I'd be happiest if every state would adopt constitutional and civics proficiency as a requirement for graduating from high school.
I agree as long as it is not infected with political correctness and revisionist anti-American history.
When I graduated from HS, way, way, way, back in 1979, in Baltimore City no less, passing a civics class in the senior year was a requirement to graduate. IIRC, the class covered the Constitution, Bill of Rights, the three branches of government, how a bill becomes a law, etc.
The HS I went to was what would now be called a “magnet school”. I had to apply to get in, had to have had excellent grades and with zero disciplinary problems all through middle school along with two teacher recommendations. The school, while a public school, was also all girls but was at the time one of the very top rated public high schools in the country, rivaling even some local private schools and you could be booted out for not only failing grades but also for any disciplinary infractions which were pretty strict including a dress code and a code of honor.
As I was in the Advanced College Prep course and had excellent grades in all my previous history classes, so I was able to opt out of the civics class and instead could opt to take Advanced Political Thought instead of the basic civics class.
The Advanced Political Thought class started with the ancient Greeks and Romans, covered medieval feudalism and the Age of Enlightenment, the American and French revolutions, the industrial revolution and the social reforms that came about, and the rise of Communism and Socialism, modern liberalism vs. modern conservatism.
As I had enough credits for graduation in math and science and English in my senior year, I could take an elective course. While most in my position opted for the easiest of classes (gardening, folk dancing), I took Advanced European History (yes I was a bit of history nerd even then) and that class dovetailed nicely with the Political Thought class as they both covered the same time periods during the school year. So much so that my Advanced Political Thought teacher would say, “as those of you in Mr. Smith’s Advanced European History class already know” and “as those of you in Ms. Jones’ Political Thought class have already covered…
My Advanced Political Thought teacher was, as I recall was young and a liberal but she was a fair and balanced teacher.
In order to pass her class, you had to write a term paper (50% of the final grade was based on this) and it was really more of a thesis, and by thesis, it was really expected to be on at least a first year college level paper - a title page, an abstract, a table of contents, foot notes and attributions, bibliography and a conclusion.
I wrote my paper on Marx and Engle and the Communist Manifesto but from a conservative prospective; on why conservatism and a free market economy frees people while communism and socialism enslaves them.
I got an A.
