By: Dr. Rob Hornberger
A new Missouri Senate bill requires “Any student entering a public institution of higher education for the first time after July 2019 who is pursuing an associate’s or bachelor’s degree from such institution shall successfully pass an examination on the provisions and principles of American civics with a score of seventy percent or greater as a condition of graduation from such institution.”
Missouri State University is currently working on a plan to ensure compliance regarding this bill. Dr. Rob Hornberger, Assistant Vice President for Enrollment Management and Services/Registrar, explains the process of how Missouri State plans to administer the test, have it checked as a graduation requirement, and display it on student transcripts. According to Hornberger, the test will be “developed by our Political Science and History departments and administered to students via our learning management system (Blackboard).”
Beginning in fall 2019, Hornberger explains, “We will run a script to find all undergraduate degree-seeking students who started fall 2019 or later and have not yet taken the exam and add them to this class. Then we will use the announcements feature of Blackboard to send notifications to these students to take the exam. Students will see this ‘course’ in their list of Blackboard courses. They can select it and take the exam at any point.”
The next step in the process will involve adding a test score to a student’s record in Missouri State’s student information system (Banner). Hornberger continues, “On Banner’s SOATEST form, the script will record a Completed (Y or N), Score (actual score on the exam), and Pass/Not Pass value.” Transcripts from sending institutions of transfer students will be evaluated and, if students have completed the exam, a Pass score will be added to SOATEST.”
As the Civics Exam will be a requirement for graduation, Hornberger explains, “our degree audit system (Degree Works) will be programmed to have this as a graduation requirement for bachelor degree-seeking students who started fall 2019 or later and look for the “Pass” value in SOATEST. If so it will display that the civics exam degree requirement is met.”
Transcripts will show that students have passed the Civics Exam in the section that “displays degrees, notes, events, etc.” instead of being attached to a particular semester along with other courses.
Missouri State is working diligently to guarantee that not only is the university in compliance with the requirement but is a leader among state institutions. Dr. Hornberger offers, “I’m…hopeful this sets a standard for all four-year public universities in Missouri regarding how we implement this new State requirement.”