Peter Levine

Oxford University, Balliol College: doctorate in philosophy (1992)

Yale University: B.A. in philosophy (1989)

Awards and Honors

Rhodes Scholarship (1988)

Marshall Scholarship (1988, declined)

Alpheus Henry Snow Prize, for the "senior who, through the combination of intellectual achievement, character, and personality, shall be adjudged by the faculty to have done the most for Yale" (1989)

Summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, distinction in the major (1989)

Jacob Cooper Prize for the best essay in ancient philosophy by a Yale graduate or undergraduate student (1986; again in 1988)

Andrew White Prize in European History at Yale (1987)

E. Francis Riggs Prize at Yale "for demonstrating the best knowledge of general culture" (1986)

Positions

Tufts University: Director of Research and Director of CIRCLE (Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Education), Jonathan M. Tisch College of Citizenship and Public Service (since July 2008)

CIRCLE has published more than 100 fact sheets that provide basic information about community service, voting, consumption of the news, civics courses and other aspects of youth development; published more than 70 working papers that present the results of more intensive and specialized research funded or conducted by CIRCLE; published a free quarterly newsletter; conducted four nationally representative surveys of American youth; conducted and analyzed scores of focus groups; served as reporters' main source on youth civic engagement research; and provided advice, tailored research, or other forms of support to more than 300 organizations.

University of Maryland: Deputy Director of CIRCLE (2001-2005), Director of CIRCLE (2006-2008), Research Scholar, Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy (1993-2008). I was also an affiliate faculty member of the Philosophy Department and a member of the University’s Committee on Philosophy, Politics, and Public Policy.

National Commission on Civic Renewal: Deputy Director (half-time post in 1997 and 1998). The Commission was chaired by Hon. William Bennett and Senator Sam Nunn, and funded by the Pew Charitable Trusts.

Common Cause: Research Associate and registered federal lobbyist (1991-1993)

Rosenthal Fellowship in International Relations, assigned to the U.S. Agency for International Development (1989)

Organizational Leadership

Executive Committee member (2003-present) and Chair (2003-6), Campaign for the Civic Mission of Schools, a coalition comprising about forty groups, including the American Bar Association, American Catholic Education Association, American Federation of Teachers, American Political Science Association, Center for Civic Education, Constitutional Rights Foundation, National Council for the Social Studies, and the National Education Association. The National Advisory Council is co-chaired by Justice Sandra Day O'Connor and Rep. Lee Hamilton.

Founding member and member of the Steering Committee of the Deliberative Democracy Consortium

Board of Directors and Program Committee Chair, Streetlaw, Inc. (elected 2004)

Board of Directors, AmericaSPEAKS (appointed in June 2006)

Trustee, Newspaper Association of America Foundation (May 2007-March 2009)

Steering Committee, November Fifth Coalition (2007-)

Director, Charles F. Kettering Foundation (elected December 2004)

Director, Paul J. Aicher Foundation, whose primary project is the organization Everyday Democracy (elected 2009)

National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP) Civics Standing Committee and NAEP Background Variables Committee (since 2008)

Co-founder, National Alliance for Civic Education (NACE); member of Research Task Force; responsible for the website at www.cived.net

Other advisory boards: Research & Assessment Committee, Learn & Serve Regional Higher Education Consortium; America's Promise Research Council; Mobilize.org Advisory Board; American Bar Association Standing Committee on Public Education Advisory Commission; Maryland Task Force on Civic Literacy (gubernatorial appointment); The Democracy Imperative (University of New Hampshire); Obama Campaign Education Policy Committee (March 2007-November 2008) and Urban Policy Committee (May 2008-November 2008)

Books

As sole author

We are the Ones We Have Been Waiting For: The Philosophy and Practice of Civic Renewal: completed manuscript

Reforming the Humanities: Literature and Ethics from Dante through Modern Times (Palgrave Macmillan, 2009)

The Future of Democracy: Developing the Next Generation of American Citizens (Tufts University Press, 2007)

The New Progressive Era: Toward a Fair and Deliberative Democracy (Rowman & Littlefield, 2000)

Living Without Philosophy: On Narrative, Rhetoric, and Morality (Albany: SUNY Press, 1998)

Something to Hide, a novel (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1996)

Nietzsche and the Modern Crisis of the Humanities (Albany: SUNY Press, 1995)

