Course Title: Teaching Democracy
Campus Course Code: POLS 4318
Campus: UT El Paso
Program: Non-Program
Course Description
Those who enroll will encounter fascinating content, high expectations for reading and writing, and useful problem-solving skills that can be applied to a future of teaching, civic engagement, and public policy analysis. This political science course is designed both for majors and for future teachers of social studies in middle and high schools.
In the course, we will examine the practices of educational governance, policies, and politics at the federal, state, and local levels, as residents, citizens, and teachers living in a democracy. We will also examine civic education at the U.S.-Mexico border, assessing not only what students learn but also what students could or should learn to become engaged in the civic and public affairs of democracies.
NOTE: This course may meet a requirement for pre-teachers seeking social studies certification at the middle- and high-school levels.
Objectives
- To understand power relations, reform strategies, access points, stakeholders, and decision-maker targets for school governance in democracies, including school board trustees.
- To assess the relationship between social studies standardized testing and teaching democracy.
- To learn about and propose multiple strategies for civic learning in classrooms and course materials.
- To compare educational reform strategies in multiple U.S. cities that may be applied in students' own locales.
- To gain experience in reading and interpreting relevant data from the Texas Education Agency, the Census, and the National Assessment of Educational Progress (Civics), including trends over time.
Materials
Visit the Bookstores page for links to campus bookstores that provide information on course materials.
Prerequisites: Students must have successfully completed two introductory political science courses (a requirement in all public universities in Texas).
Credits:3
Level:Undergraduate
Faculty
Kathleen Staudt
kstaudt@utep.edu
915-747-7975