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From: "Young, Meg" <myoung@SMTP.nifl.gov>
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Subject: Citizenship test revision
Date: 18 Nov 1996 10:21:12 -0500
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The article below, from yesterday's Washington Post, shares that the
INS is interested in revising the citizenship test. More importantly,
they are taking suggestions!
Suggestions may be sent to: Citizenship USA, 425 I St. NW, Washington,
D.C. 20536.
*****************************************************
A Look At . . . The U.S. Citizenship Test: Learning, And Earning,
Their Stripes
The 100 Questions That Open the Door to America
By William Booth
Sunday, November 17 1996; Page C03
The Washington Post
A RECORD NUMBER of immigrants, more than 1 million, will become U.S.
citizens this year.
To do so, they must pay $95 and meet certain standards: They need to
have lived in the country for five years (or three, if they are
married to a U.S. citizen), be of good moral character (meaning no
felony convictions), be of sound mind (a judgment call) and speak and
understand English (unless they are elderly or disabled). Finally,
they must pass what is generally referred to, in many different
languages, as the Test -- a quiz on the basics of U.S. history and
government. For many, the Test looms large in their minds, the
ultimate Double Jeopardy.
Some new citizens have spoken to me of nightmares, before and even
after the Test, in which a grand inquisitor from the Immigration and
Naturalization Service (INS) demands "Who wrote The Star-Spangled
Banner?" And they freeze, like stunned gerbils. They absolutely know
that Woody Guthrie wrote The Star-Spangled . . . .
BZZZZT! Wrong. Francis Scott Key is the correct answer. Go to the back
of the line, or so the nightmare goes.
INS officials, of course, wince when they hear this kind of thing.
They don't intend the nightmare to be real. For one thing, there is no
official Test. It is up to each of the 33 district offices, and
individual INS interviewers, to determine whether the aspiring
American knows enough about the governing principles and history of
the United States. Most district offices give applicants a list of 100
sample questions -- and the answers -- which the INS was happy to let
us publish here (the answers are on Page C4).
When it comes time for their interview, said Jack Bolger, head of
INS's "Citizenship USA" program in Florida, applicants typically will
be asked about a dozen questions -- sometimes more, sometimes fewer.
The would-be citizen can make a couple of mistakes, but cannot be
completely clueless, Bolger said. The whole process takes about 10
minutes.
David Rosenberg, director of program initiatives at INS headquarters
in Washington, knows the Test produces "a lot of unfounded anxiety,
which we are trying to overcome . . . . It's not an impossible or
difficult thing. We're not trying to trick people. On the other hand,
you can't come in and grunt two words and we rubber stamp you."
So how tough are the questions?
More than a few are so easy as to be almost meaningless, such as "What
are the colors of our flag?" That's a pitch anyone should be able to
hit.
There are a few real puzzlers, though. To wit: "How many changes or
amendments are there to the Constitution?" I confess that the correct
answer (27) was not on the tip of my tongue.
Many are almost like Zen koans, such as "What is Congress?" Hmmmm. A
lot of U.S. citizens might have trouble answering that one. Others
suggest inappropriate responses. "What special group advises the
President?" The answer is not "pollsters." It is, of course, "the
Cabinet."
Others are ambiguous; even INS officials are not sure that "What is
the most important right granted to United States citizens?" has just
one correct answer (INS answer: "the right to vote"). What about
freedom of speech? Religion?
You may feel different when you read the list, but I found a few too
many of the sample questions fixated on the Pilgrims.
I asked a popular critic of American history instruction what he
thought.
"The questions are typical of the ones you would find at the end of
the chapters in a typical high school American history textbook," says
James Loewen, a University of Vermont sociology professor and author
of "Lies My Teacher Told Me."
"There's kind of an emphasis on factoids, which are smaller than
facts, the stuff that no one can remember and probably shouldn't, such
as what state was the 49th, Alaska or Hawaii?" Loewen says.
Loewen points to the question, "Who helped the Pilgrims?" (INS answer:
the American Indians.) "It asks for a simple rote response, but
lurking behind the question is a context, a whole missing story," the
professor said. The American Indians did help the Pilgrims, but they
were not "haplessly hospitable, as our origin myths have it," Loewen
explains. The Indians who assisted the Pilgrims did so for specific
reasons: They wanted a strategic alliance, a buffer against other
tribes. They also were less likely to be inhospitable because a plague
of uncertain origin wiped out many Indians a few years before the
Pilgrims arrived -- a disease that Loewen and others suspect was
bubonic plague, brought to the New World by British fishermen.
Well, that's very thorough, professor. But this is a citizenship test,
not a master's thesis.
John Fonte, a visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute in
Washington, says he has no problem with the nuts-and-bolts questions
about government, but he is disappointed that the INS does not ask
more "substantial" questions about the meaning of being an American.
He suggests that "What is the White House?" does not really get to the
meat of our experiment in democracy.
Touche. INS officials believe there's room for improvement, and so
they are developing a new, standardized test. "We would invite readers
to give us ideas on this," said Rosenberg of the INS, who asks that
ideas be mailed to the following address and not left on his home
answering machine.
Suggestions may be sent to: Citizenship USA, 425 I St. NW, Washington,
D.C. 20536.
William Booth is The Post bureau chief covering the Southeast United
States, based in Miami.
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