Entropy, a continuous, formal, narrative poem of 2,900 lines. A finalist for the 1999 Bright Hill Press Poetry competition and one of 25 semifinalists (out of more than 700 entries) to the Nicholas Roerich Poetry Prize in 2000

Co-edited volumes

(With James Youniss) Engaging Young People in Civic Life (Vanderbilt University Press, 2009)

(With John Gastil), The Deliberative Democracy Handbook: Strategies for Effective Civic Engagement in the Twenty-First Century (Jossey-Bass, 2005)

Other Publications: 1. Politics and Civil Society

"Should We Teach Patriotism? in Current Controversies: Patriotism (Greenhaven, in press)

"What Do We Know about Civic Engagement?" Liberal Education (in press)

(With Barry Checkoway and Richard Guarasci), "Reuniting the 'Often Neglected' Aims of Liberal Education," in Don Harward, ed., Transforming Undergraduate Education: Theory that Compels and Practices that Succeed

"Seeing like a Citizen: The Contributions of Elinor Ostrom to 'Civic Studies,'" The Good Society (forthcoming)

"A Policy Approach for the Federal Government," chapter in David Feith (ed.),Teaching America: The Case for Civic Education (Rowman & Littlefield, in press)

"Public Engagement and Community Information Needs: A Strategy Paper" (Aspen Institute, forthcoming)

(with Jonathan F. Zaff, Daniel Hart, Constance A. Flanagan, and James Youniss), "Developing Civic Engagement within a Civic Context," The Handbook of Life-Span Development (John Wiley & Sons, 2010)

"Social Accountability as Public Work," in Sina Odugbemi and Taeku Lee, eds, Accountability through Public Opinion: From Inertia to Public Action (Washington, DC: The World Bank, 2011), pp. 291-306

"Making the Case: The Civic Case for Voluntary Student Groups," Leadership for Student Activities, vol. 39, no. 9 (May 2009), pp. 16-17.

"The Public and its Problems," National Civic Review, centennial edition, vol. 100, no. 1 (April 2011), pp. 42-50

(with Elizabeth Hollander, Kei Kawashima-Ginsberg, Duncan Picard, and Jonathan Zaff), "Assessing the Effects of Institutional Culture on Leadership Education at Tufts University," in Nicholas V. Longo and Cynthia M. Gibson, eds., From Command to Community: A New Approach to Leadership Education in Colleges and Universities (University Press of New England, 2011), pp. 169-87

(with Michael Berson and Kerry Poole), "On Becoming a Legislative Aide: Enhancing Civic Engagement through a Digital Simulation," Action in Teacher Education, vol. 32, no 4 (2011), pp. 70-82.

 (with Ann Higgins d'Alessandro), "The Philosophical Foundations of Civic Education," Philosophy & Public Policy Quarterly, vol. 30, no. 3/4 (Summer/Fall 2010), pp. 21-7 (pdf)

"Teaching and Learning Civility," in Nancy L. Thomas (ed.), "Educating for Deliberative Democracy," New Directions for Higher Education, no. 152 (winter 2010), pp. 11-17

"Service-Learning Research: Returning to the Moral Questions," in Trae Stewart and Nicole Webster (eds.), Problematizing Service-Learning, Information Age Publishing (in press), pp. 343-350

(with Nancy Thomas), "Deliberative Democracy and Higher Education: Higher Education's Democratic Mission," in John Saltmarsh and Matthew Hartley, eds., To Serve a Larger Purpose: Engagement for Democracy and the Transformation of Higher Education (Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press, forthcoming 2011).

"Civic Knowledge," in Michael Edwards, ed.., The Oxford Handbook of Civil Society, Oxford University Press (in press).

(with Jonathan Cohen and Terry Pickeral) "The Foundation for Democracy: Promoting Social, Emotional, Ethical,Cognitive Skills and Dispositions in K-12 Schools," Revista Interamerica de Educación para la Democracia, vol. 3, no. 1 (April 2010), pp. 74-94 (PDF)

(with Constance Flanagan), "Youth Civic Engagement During the Transition to Adulthood," in Mary Waters, Gordon Berlin, and Frank Furstenberg (eds.), Transition to Adulthood, (Princeton/Brookings: The Future of Children), vol. 20, no. 1, Spring 2010, pp. 159-180.

