Rebooting Civics for the Digital Age

Today’s teenagers can produce a viral video in 60 seconds, yet many struggle to name the three branches of government. That failure is less an indictment of them than of us. We’ve treated civics as something to memorize and quickly forget, not something valuable to practice and learn.

In reality, we know that civics education requires the cultivation of skills, such as problem-solving, media literacy, and negotiation.

Across the United States, leaders worry about the decline of civics education, yet the students who need it most live in a different learning universe. Those of us raised on Schoolhouse Rock learned civics through Saturday morning television cartoons. Generation Alpha and the slightly older Generation Z learn through influencers, social media, and curated digital content.

In an era of disinformation, polarization and online outrage, democracy depends not on rote recall but on citizens who think critically, collaborate effectively and disagree civilly.

Our schools need a modern approach to civics education. This century needs Americans who can filter disinformation, engage online without dehumanizing one another, and use digital tools to solve problems effectively. The skills have changed, but the goal is the same: cultivating the character required for self-governance. 

In a world where we can say anything instantly, we must teach young people how to respond with moderation, empathy, and discretion. The stakes are high, given the potential for enormous reach due to social media and online communication.

The Founders never thought civics education was a spectator sport. Thomas Jefferson argued that self-government required “habit and long training.” Benjamin Franklin warned that the republic would endure only “if you can keep it.” As demonstrated repeatedly in the new Ken Burns film “The American Revolution,” early Americans learned civics by doing it — participating in town halls, volunteering for militias and engaging with public debates — not by memorizing a few facts before a test.

The concept of self-government began with learning how to govern oneself, which required the cultivation of restraint, discipline, and reason. In fact, public schools taught students how to debate, deliberate, and serve. Civics cultivated character and prepared citizens to shoulder the responsibilities of democracy. The 19th-century McGuffey Readers that taught schoolchildren about individual character might seem antiquated now, but they served a clear purpose by shaping future citizens.

Over time, that vision of civics narrowed. Students learned about democracy and American history, but less about what effective citizenship requires. Teaching the democratic virtues of courage, humility, patience, integrity, respect, and resilience got shelved, too.

Taking a multiple-choice test won’t cut it for 21st-century civics. Knowledge about the American system, its history, and the founding principles is necessary but not sufficient.

Students should learn how to deliberate, disagree respectfully, and collaborate. They need to understand how to analyze social media feeds for bias, just as previous generations were taught to scrutinize newsprint. Most importantly, when faced with challenging problems, they must have the skills and confidence to devise reasonable solutions with broad support.

There is reason for hope. Young Americans volunteer and advocate in record numbers, demonstrating that they care deeply about pressing issues. According to Donorbox’s 2025 volunteer statistics, more than half of Generation Z has volunteered at least once in the past year. The challenge is to connect their inclination for engagement with a shared grounding in the vocabulary of rights, responsibilities, and constitutional limits.

In addition to modernizing our approach to civics education, we also face a political problem to confront. Those on the right criticize “action” civics, which uses advocacy or protest to learn about democracy. Those on the left decry “traditionalist” civics, which emphasizes American exceptionalism and blind patriotism. Neither approach is constructive; both are stand-ins for tired ideological battles.

Rethinking civics for the digital age must transcend polarization. It should be neither conservative nor liberal but should cultivate the knowledge, skills, and dispositions democracy demands today. Anyone can post a video or write a witty comment, but are students widely taught to do so in a responsible manner that cultivates cooperation, understanding, and better solutions?

The answer right now is no.

Linking knowledge to experiential learning is key. Students can do this in a variety of creative ways: creating a podcast about their town’s history, undertaking a local service project benefiting the community, or participating in moderated debates on national issues that respect divergent opinions. An approach that combines traditional learning with nonpartisan, sensible opportunities for community engagement should find support from both political parties.

Civics wasn’t meant to be recited; it was meant to be lived. In an age when participation is easy and responsibility is hard, a civics reboot can prepare the next generation to meet the challenges ahead.

This post was first published on The 74.