Effective July 1, 2023, HB 1273 amended the School Code and, "provides that Constitution Day (September 17) shall also be a commemorative holiday. Effective July 1, 2023."

The bill's Senate sponsor, State Sen. Erica Harriss (R-Edwardsville) explained to WCIA, "The Constitution was the fundamental document,” Harriss said. “It seems very important that our students would be familiar with that to be able to build on the rest of their civics education.”

Illinois' move supports federal law that designates September 17 as Constitution Day and Citizenship Day (also referred to as Constitution Day). To commemorate the September 17, 1787 signing of the U.S. Constitution, most years Constitution Day will be celebrated on September 17. If September 17 falls on a Saturday, Sunday, or holiday, your school may celebrate Constitution Day during the preceding or following week.

If you are looking for ways to celebrate Constitution Day in your school or classroom, here are some places to start:

• The Bill of Rights Institute is hosting Constitution Day Live! a hybrid streaming program that features direct live engagement with educators and students coupled with pre-recorded segments and published in-class materials to promote the study of the Constitution and Constitutional issues on Constitution Day.
• Watch this webinar recorded by Street Law concerning their resources for Constitution Day. Included are:
• Tips on using LegalTimelines.org most effectively in the classroom on Constitution Day.
• An overview of what the Rule of Law for All curriculum covers and how it relates to the Constitution.
• Additional Street Law resources, methods, and strategies to enhance Constitution Day instruction.
• Explore iCivics and the Center for Civic education video series, Constitution EXPLAINED to teach your students about the text, history, and relevance of the U.S. Constitution.
• You can also peruse the resource pages created by the:
• National Constitution Center
• National Archives
• Library of Congress
• Department of Education

The Barat Foundation is excited to share that they are offering every Middle School free access to the online Our American Voice ® (OAV) Civics curriculum.

Please visit the site, register, and view the lessons. 

This OAV initative is supported by the Robert R. McCormick Foundation and a recent grant from the State of Illinois State Senate under the leadership of State Senator Don Harmon.

The OAV Civics Curriculum aligns with the Illinois middle school civics requirements and recommendations from numerous national organizations for effective civic education. The OAV Middle School Civics Curriculum builds the civic knowledge, skills, and dispositions required for good citizenship of middle school students (grades 5-8). OAV also empowers teachers to develop those citizens of tomorrow.

The Museum of Tolerance (MOT) and Mobile Museum of Tolerance (MMOT) are offering a dynamic in-person workshop that engages students in critical thinking for decoding and rejecting online hate. This is an online safety curriculum aligned with Illinois Media Literacy standards.

During this workshop, students will apply the Center for Media Literacy’s 5 Key Questions to diverse real life examples compiled by the Simon Wiesenthal Center (SWC)’s Research Department. Students are challenged to interpret hateful messages and their impact. The workshop ends using an action planning worksheet, which all students take home for ongoing use. This workshop provides an opportunity to begin and maintain critical conversations between adults and students regarding online safety and speaking.

The workshop is approximately 50 minutes and is delivered by one of MOT's trained facilitators. 

To register your interest, click here!

The United States Courts of Appeals along with the United States District Courts in the Seventh and Eight Circuits are holding their 4th Annual Bill of Rights Day art & essay contest. The contest is now live and better than ever!

Students in grades 5-12 in the Seventh and Eighth circuits; Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wisconsin, are encouraged to submit art and essays on the importance of the Bill of Rights. Students can win up to $500, and teachers can win prizes, too.

The contest deadline is October 29, 2023. For contest prompts, complete rules, and a link to the online submission form, please visit https://judiciallearningcenter.org/bill-of-rights-day/.

Teachers, if you would like to submit entries on behalf of your entire class, please contact EducationTeam@ca8.uscourts.gov.

The Constitutional Democracy Project in partnership with the American Bar Association’s Division for Public Education would like to invite you to submit a proposal for the 2023 Annual Professional Development Conference for Teachers in Civics, Law, and Government, which will be held on October 27, 2023 at the Conviser Law Center, 565 W. Adams Street in Chicago.

This year’s conference will focus on the theme of “Holding Our Democracy Accountable.” Democracy works best when the citizens of a nation hold their government accountable. But how do we, as citizens, ensure that our government exercises its power responsibly and in the best interest of the people? How do we contribute to ensuring transparency, fairness, and accountability in a democratic system?

