The Intercollegiate Studies Institute polled 2500 people including 164 elected officials. 74% of Elected officials, and 71% of the general population failed the test. You can read the story here. http://www.wnd.com/?pageId=251081
The test, 33 questions related to the Constitution, is here;
http://www.americancivicliteracy.org/resources/quiz.aspx You can also link to it at the bottom of the story. Some of the questions relate more to history, but are still relevant to the Constitution. Below is how I did. It will give you the answers to the questions you miss. I left that part out so that anyone who is interested in taking it can't cheat. 😉
You answered 25 out of 33 correctly — 75.76 %
Average score for this quiz during January: 74.9%
You can take the quiz as often as you like, however, your score will only count once toward the monthly average.
If you have any comments or questions about the quiz, please email americancivicliteracy@isi.org.
Edit: Below is the results, so far, for those that have taken it at the forum site I found it on:
90% to 100% 13.8% (64)
80% to 89% 28.7% (133)
70% to 79% 33.0% (153)
60% to 69% 17.1% (79)
50% to 59% 4.3% (20)
Less than 50% 3.0% (14)
Blank (View Results) (59)
Non-Blank Votes: 463
Mine:
You answered 31 out of 33 correctly — 93.94 %
"You [meaning me] answered 33 out of 33 correctly — 100.00 %"
That's a little scary that any educated adult citizen of the US would miss more than perhaps one question on that test.
Edit: Okay, I revise the threshold of scariness down to missing three questions.
You answered 30 out of 33 correctly — 90.91 %
Not bad...
31/33
You answered 31 out of 33 correctly — 93.94 %
> "You [meaning me] answered 33 out of 33 correctly — 100.00 %"
>
> That's a little scary that any educated adult citizen of the US would miss more than perhaps one question on that test.
>
> Edit: Okay, I revise the threshold of scariness down to missing three questions.
LOL! 😀 Man, you must be one more scaredy cat out of touch with the real world type dude. I figured before I posted this that you'd probably be the first to report a 'perfect' score. Hmmmmm, missing 8 as I did, well, I guess I must REALLY come across as being REALLY stupid. Maybe even, GASP!, unpatriotic. But, I didn't google any answers, and I'm not implying that any of my esteemed colleagues here would, and I took all of five minutes to take it. Another thought I had was that with all the overall genius about all things that is posted here that most respondents would report high scores on the test, yet I don't know of any members who hold public office. According to the results of the study to date public officials who have taken the test aren't scoring as well as I did. Maybe more surveyors need to fill this critical gap.
And why haven't you whined about this not being in P&R?:-)
Take care,
Ed
Here are the latest results from a real world non genius saturated forum that I found this test on;
90% to 100% 13.7% (88)
80% to 89% 29.9% (192)
70% to 79% 32.2% (207)
60% to 69% 16.8% (108)
50% to 59% 4.5% (29)
Less than 50% 2.8% (18)
Blank (View Results) (86)
Non-Blank Votes: 642
Notice the number of 'Non-Blank' replies. This thread was started there at 10:21 this morning. How many members does Beer Leg have now?
"...and your wise men don't know how it feels,
to be thick, as a brick."
(Attribute, somebody associated with Jethro Tull)
Take care,
Ed
>Man, you must be one more scaredy cat out of touch with the real world type dude.
Well, when I went to school, all of that with only a couple of exceptions was covered in civics classes. Of course, civics was part of the curriculum in junior high and high school in the late 1960's in Texas and it may not have been elsewhere. The questions on that test were mostly high school level or below. Scary that this is considered to be esoteric stuff by otherwise presumably intelligent, educated people. I'm just saying.
>
> Well, when I went to school, all of that with only a couple of exceptions was covered in civics classes. Of course, civics was part of the curriculum in junior high and high school in the late 1960's in Texas and it may not have been elsewhere. The questions on that test were mostly high school level or below. Scary that this is considered to be esoteric stuff by otherwise presumably intelligent, educated people. I'm just saying.
