{"id":283764,"date":"2026-05-25T16:19:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-25T16:19:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/283764\/"},"modified":"2026-05-25T16:19:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-25T16:19:10","slug":"fsu-pushing-for-increased-civics-teaching-in-schools-to-reconnect-with-memorial-day-meaning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/283764\/","title":{"rendered":"FSU pushing for increased civics teaching in schools to reconnect with Memorial Day meaning"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>FSU educators are concerned that a recent poll shows only 48% of Americans know why Memorial Day was established.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.fsu.edu\/\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener noreferrer nofollow\">Florida State University<\/a> is introducing a new initiative to increase awareness of American principles among young students.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The <a href=\"https:\/\/igc.fsu.edu\/founding-voices\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener noreferrer nofollow\">Founding Voices Program<\/a> is an educational platform the school hopes will be adopted in public middle schools to help students learn the importance of Memorial Day and other chapters of the American story.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The FSU Institute for Governance and Civics (<a href=\"https:\/\/igc.fsu.edu\/\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener noreferrer nofollow\">IGC<\/a>) says the program involves enhanced teaching methods to engage younger students. Director of the IGC and Professor of Political Science Ryan Owens said increasing numbers of young people simply don\u2019t connect with the meaning of Memorial Day.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cA student who studies the (Civil War) Battle of Little Round Top through maps and lectures may learn what happened,\u201d Owens said. \u201cBut a student who must assume the role of (commander) Joshua Chamberlain, confronts impossible choices and understands what was at stake begins to grasp why courage, duty and sacrifice mattered. The lesson becomes not simply historical, but civic and moral.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The Founding Voices Program is \u201cimmersive and interactive,\u201d according to FSU. FSU officials cited a recent <a href=\"https:\/\/talkerresearch.com\/research-reveals-over-half-of-americans-dont-know-what-memorial-day-is\/\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener noreferrer nofollow\">Talker Research poll<\/a> that tapped 2,000 Americans in explaining the need to enhance civics education and emphasize meanings, morals and significance of Memorial Day.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/ncf.edu\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener external noreferrer nofollow\" data-wpel-link=\"external\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-722105 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/Sunburn_FloridaPoliticsWebsite_728x905186-scaled-e1740018793631.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"728\" height=\"90\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The survey found only 48% of Americans knew that Memorial Day is designed to honor military personnel who were killed in the service of the country. And the numbers are worse among younger Americans. Only 27% of Generation Z respondents and only 38% of millennials knew the holiday was set aside to honor those fallen personnel.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">By design, FSU IGC leaders acknowledge that they want the institute to become \u201cthe nation\u2019s premier policy institute (in)\u2026 constitutional and educational liberty through bold research and transformative teaching.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FSU educators are concerned that a recent poll shows only 48% of Americans know why Memorial Day was&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":283765,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[120590,1422,120591,3603,120592,93637,120593,75415,12037,95031,120594,120595,232,234,233],"class_list":["post-283764","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tallahassee","tag-civics-awareness","tag-florida-state-university","tag-founding-voices-program","tag-fsu","tag-igc","tag-institute-for-governance-and-civics","tag-joshua-chamberlain","tag-memorial-day","tag-middle-school","tag-political-science","tag-ryan-owens","tag-talker-research-poll","tag-tallahassee","tag-tallahassee-headlines","tag-tallahassee-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283764","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=283764"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283764\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/283765"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=283764"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=283764"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=283764"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}