Presentations should be relevant, address at least one or more best practices as outlined in the IL Civics Course requirement, encourage opportunities for learner participation, and/or demonstrate application to the work of the audience. Extra consideration will be given to proposals that address the theme of the conference, “Holding Our Democracy Accountable.”

Sessions are 55 minutes long. Proposals are due no later than October 6.

For more information, contact Dee Runaas, Project Director.

To submit a proposal, click here.

Mark your calendar for a free webinar for Private i History Detectives on September 21! We’ll investigate whether the delegates at the Constitutional Convention did what they were supposed to do, and we’ll explore how to make the Constitution and civic engagement accessible to your young learners. 

During this webinar, Natacha Scott, iCivics’ Director of Educator Engagement, and Kelly Brown and Laurie Risler, the Private i History Detectives curriculum writers, will review how to use Private i History Detectives, our free inquiry-based history and civics curriculum for K–5, in your classroom. 

You can anticipate exploring:  

• How to use the curriculum to engage your students as history detectives
• Fun, age-appropriate strategies and ready-made activities for teaching historical thinking, key historical events, civics, geography, citizenship, and more
• The various components of our inquiry-based lessons 
• How to help young learners build content knowledge and critical thinking skills

Build your knowledge and toolkit to teach civics, social studies, and history by joining us for this free PD webinar.

Free Webinar

September 21, 2023 | 6:00–7:00 p.m. CT

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llinois Holocaust Museum’s literature-based teaching trunk program provides K–12 educators with a wide array of resources for classrooms with units on character education, human rights, the Holocaust, and/or genocide.

IHMEC ships across the country free of charge. Don't miss this wonderful opportunity!

Find Out More!

When news events become a topic of discussion in the classroom, it’s useful to have a go-to set of adaptable strategies that allow you to easily integrate these discussions into your teaching routine.

Facing History’s Current Events Toolkit is full of flexible activities that foster respectful conversation so that you and your students have an opportunity to process the news that matters to your classroom community. 

The National Humanities Center has announced its Humanities in Class webinar schedule for 2023-24. Each webinar is a live, interactive professional conversation led by a scholarly expert addressing a compelling topic through the lens of the humanities. Appropriate for educators at all levels, from K-12 to collegiate classrooms, each session features research, source documents, and readings to support the discussion. 

Participants receive a certificate of completion to document five hours of professional development to meet continuing education requirements.

All webinars are free. Register today!

2023–24 webinar topics include:

• The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together
• Media History and Freedom of Speech
• Hip Hop and Youth Culture as Pedagogy
• Indigenous Center, European Other: Teaching Indigenous Histories of the Americas
• Civic Engagement 101: Connecting Your Classroom to the Community
• How Will Students Learn to Write Now That We Have ChatGPT?
• Teaching Chaucer
• Exploring Women and Girls of African-Descent in Twentieth and Twenty-First Century Speculative Fiction
• F.B. Eyes on Langston Hughes and Martin Luther King, Jr.
• What The Fact?!: Finding the Truth in All the Noise

View the full webinar schedule.

Constitutional Rights Foundation (soon to be Teach Democracy) is excited to launch new Civic Action Project (CAP) curriculum, featuring:

• New lessons that include multimedia elements.
• New Project Planners that promote critical thinking and informed action. 
• Civic Action Toolkit with dozens of examples of how students can impact a problem or concern in their community. 

The CAP curriculum is web-based, standards-aligned, and FREE! CAP is excellent for satisfying the Illinois Civics service-learning requirement for middle and high school.

Visit the CAP website to learn more, and inspire your students to be active and engaged members of our democracy! 

It’s one thing to implement a media project in your classroom. It’s another to assess it. In KQED's self-paced course, teachers will learn how to apply assessment best practices and incorporate new media-specific techniques, such as formative and summative assessment formats for various media projects. Participants will explore ways to set up student self-reflection, create a rubric, and more. 



Click here to find out more!

The 2024 MyImpact Challenge is now open for submissions!  The Bill of Rights Institute launched their national civic engagement contest on September 11, the National Day of Service, to continue the legacy of 9/11/2001.

