|
|
|
|
 |
|
REPORT RANKS COLLEGE NO. 4 IN 'CIVIC LITERACY' |
|
|
|
|
September 27, 2006
GROVE CITY, Pa. – Grove City College is ranked fourth in the nation for increasing students’ knowledge of American history and institutions, according to a recent Intercollegiate Studies Institute study.
Commissioned by the ISI, the study is the culmination of research administered by the University of Connecticut’s Department of Public Policy. It is the first and largest study of its kind, according to ISI. The study identifies the lack of knowledge most college students have about American history, government and politics and ranks colleges and universities according to strength of coursework, learning and civic involvement.
The researchers asked more than 14,000 randomly selected college freshmen and seniors at 50 colleges and universities across the country 60 multiple-choice questions aimed at measuring their knowledge in four subject areas: American history, government, America and the world, and the market economy.
Rhodes College in Memphis, Tenn., topped the list with an 11.6 percent increase in students’ knowledge, with Colorado State University and Calvin College following. Grove City scored a 9.4 percent increase in students’ knowledge, significantly outranking elite schools like Georgetown University, Yale University and Johns Hopkins University.
“America’s most prestigious schools, including Yale, Georgetown and Brown, improved their students’ civic knowledge far less than schools such as Rhodes, Calvin and Grove City,” the study reports. “… Seniors at the top-ranked colleges in our study, such as Rhodes, Calvin and Grove City, graduate knowing nearly as much or more than seniors at Brown, Georgetown and Yale, who entered college as more knowledgeable freshmen.”
ISI reported that the top-ranked schools’ strengths appear to lie in the amount of civic courses taken, involvement in civic activities and time spent learning. According to the study, on average, Grove City’s students take one of the highest amounts of political science, history and economy courses and seniors report a higher number of hours per week doing homework than elite schools like University of California at Berkeley and Georgetown. A large number of students also reported having voted at least once.
For more information, go to www.americancivicliteracy.org to view the online version of the results.
| |
|
|
|
|
Print Page
