US officials flunk test of American history, economics, civics US elected officials scored abysmally on a test measuring their civic knowledge, with an average grade of just 44 percent, the group that organized the exam said Thursday.
Ordinary citizens did not fare much better, scoring just 49 percent correct on the 33 exam questions compiled by the Intercollegiate Studies Institute (ISI).
"It is disturbing enough that the general public failed ISI's civic literacy test, but when you consider the even more dismal scores of elected officials, you have to be concerned," said Josiah Bunting, chairman of the National Civic Literacy Board at ISI.
"How can political leaders make informed decisions if they don't understand the American experience?" he added.
The exam questions covered American history, the workings of the US government and economics.
Among the questions asked of some 2,500 people who were randomly selected to take the test, including "self-identified elected officials," was one which asked respondents to "name two countries that we
re our enemies during World War II."I took the challenge and missed a few of the obscure ones, but 84.5% isn't bad. But maybe this is all about a new country called Ameria. See the headline from Yahoo.
Indeed, how can political leaders make informed decisions if they don't understand the American experience? And how can journalists tell us anything if they do not know how to spell?
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