The My Impact Challenge website contains the contest guidelines and a six-lesson curriculum that helps students design a locally targeted service project. 

Students ages 13-19 can submit Community Service Projects for a Change to win up to $10,000. A complete submission contains a project report, a principles essay, and photo or video documentation.  

The contest submission deadline is May 20, 2024. 

With its historic passage in April of 2021, the Teaching Equitable Asian American Community History (T.E.A.A.C.H.) Act amended Illinois School Code, ensuring every public elementary and high school student in Illinois learns about the contributions of Asian Americans to the economic, cultural, social, and political development of the United States.

The Illinois Civics Hub is partnering with Asian Americans Advancing Justice to offer FREE PD hours to K-12 educators looking to deepen their own understanding of Asian American Pacific Islander (AAPI) history, and to gain classroom resources to support cross-cultural education for all students in Illinois, aligned with the revised social science standards.

Educators can click the links below to choose from the following webinar opportunities:

Teaching About the Asian American Experience: A Primer for Grades K-5

• September 26 from 4:30-6:30 p.m.(online)
• October 16 from 4:30-6:30 p.m.(online)
• November 4 from 9:00-11:00 a.m.(online)
• December 4 from 4:30-6:30 p.m.(online)

Teaching About the Asian American Experience: A Primer for Grades 6-12

• September 27 from 4:30-6:30 p.m. (online)
• October 22 from 9 to 11:00 a.m. (online)
• November 14 from 4:30-6:30 p.m. (online)

Be sure to visit the Asian Americans Advancing Justice site for more resources to implement the T.E.A.A.C.H. Act.

Researchers at the University of Oregon are seeking teachers to participate in a study that aims to understand how school district staff locate, review, and make decisions to adopt civics programs (like those focused on government, voting, community service) to use in their school, district, or classroom. 

Teachers will earn a $50 gift card for participating in a 30-to-60-minute phone or zoom interview that asks a series of questions about your role in locating, reviewing, and selecting civics programming for your school district. Your participation will help the creation of a tool that will help other school districts and educators locate, select, and feel confident in implementing high quality civics programs.

Contact Dr. Mariah Kornbluh at the University of Oregon for more information.  

The Illinois Civics Hub has partnered with the Lou Frey Institute at the University of Central Florida to provide educators the opportunity to earn their microcredentials in the proven practices of civic education embedded in the middle and high school civics course requirements in Illinois. Courses include:

• Current and Controversial Issue Discussions—Learn from academic experts Dr. Diana Hess & Dr. Paula McAvoy as you explore the purpose, role, and function of discussion strategies as pedagogical tools to equip young people to be engaged citizens. This course will enhance the practice of educators with strategies and resources to create a classroom climate in which there are equitable opportunities for ALL students to engage in dialogue about essential questions across the curriculum.

• Simulations of Democratic Processes—Learn from academic experts Dr. Walter Parker & Dr. Jane Lo as you explore how democratic processes and procedures occur as part of the regular functioning of government, in each of the three branches of government, and at each level of government. This course will guide you through the purpose, planning, and implementation of three simulations: town hall meetings, legislative hearings, and moot courts.

• Informed Action through Service Learning—Learn from academic experts Dr. Joseph Kahne and Jessica Marshall as you explore the purpose, role, and function of informed action through service learning as a pedagogical tool to equip young people with the knowledge, skills, and dispositions to be active members of their community. In this course, you will interact with strategies and tools you can use in your classroom to support student-centered informed action through service learning.

• NEW: Constitutional Democracy as Content and Practice—Learn from academic experts Dr. Kei Kawashima-Ginsberg, Dr. Shawn P. Healy, and Dr. Bonnie Laughlin Schultz as you explore how the Educating for American Democracy Roadmap can help teach constitutional democracy as both content and practice across disciplines K-12.

Registration information is available on the Guardians of Democracy homepage. Those who successfully complete the 5-week online course will earn a Bronze Certified Guardian of Democracy Educator badge via Badgr and the University of Central Florida Center for Distributive Learning.

Participants can earn 15 PD hours through the DuPage Regional Office of Education for an additional fee.

There are three strands of courses for each proven practice of civics education. Graduate credit is available through the University of St. Francis for completing all three courses. For more information, please visit the Guardians of Democracy homepage.