(with John M. Bridgeland), "Civic Health in Hard Times," Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity, September 28, 2009

(with Ann Higgins-D'Alessandro), "Youth Civic Engagement: Normative Issues," chapter in Handbook of Research on Civic Engagement in Youth, edited by Lonnie Sherrod, Judith Torney-Purta, and Constance A. Flanagan (John Wiley & Sons, 2010).

 "The Civic Opportunity Gap," Educational Leadership, vol. 66, no. 8 (May 2009), pp. 20-25.

"Civic Engagement for All: A Conversation with Peter Levine," Northwest Education, vol. 14, no. 2 (Winter 2009), pp. 12-13

(with Mark Hugo Lopez, Kenneth Dautrich, and David Yalof), "Schools, Education Policy and the Future of the First Amendment, Political Communication, vol. 26, no. 1, January-March 2009

(with Constance A. Flanagan and Les Gallay), The Millennial Pendulum: A New Generation of Voters and the Prospects for a Political Realignment, New America Foundation monograph, February 2009

(with Constance A. Flanagan and Richard Settersten), Civic Engagement and the Changing Transition to Adulthood, CIRCLE monograph, January 2009

(with Mark Hugo Lopez and Karlo Barrios Marcelo), Getting Narrower at the Base: The American Curriculum After NCLB, CIRCLE monograph, December, 2008.

"The Case for Service," Philosophy & Public Policy Quarterly, vol. 28, no. 3/4 (summer/fall 2008), pp. 2-8. Also anthologized in Sylvan Barnet and Hugo Bedau, eds., Current Issues and Enduring Questions (St. Martin's Press, in press).

"America's Civic Health Index," 2008, published by the National Conference on Citizenship in partnership with CIRCLE and the Saguaro Seminar. I was one of several authors and drafted the original text.

(with Matt Leighninger), "Education in a Rapidly Changing Democracy: Strengthening Civic Education for Citizens of All Ages," The School Administrator, October 2008.

(with Robert M. Hollister and Nancy Wilson), "Educating Students to Foster Active Citizenship," PeerReview, vol. 10, no. 2/3, spring/summer 2008

"The Civic Engagement of Young Immigrants: Why Does it Matter?" Applied Developmental Science, volume 12, issue 2 (April 2008), pp. 102 - 104

(with Joseph Kahne), "Voter Turnout Spotlights Educational Need," op-ed, San Francisco Chronicle, March 9, 2008

"The Engaged University: A Tale of Two Generations," in David W. Brown and Deborah Witte, eds., Agent of Democracy: Higher Education and the HEX Journey (Dayton: Kettering Foundation Press, 2008), pp. 11-28

"Education and the Limits of Technocracy," Philosophy & Public Policy Quarterly, vol. 27, no. 3/4 (Summer/Fall 2007), pp. 17-21.

"America's Civic Health Index," 2007, published by the National Conference on Citizenship in partnership with CIRCLE and the Saguaro Seminar. I was one of 12 authors and drafted the original text.

(With Rose Marie Nierras) "Activists' Views of Deliberation," Journal of Public Deliberation, vol. 3, no. 1 (2007), article 4.

"Learning and Democracy: Civic Education," The Kettering Review, vol. 24, no. 3 (Fall 2006), pp. 32-42.

(With John M. Bridgeland) "Civic Priorities," op-ed, The Washington Times, October 4, 2006.

(With Mark Hugo Lopez and others), "The 2006 Civic and Political Health of the Nation" (CIRCLE, based on a nationally representative survey.)

Broken Engagement: America's Civic Engagement Index, A report by the National Conference on Citizenship in association with CIRCLE and the Saguaro Seminar (September 18, 2006): with 12 co-authors, but I was responsible for the data and quantitative analysis.

"Civic Renewal in America," Philosophy and Public Policy Quarterly, vol. 26, no. 1/2 (winter/spring 2006), pp. 2-12.

"Higher Education: Civic Mission & Civic Effects," published by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and CIRCLE in February 2006. This is a consensus report by 22 scholars; I drafted it and revised it to achieve agreement.

