Civic engagement and service learning are common now in American schools, but such programs are normally embedded in hierarchical, rule bound, and inegalitarian institutions. Even while called to service outside, most students are excluded from meaningfully shaping the social environment inside their school. Based on a three-year research study done with the Kettering Foundation, this paper examines schools embracing a different model. Democratic schools involve students in curriculum design, teaching, and institutional governance. Historically linked to progressive education reforms and to student power efforts in the 1960s, contemporary democratic innovators in mainstream K-12 education are motivated by three factors seen as under threat: professional identity, academic engagement, and genuine civic education. Drawing on interviews with teachers and principals working in democratic schools across different regions, this paper describes barriers to growth as well as available resources for sustaining long-term reform.
