Edition No. 21
In this Edition
Arts and Culture
In honor of Women’s History Month, we want to spend some time celebrating the composers, performers, and conductors paving their own way in the classical music genre. A recent post from YourClassical shares a list of ten new contemporary artists to add to your next playlist.
Our American Values
This week, we kick off an ongoing series that examines what Americans need to become more responsible and effective citizens. As a baseline for our understanding of our system of government, we analyze the results of the 2020 Constitution Day Civics Survey.
Women's History Month
Honoring Women In Classical Music
Given that March is Women’s History Month, we want to spend time celebrating the strong and talented women who have paved the way and made a name for themselves in the arts sector. The classical music genre, one that is ever-changing and near to our hearts, features incredible women composers, performers, and conductors. While most household names are men (think Bach and Beethoven), these incredible women composers deserve to share and shine in the spotlight alongside their male counterparts. And to make discovering these talented artists easier, YourClassical has put together a list of ten contemporary women composers to add to your Spotify or AppleMusic playlist today. We’ve highlighted a few of them below!
YourClassical is dedicated to honoring women in classical music and has done so with carefully crafted playlists, articles, and programs. Visit their site and nominate your choice for the 2021 Classical Woman of the Year, as well as brush up on women composers everyone should be familiar with (and not just Clara Schuman). Click or tap here to visit YourClassical today.
A Few Of Our Favorites
Education for Responsible Citizenship
There is a persuasive body of evidence showing that our nation has long neglected civics and social studies education. Only twenty-two states require that high school students demonstrate a meaningful understanding of our system of government to graduate and annual surveys show an appalling lack of knowledge of even our most fundamental rights on the part of adult Americans. There is also a growing consensus that neglecting social studies and civics education has contributed to our present political dysfunction and, possibly, to events of January 6th. There is much less consensus, however, as to exactly what Americans need to know to become more responsible and effective citizens.
So, for the next few editions, we will use this space within Inspired Thoughts devoted to American Democracy to consider four questions that are at the heart of our work:
How much do Americans really know about our system of government?
Can better civics and social studies education truly remedy America’s political dysfunction?
What needs to be emphasized, or not emphasized, in a renewed focus on civics and social studies?
How can we also reach adults who seemed to have missed, or forgotten, civics class?
The 2020 Constitution Day Civics Survey
How Much Do Americans Really Know About Our System of Government?
This week, we’ll set a baseline establishing how much, or how little, Americans truly know about our system of government. To do that, we’ll look at the results of the 2020 Constitution Day Civics Survey from the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania.
While 2020 results were better than some years, they remain far from good with just 51% of Americans surveyed being able to correctly name all three branches of government.
When asked who the final responsibility for would have deciding whether an act is constitutional if the president and the Supreme Court differed, only 51% correctly identified the Supreme Court as the final arbiter of constitutional questions. Click or tap here for access to the full Annenberg Center report.
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