"The Civic Mission of Schools: Chief Findings and Next Steps," Knowledge Quest, vol. 34, no. 4 (March/April, 2006), pp. 20-22

"Politics is About Relationships by Harold H. Saunders" (book review), Connections (winter 2006), pp. 26-27

"Youth Voting in 2004: The Myths and the Facts," Wingspread Journal (2005), pp. 3-6

(with Archon Fung and John Gastil) "Future Directions for Public Deliberation," Journal of Public Deliberation: Vol. 1: No. 1, Article 3 (2005). Also appears as Chapter 19 of Gastil and Levine, eds., Handbook of Public Deliberation

(with Mark Hugo Lopez) "What We Should Know about the Effectiveness of Campaigns but Don't," Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, vol. 601 (Sept. 2005), pp. 180-191

"Journalism and Democracy: Does it Matter How Well the Press Covers Iraq?" National Civic Review, vol. 93, no. 3 (Fall 2004), pp. 16-24. (Preprint draft available in .pdf.)

(with David Brown and Robert Kingston) "What is 'Public' About What Academics Do? An Exchange with Robert Kingston and Peter Levine," Higher Education Exchange, 2004 pp. 17-29

"Civic Education" (letter), Education Next, Spring 2004, p. 5

With Mark Hugo Lopez, "Themes Emphasized in Social Studies and Civics Classes: New Evidence," CIRCLE fact sheet, Feb. 2004

(with Cynthia Gibson) "The Path To Consensus: Coalition-Building, Advocacy, Research and Communications Converge for Success in Carnegie/CIRCLE Program," Gold Book (Alliance for Nonprofit Management), February 2004

(with Mark Lopez) "Young People and Political Campaigning on the Internet," CIRCLE fact sheet, January 2004

The Civic Mission of Schools, a report released by Carnegie Corporation of New York and CIRCLE, February 2003. This report was generated by more than 50 author/endorsers as a result of a deliberative process jointly organized and managed by Cynthia Gibson (Carnegie) and me. It was the subject of a syndicated column by David Broder, several unsigned editorials, and numerous news stories. Copies were distributed at a White House Forum on History, Civics, and Service and a Congressional Conference on Civic Education, among other events. More than 30,000 copies have been requested. It is the charter for the Campaign for the Civic Mission of Schools.

"The Idea of an Engaged University," an interview of me by David Brown, Higher Education Exchange, 2003

(co-written with Mark Lopez) "Youth Voter Turnout has Declined, by Any Measure," CIRCLE publication, June 2002

"The Libertarian Critique of Labor Unions," Philosophy & Public Policy Quarterly, Volume 21, Number 4 (Fall 2001)

"The Legitimacy of Labor Unions," The Hofstra Labor and Employment Law Journal, vol. 18, no. 2 (Spring, 2001), pp. 529-573. This is forthcoming in Chinese translation in Global Law Review, a quarterly law journal published by the Institute of Law, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences

"Public Intellectuals and the Influence of Economics," The Higher Education Exchange, 2001

"Lessons from the Brooklyn Museum Controversy,"  Report from the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy, vol. 20, no. 2/3, Summer 2000

"Michael Edwards, Future Positive: International Co-operation in the 21st Century," book review in the IDEA Newsletter, May 2000

"Getting Practical About Deliberative Democracy," The Report from the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy, Fall 1999

"Hopeful Signs in America’s Civic Health," press release and talk given at the Brookings Institution, Washington, June 18, 1999

"The Index of National Civic Health (INCH)," a publication of the National Commission on Civic Renewal (1998). INCH used 22 variables to measure a steep decline in civic health since 1974; the results were widely reported in newspapers.

"America's Civic Condition: A Glance at the Evidence" (with William A. Galston), The Brookings Review, vol. 15, no. 4 (Fall 1997), pp. 23-26. This article is reprinted in E.J. Dionne, Jr., editor, Community Works: The Revival of Civil Society in America (Washington: Brookings Institution Press, 1998), pp. 30-36

"Expert Analysis vs. Public Opinion: The Case of Campaign Finance Reform," The Report from the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy, summer, 1997. This article is anthologized in Social Problems, twenty-seventh edition, edited by Kurt Finsterbusch (McGraw Hill-Dushkin, 1999). A shorter version was published as "Cleaning Up Campaigns," The Birmingham News, "Review & Comment" section, Sunday, August 17, 1997, p. C 1

"Deliberation and Technical Reasoning," a chapter in the Standing with the Public: The Humanities and Democratic Practice, edited by Noelle McAfee and Jim Veninga (Dayton, 1997)

"Public Journalism and Deliberation," Report from the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy, winter, 1994. This article was reprinted in Theodore Lowi, et al., Readings for American Government (Norton, 2000)

