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CU Engage is proud to have two proposals funded as part of the Spencer Foundation’s New Civics Initiative, which aims to develop measurement tools that promote high-quality civic and political engagement.

The first project, led by principal Investigator Leah Sprain, an assistant professor in Communications, and co-PI Karen Ramirez, program co-director for CU Dialogues, is called "Assessing Deliberative Spaces for Engagement across Difference: Two New Civics Measurement Instruments.” In this project they will work with CU Engage programs and graduate students to measure the quality of deliberative spaces for young people to interact across difference, such as political ideology, race, or class. Learn more about the project .  

The second project, led by Ben Kirshner, Faculty Director of CU Engage, along with co-PIs Carlos Hipolito-Delgado and Shelley Zion, from UC Denver School of Education and Human Development, examines young people’s public policy arguments.

"We believe young people ought to have opportunities to participate in decisions that affect their lives,” stated Dr. Ben Kirshner.

The main focus will be to develop a protocol that teachers and community-based educators can use as a rubric and for curriculum design. Learn more about this project .

The Spencer Foundation’s $2 million initiative, which also funds projects at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Stanford University, and the National Writing Project, will focus on accomplishing a task where progress is sorely needed but difficult to achieve – developing ways to measure the nature and quality of civic and political discussions taking place amongst youth, whether face to face, in writing, or online.

While many in civic education today bemoan the poor quality of dialog in the public sphere, which is all too frequently characterized by a lack of respect for informed arguments and for those with different perspectives, what is needed are ways to measure these qualities in order to help educators and policymakers identify needs and assess whether particular approaches are helping.

CU Engage supports programs and initiatives that work collaboratively with community groups to address complex public challenges through research, creative work, and action.  Dr. Sprain and Dr. Kirshner note that “CU Engage programs, including CU Dialogues, INVST Community Studies, and Public Achievement, will be important sites for this research.”

Read the entire Spencer Foundation press release .