purpose of the seminar was to critically analyze two seemingly simple, but actually very complex, questions: What is democracy? What is democratic education? Both are contested concepts, and the seminar was designed to help students understand…

In November of 2001, less than two months after the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, Nebraska's state board of education approved a patriotism bill specifying content for the high school social studies curriculum in accordance with the state's 1949 statute--the Nebraska Americanism law. Nebraska was not alone. Within a few months, more…

Surveys levels of political tolerance among 152 U.S. government teachers and 96 social studies coordinators in Texas. Investigates attitudes toward various groups (e.g., neo-Nazis), and whether respondents felt that even disliked groups should be accorded their civil liberties. Concludes majority of these educators practiced what they taught.…