"Consultants and American Political Culture," Report from the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy, summer/fall issue, 1994 This article was abridged in The Congressional Quarterly Researcher (1996)

Carol Gould, "Rethinking Democracy," Civic Arts Review (1989)

"Lawrence Cremin, American Education: The Metropolitan Experience" (book review), Civic Arts Review (Ohio Wesleyan University, 1988)

Other Publications: 2. The Internet

Civic Engagement and Community Information: Five Strategies to Revive Civic Communication, A White Paper on the Civic Engagement Recommendations of the Knight Commission on the Information Needs of Communities in a Democracy, Aspen Institute Communications and Society Program and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.

"A Public Voice for Youth: The Audience Problem in Digital Media and Civic Education," in W. Lance Bennett (ed.), Civic Life Online: Learning How Digital Media Can Engage Youth (Cambridge, Mass. and London: MIT Press, 2007), pp. 119-138.

"Collective Action, Civic Engagement, and the Knowledge Commons," chapter in Charlotte Hess and Elinor Ostrom, eds., Understanding Knowledge as a Commons: From Theory to Practice (MIT Press, 2006). This is a revised version of "Youth-Led Research, the Internet, and Civic Engagement" (Digital Library of the Commons, 2004).

"The Problem of Online Misinformation and the Role of Schools," Studies in Media & Information Literacy Education, volume 5, issue 1 (February 2005)

"Creative Use of the New Media" in Lonnie R. Sherrod, Ron Kassimir, and Connie Flanagan (eds.), Youth Activism: An International Encyclopedia (Westport, CT: Greenwood, 2005)

"What is the Role of Government Supported Medical Websites?" Library and Information Science Electronic Journal (LIBRES), vol. 14, issue 2, September 2004

"The Internet and Civil Society," in Verna V. Gehring, ed., The Internet in Public Life (Rowman & Littlefield, 2004), pp. 79-98. This is a revised and updated version of "The Internet and Civil Society," Report from the Institute for Philosophy & Public Policy, vol. 20, no. 4, Fall 2000. This article originated as a talk on the same subject at the University of Tilburg (in the Netherlands). A long version has been published in a volume entitled Ethics and the Internet, edited by Anton Vedder (Oxford: Intersentia, 2001), pp. 177-193. In other versions it has been republished as "The Internet and Civil Society: Dangers and Opportunities" in iMP Magazine (May 2001) and by the Institute for Global Ethics' Public Policy Program. A Hungarian translation by the Information Society Research Institute (Budapest) is forthcoming

"A Movement for the Commons?" The Responsive Community, vol. 13, no. 4 (Fall 2003), pp. 28-39

"Building the E-Commons," The Good Society, vol. 11, no. 3 (2003), pp. 1-9. This is a shorter version of a document entitled ""Building the E-Commons:  A Project of the Democracy Collaborative," which is available from The Democracy Collaborative

"Information Technology and the Social Construction of Information Privacy: Comment," Journal of Accounting and Public Policy, Volume 22, Issue 3, May-June 2003, pages 281-285

"Campaign Web Pages and the Public Interest," in David M. Anderson and Michael Cornfield, eds., The Civic Web: Online Politics and Democratic Values (Rowman & Littlefield, 2002).

"Civic Renewal and the Commons of Cyberspace," The National Civic Review, vol. 90, no. 3 (Fall 2001), pp. 205-211

“Can the Internet Rescue Democracy? Toward an On-line Commons” in Ronald Hayduk and and Kevin Mattson (eds.), Democracy’s Moment: Reforming the American: Political System for the 21st Century (Lanham, MD, Rowman & Littlefield, 2002), pp. 121-137

Other Publications: 3. Moral Philosophy and Literature

"An Ethical Turn for the Humanities," commissioned for a volume entitled Rethinking the Humanities (under consideration by University of Leuven Press)

"Reforming the Humanities: The Ethical Interpretation of Stories," Intellectual News (the review of the International Society for Intellectual History), vol. 16 (2010), pp. 110-112

"Keats Against Dante: The Sonnet on Francesca da Rimini," Keats-Shelley Journal, vol. LI (2002), pp. 76-93

"Why Dante Damned Francesca da Rimini," Philosophy & Literature, vol. 23 (October, 1999), pp. 334-350