What, you think the same perfunctory civics lessons weren't taught in Georgia junior highs and high schools to me and others in the late 1960s? I learned a great many of those 'lessons' and over the years have forgotten a great many of them. Many of them have turned out to be total BS anyway. All the more reason to forget them. One question on that test, about what the Puritans believed, or something similar, would be something I'd not have EVER bothered to remember. Now, when combined with the fact that public education in this country is tres' crappier now, and especially over the last 3 decades or so, than it was in the 'late 1960s' it's a wonder the average scores on this test are as high as they are. People tend to too easily forget that education and knowledge doesn't necessarily equate to intelligence.
Just sayin, as well.:-)
Take care,
Ed
You answered 33 out of 33 correctly — 100.00 %
Average score for this quiz during January: 75.1%
I made educated guesses on a couple of them. That is a test with an agenda. It's more of a history test than a constitution test.
> What, you think the same perfunctory civics lessons weren't taught in Georgia junior highs and high schools to me and others in the late 1960s? I learned a great many of those 'lessons' and over the years have forgotten a great many of them.
Sold to the man in the Allman Brothers t-shirt at the back of the room!
Dave, I totally see your point...
> You answered 33 out of 33 correctly — 100.00 %
>
> Average score for this quiz during January: 75.1%
>
> I made educated guesses on a couple of them. That is a test with an agenda. It's more of a history test than a constitution test.
I don't know if there's an "agenda", but I went back and looked at it again. Here are some questions that could cause one to say hmmmmmmm....;
2) In 1933 Franklin Delano Roosevelt proposed a series of government programs that became known as:
4) What was the main issue in the debates between Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas in 1858?
8) In 1935 and 1936 the Supreme Court declared that important parts of the New Deal were unconstitutional. President Roosevelt responded by threatening to:
13) Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, and Aquinas would concur that:
14) The Puritans:
A. opposed all wars on moral grounds
B. stressed the sinfulness of all humanity
C. believed in complete religious freedom
D. colonized Utah under the leadership of Brigham Young
E. were Catholic missionaries escaping religious persecuti
(this one is esoteric if ever there was esoteric)
16) In his “I Have a Dream” speech, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.:
17) Sputnik was the name given to the first:
18) Susan B. Anthony was a leader of the movement to
21) Name two countries that were our enemies during World War II.
23) In October 1962 the United States and the Soviet Union came close to war over the issue of Soviet:
26) Business profit is:
27) Free markets typically secure more economic prosperity than government’s centralized planning because:
28) A progressive tax:
And 29 through 33 have nothing to do with the Constitution.
Yikes! I didn't think about this enough when I took it. I was just so proud I passed!
Probably phishing at it's finest.;-)
(btw, Dave, I wasn't the one who scored 100%)
> > What, you think the same perfunctory civics lessons weren't taught in Georgia junior highs and high schools to me and others in the late 1960s? I learned a great many of those 'lessons' and over the years have forgotten a great many of them.
>
> Sold to the man in the Allman Brothers t-shirt at the back of the room!
Are you serious? I've never owned an Allman Brothers t shirt. Haven't been 'hep' on them in 20 years. More into old madtaterfarmer stuff these days. REALLY esoteric grooves.;-) Austin could use a band like this.
Take care,
Ed
Dave, I totally see your point...
I know.
I scored 100%.
I guessed a little on 13 and was pretty sure about the Puritan one.
The last 5 or 6 are basic conservative economic theory which is fine as far as it goes but really the economy is more complex than that. Our government does a lot of things to influence or restrain the free market such as spending, regulation and anti-trust among other things. True we don't have a unified centralized planning effort, we are much more disorganized than that.
It likewise seemed to me that there were several questions that were cherrypicked along certain issues and agendas. And while these things should be taught in school, not all of the questions were in fact based on things taught in high school history or civics class while I was going, decades ago. I answered several based on things I learned after high school and college.
At first I was pleased, then condemned for stupidity, then consoled by my brethren.
84.85% 28 of 33
I answered the one about Sputnik, based on the answers provided, correctly. However, their answer is absolutely incorrect. Just ask the Russians.
I, too, felt the line of questions pushed a specific agenda.
I got 32 out of 33, missed the last one. There is an agenda to any education or test in the way it words test, qustions, what it teaches, how it presents that information.
Did the Russians think it is a telecommunications satellite?
