The American Democracy Project (ADP) is a program offered by the American Association of State Colleges and Universities (AASCU). It is a non-partisan initiative that advances quality civic education at the college level. Its mission is to develop respectful, courageous, and responsible global citizens by helping students become informed citizens actively engaged in our democracy.
Where They’re Focused
For over 20 years, AASCU’s nonpartisan American Democracy Project has helped nearly 300 state colleges and universities prepare informed, active citizens who engage different viewpoints and perspectives to drive collective progress.
Promoting Civic Engagement Is a Critical Educational Responsibility of Public Colleges and Universities
- Highlight the role of education in restoring and promoting civil discourse, which is essential to the health of our democracy.
- Sponsor and support civic learning and engagement initiatives.
- Support programs that provide public service opportunities and learning for students and graduates.
- Support programs that build student civic and information literacy in online spaces through broad, cross-institutional projects that enable students to fact-check, annotate, and provide context for emergent news stories promulgated by social media.
- Educate students to critically analyze information and act as informed citizens.
- Encourage regional public universities to facilitate their students’ participation in the election process to the maximum extent possible.
- Oppose state legislative interventions that unnecessarily and inappropriately limit college students’ voting ability.
LWV Klamath County, a Willing Partner
On Tuesday, June 2 incoming board member, Dr. Deborah Eicher-Catt, and her husband, Dr. Isaac E. Catt, attended the last faculty senate meeting of the academic year at Oregon Institute of Technology. Their invite to attend the meeting was extended by the Vice-President of the local bargaining unit, Dr. David Johnston, professor of physics, and the current President of the faculty senate, Dr. Yuhai Yang. As representatives of our local LWV, the Catt’s had reached out to OIT’s administration to request an audience so they could present our League’s interest in partnering with OIT to offer programs and events that support the American Democracy Project (ADP).
After informing the faculty senate about the ADP and the LWV’s commitment to educate voters on what it means to be a good citizen, the Catt’s encouraged the faculty and administration at OIT to: 1) consider joining the AASCU so they could have access to resources including funding to support the ADP, 2) consider forming an ad-hoc committee to investigate partnering with us to offer forums, speaker series, and other events that would engage OIT students in experiential learning while also connecting OIT to the local community. A model of this kind of partnership between a university, a local LWV, and the greater community is provided by Eastern Oregon University in La Grande. We hope to make this kind of partnership a reality here in the Klamath Basin.