"Nietzsche and the Greeks," The International Journal of the Classical Tradition, Spring 1998, pp. 527-529

"Lolita and Aristotle's Ethics," Philosophy and Literature, volume 19, number 1 (April, 1995), pp. 32-47

Five entries for the Norton Dictionary of Modern Thought, edited by Alan Bullock and Stephen Trombley ("Will to Power," "Eternal Return," "Ubermensch," "Last Man," and "Master Morality/Slave Morality")

Keynote/Plenary Speeches

Roundtable to release my paper, "Civic Engagement and Community Information: Five Strategies to Revive Civic Communication," organized by the Aspen Institute Communications and Society Program and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, Chicago, June 10, 2011

"What do College Students Gain from Civic Engagement?": inaugural Civic Engagement & Democracy lecture, Institute for Policy and Civic Engagement, University of Illinois-Chicago, April 21, 2011

"What Matters and What Counts in Education?" a speech sponsored by Facing History And Ourselves, Colorado Legacy Foundation and the Donnell-Kay Foundation, Denver, CO, Feb 15, 2011

"Concepts of Citizenship," opening keynote at the Future of Community Engagement in Higher Education Conference, Boston University, June 25, 2010

"The Obama Administration's Active Citizenship Agenda," University Lecture, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Feb. 19, 2010

"Civic Engagement Research," plenary presentation at the National Symposium on Civic Engagement, Public Work and Psychosocial Well-Being convened by the Bringing Theory to Practice Project and others, Washington, DC, November 5, 2009

"Closing the Civic Opportunity Gap," Lifetime of Learning Conference on Service-Learning, Civic Responsibility, and Higher Education, organized by the Alabama Poverty Project and others, Birmingham, Alabama, September 25, 2009

"Why Obama Won (and What that Says about Democracy and Change in America)", Presidential Plenary Panel, American Sociological Association Annual Conference, San Francisco, August 8, 2009

"Restoring the Civic Mission of Schools in Rhode Island," 2009 Rhode Island Civic Education Summer Institute, Providence, RI, June 25, 2009

"Civic Engagement and Service-Learning Policy for Administrators," Kids Consortium conference, Framingham, MA, Dec. 4, 2008  

"Developing the Next Generation of American Citizens," conference on Service Learning and Civic Education, sponsored by the Iowa Department of Education and others, Des Moines, IA, Nov. 19, 2008

"What's at Stake in Election 2008?" University of Wisconsin-Madison Pyle Center, September 20, 1008

"The Future of Democracy," SUNY Geneseo, September 15, 2008.

Launch of Project ELECT, Educating Learners to Engage in Civics Today, organized by the Hillsborough County School District, Tampa, Florida, January 31, 2008

Lunchtime plenary speech at the 7th International Research Conference on Service-Learning and Community Engagement, Tampa, Florida, Oct. 7, 2007

Release of America's Civic Health Index 2007, National Archives Building, Washington, DC, Oct. 4, 2007

"Youth Civic Engagement," keynote speech at the Cluster VII meeting, Fairfax County (VA) Public Schools, August 3, 2007

"The Civic Mission of Schools after Four Years," keynote address for the 7th Annual R. Freeman Butts Institute on Civic Learning in Teacher Education, Indianapolis, May 18, 2007

"American Grassroots Democracy and Civil Society," keynote for United States State Department International Visitor Leadership Program, Washington, DC, May 3, 2007

"Service-Learning: Why We Do It, and How to Show it Works," Learn & Serve America Grantee Meeting, Hilton Washington Dulles Airport, November 1, 2006.

"Youth Civic Engagement: Why and How?" Summit of National Youth Leadership Organizations, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Washington, DC, September 15, 2006.

"The Civic Mission of Higher Education," keynote at a conference on "TCU and Fort Worth: An Agenda for Collaboration," Texas Christian University, Fort Worth, TX, January 28, 2006.

"Education for Democratic Citizenship," Congreso Internacional de EducaRed III, Madrid, November 4, 2005.

"The Civic Mission of Schools," plenary speech, Professional Association of Georgia Educators (PAGE) summer conference, Gwinnett County, GA, June 25, 2005.

"Six Promising Approaches to Civic Education," keynote address, Second Annual Conference on Democracy Education, Madison, WI, Nov. 30, 2004.

