From Sen. Annette Sweeney’s newsletter:
We also passed a bill aimed at improving the knowledge of Iowa students on U.S. government and history. Senate File 209 requires school districts and accredited nonpublic schools to offer all students in grades 9-12 opportunities to take the latest available U.S. citizenship and immigration services naturalization civics test. The goal of this bill is to provide high school students with knowledge of our nation’s government and political processes and help increase civic engagement.
According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress, only 24 percent of U.S. high school students are proficient in civics, and studies by the Annenberg Foundation show a third of U.S. citizens can’t name even one branch of our federal government. The bill passed the Senate 43-3.
