by Alexander Heffner

Civic illiteracy is threatening Pennsylvania, one failed public policy and disengaged citizen at a time. This picture of the Keystone State comes from a wealth of troubling metrics recently collected to measure the state's level of civic participation.

Last month at the National Constitution Center, the Pennsylvania Civic Health Index revealed that the state's population was plagued by apathy, a dearth of civic activity from volunteerism to voting to community service. In the state where the Liberty Bell rests - where America's framers drafted and ratified the longest-standing constitution in the world - the report is simply embarrassing.

According to the index, only 3.5 percent of citizens have participated in a political march, rally, protest, or demonstration; 7.3 percent have worked with neighbors to resolve a community problem; 8.8 percent have talked politics at a meeting, and 11.2 percent have contacted or visited a national or local public official. Only 27.6 percent volunteered in 2009.

Then there is electoral apathy. In 2008, while record numbers of citizens turned out to vote elsewhere, Pennsylvania's voter registration and turnout dropped, including among residents ages 18 to 29, the index reports.

The City of Brotherly Love, where concerned neighbors once congregated in town halls to shape policy, is no longer instilling civic values, virtues, or anything of the kind. David Eisner, the president of the Constitution Center, said that "across the board, our nation is in a civic recession." Eisner, alongside Gov. Rendell at the unveiling of the health index, argued that education was the greatest hope for change.

It is also our greatest hope to revive sound state policy that doesn't create deficits or inefficient programs, and that truly works for the people.

This must be the year of civic reengagement. It is time for Pennsylvania, our Constitution's birthplace, to mandate Civics 101, creating a yearlong civics course that students must complete to graduate from high school. (To truly raise the stakes, Pennsylvania might even make voter registration hinge upon completion of such a course.)

Such a program would require students to learn how their government ticks (including essential constitutional theories), follow current events in the state and beyond, and engage in community activities. These could vary from constructing inner-city Philly organic greenhouses to volunteering at a Red Cross chapter or Veterans Affairs hospital to developing investigative feature stories about community hardships. A series, for example, could focus on the impact of the recession on neighbors.

The curriculum would require students to examine important documents in American life, from Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address to the Supreme Court ruling in Brown v. Board of Education. Daily reading of The Inquirer and an international newspaper would be required. Vibrant classroom discussion would follow such assignments.

According to a Zogby poll conducted last month, more than 70 percent of Americans believe civics is not adequately emphasized in their children's education.

This civic inattentiveness and lack of interest is so dire that Civics 101 might be our state's (and the nation's) only solution. Too many youths are in the grip of a consumer culture centered on individual rather than collective interests. Pennsylvanians should revive the spirit of service that has defined their history, leading as a beacon of civic literacy for the next decade.

Alexander Heffner is a junior at Harvard University concentrating in history and director of a civic and journalism education initiative at www.scoopseminar.org