Recent global security threats, economic instability, and political uncertainty have placed great scrutiny on the requirements for U.S. citizenship. The stipulation of literacy has long been one of these criteria. In Producing Good Citizens, Amy J. Wan examines the historic roots of this phenomenon, looking specifically to the period just before World War I, up until the Great Depression. During this time, the United States witnessed a similar anxiety over the influx of immigrants, economic uncertainty, and global political tensions. Early on, educators bore the brunt of literacy training, while also being charged with producing the right kind of citizens by imparting civic responsibility and a moral code for the workplace and society. Literacy quickly became the credential to gain legal, economic, and cultural status. In her study, Wan defines three distinct pedagogical spaces for literacy training during the 1910s and 1920s: Americanization and citizenship programs sponsored by the federal government, union-sponsored programs, and first year university writing programs. Wan also demonstrates how each literacy program had its own motivation: the federal government desired productive citizens, unions needed educated members to fight for labor reform, and university educators looked to aid social mobility. Citing numerous literacy theorists, Wan analyzes the correlation of reading and writing skills to larger currents within American society. She shows how early literacy training coincided with the demand for laborers during the rise of mass manufacturing, while also providing an avenue to economic opportunity for immigrants. This fostered a rhetorical link between citizenship, productivity, and patriotism. Wan supplements her analysis with an examination of citizen training books, labor newspapers, factory manuals, policy documents, public deliberations on citizenship and literacy, and other materials from the period to reveal the goal and rationale behind each program. Wan relates the enduring bond of literacy and citizenship to current times, by demonstrating the use of literacy to mitigate economic inequality, and its lasting value to a productivity-based society. Today, as in the past, educators continue to serve as an integral part of the literacy training and citizen-making process.

At about 45 one-month-long camps (CMTC) run each summer by the Army, young volunteers experienced the challenges & satisfactions of soldiering. Reserve Colonel Harry Truman was once a CMTC commander; Ronald Reagan was commissioned through CMTC; Generals Pershing, MacArthur, & Marshall were active in the program; & while training, it inspired 17-year-old Robert Penn Warren's first poem. "This first (account) of the CMTC is a resounding success. ...Kington presents institutional history in human terms, with fascinating results,"--Bernard Nalty, author & retired Air Force historian; "Kington's history of CMTC vividly recreates an almost forgotten chapter in the history of the U.S. Army...,"--J. Garry Clifford, author of THE CITIZEN SOLDIERS; "(This) very readable book...makes good use of lively memories of almost 100 veterans to remind us of the place of CMTC in our history,"--Edward Coffman, THE OLD ARMY; "(Finally) we have a definitive account of one of America's most significant, yet least known, social programs for young men....(The book) is an invaluable contribution to the current debate on national youth service...,"--Charles Moskos, A CALL TO CIVIC SERVICE. To order send $18.75, plus $2 postage/handling to: Two Decades Publishing, Box A-169, 3739 Balboa St., San Francisco, CA 94121, Phone: (415) 752-9511.

Educating for citizenship was the original mission of American schools, but for decades that knowledge—also known as civics education—has been in decline, as schools have shifted focus to college and career, STEM, and raising reading and math scores. But over the last few years, spurred on by political polarization and a steep decline in public understanding, civics education is seeing a nation-wide resurgence, as school leaders, educators, and parents recognize the urgency of teaching young people how America works—especially young people who have been marginalized from the political system. But this isn’t your grandmother’s civics. The “new” civics has been updated and re-tooled for the phone-addicted, multi-cultural, globalized twenty-first century kid. From combatting “fake news” with fact checking in Silicon Valley, to reviving elementary school social studies in Nashville, to learning civic activism in Oklahoma City, journalist Holly Korbey documents the grassroots revival happening across the country. Along the way, she provides an essential guidebook for educators, school leaders and caregivers of all types who want to educate a new generation of engaged citizens at a critical time in American democracy.