The MacArthur Foundation Spotlight on Digital Media and Learning recently highlighted the topic of Civic Engagement. Editor Lance Bennett introduced the topic on Dec. 4: “What may be most important for politicians, educators, and young people, themselves, is to learn how to use digital media technologies to build civic and political communities that enable young people to create and explore their own political futures. The lessons involved here are likely to strain, and ultimately, expand political comprehension within and across generations.

Does Internet engagement in learning spaces have the power to model civic engagement paradigms such as those advocated by The Coalition of Essential Schools, for example? Among the coalitions’s common principles are two related to civic engagement: [schools should have] democratic and equitable school policies and practice, and [schools should foster] close community partnerships.[1]

CES founder Ted Sizer’s philosophy rests on the belief that all students deserve practice in the habits of mind characterizing a democratic citizenry, many argue that schools should structure themselves to provide those skills. If students are to reason things out on their own, we must ask them to come up with the questions, not just the answers [1]. Where do online schools and new kinds of scholarship fit in?

Online communities have found that democracy and equitable partnerships inspire contribution and participation. People like seeing their ideas reflected back to them online just as they do in person.[2]

The opposite is also true. “I see a huge up tick in rules and regulations on use of the Internet at school, and it worries me. Someone needs to show how these rules are handcuffing the technology, said Julie Evans, CEO of NetDay/Project Tomorrow at NSDL’s Annual Meeting in October, 2006. [3]

Democratic and equitable educational opportunities combined with appropriate technology have the power to model civic engagement by creating systems that respond to many kinds of user feedback in approriate ways–the more you contribute, the more you learn, the more you see your ideas in service to others, the more the system gives you what you want, and the more you feel personal responsibility for maintaining the civic life of a community you are engaged with. One possible Internet political future might be that online learning communities evolve primarily as forums for the lively exchange of ideas, dreams, principles and ideals around issues of critical importance to everyone.

[1] “About the Coalition of Essential Schools,” CES NationalWeb. http://www.essentialschools.org/pub/ces_docs/about/about.html.

[2] Kushman, K. “Empowering Students: Essential Schools’ Missing Link” Horace, Vol. 11 #1, Sept. 1994. http://www.dlib.org/dlib/december06/morris/12morris.html.