"Civic Mission of Schools," a general session at a conference hosted by the South Carolina Bar Association for the South Carolina Council for the Social Studies, Greenville, SC, Sept. 23, 2004.

"Using Recent Civic Research for State Center Development," speech at the Youth For Justice State Directors Meeting, Sept. 10, 2004.

"The Civic Mission of Schools and a Research Agenda," keynote address, International Conference on Civic Education Research, New Orleans, Nov. 16, 2003

"Service-Learning Research and the Movement for Youth Civic Engagement," keynote address, Third Annual International Service-Learning Research Conference, Salt Lake City, Nov. 7, 2003

"On the Civic Mission of Schools," speech at the Youth For Justice State Directors Meeting, Sept. 12, 2003.

Plenary speech on the subject of "World Wide Web Resources" at the Institute for Community Health Symposium, "Using Technologies That Work" (for about 200 public health professionals), April 26, 2001

Conferences Organized

National Action Civics Conference, Chicago, June 10-11, 2011 (with a group of colleagues)

"Federal Policy and Civic Skills," National Press Club, Washington, DC, April 29, 2010 (with 75 participants, five panels, and 21 speakers)

The Obama Administration's Civic Agenda After Six Months," Tisch College, Tufts University, July 24, 2009, broadcast nationally by C-SPAN

Co-organizer (with James Youniss), "Civic Engagement of Non-College Attending Youth," at the Spencer Foundation, March 25-25, 2009

Co-organizer (with colleagues at Brandeis and Berkeley), Service-Learning Emerging Scholars Work-in-Progress Seminar, College Park, MD, June 14-16, 2007. Second meeting at Brandeis, June 15-17, 2008.

Co-organizer (with Rhode Island Campus Compact and Brandeis University), "Program Evaluation and Community-Based Research Conference," Providence College, June 7, 2007, and "Learn & Serve America Grantees Meeting," Bryant University, June 8, 2007

Co-organizer (with a team of colleagues), Democracy Imperative conference, University of New Hampshire, June 3-6, 2007

Co-organizer (with colleagues from Penn State and Oregon State and the Spencer Foundation) of`"Youth Civic Engagement Research," Spencer Foundation, Chicago, May 29-30, 2007.

Faculty meeting on civic engagement, Oglethorpe University (Atlanta), January 18, 2006

Maryland Civic Literacy Summit, Annapolis, MD, Jan. 4, 2007. Convened by act of the State Assembly and co-organized by CIRCLE and the Maryland State Department of Education

Press conference on the Civic and Political Health of the Nation (followed by a forum for practitioners), National Press Club, Washington, DC, Oct 3, 2006

Co-organizer (with CIRCLE staff), "Immigrant Youth Civic Engagement," a conference at the New School University in New York City, April 25, 2006

Co-organizer (with James Youniss), conference on "Federal Policy for Civic Education." Washington, DC, Feb. 14, 2006

Organizer, CIRCLE conference on "Alternatives to Large, Traditional High Schools: Can They Enhance Students' Preparation for Work, College, and Democracy?" National Press Club, July 6, 2005. Covered by C-SPAN. A "meeting summary" by Carrie Donovan is available here.

Co-organizer (with James Youniss), "Youth and Political Participation," conference at the Life-Cycle Institute, Catholic University, March 18-19, 2005.

Advisory Committee member for the Second Annual Congressional Conference on Civic Education, sponsored by the Majority and Minority Leaders of the US House and Senate and organized by the Alliance for Representative Democracy (2004)

Co-organizer (with Rose Marie Nierras), session on "Advocacy and Deliberation" at the Deliberative Democracy Consortium/LogoLink Partners meeting in Washington, DC, June 11, 2004 (participants were activists from nine northern and southern countries).

Organizer, Youth Voting Research Meeting: convened leading researchers on the mobilization of young voters, plus leading nonpartisan organizations committed to getting out the youth vote--30 in all (Jan. 5, 2004)

Organizing committee for the Researcher & Practitioner Conference of the Deliberative Democracy Consortium, (Oct., 22-24, 2003)

Advisory Committee member for the First Annual Congressional Conference on Civic Education (2003)

Planning committee for the Campaign for the Civic Mission of Schools' preliminary meeting (May 2, 2003) and first Steering Committee retreat (Oct. 2-3, 2003).

Co-organizer and co-moderator (with Cynthia Gibson) of two conferences on "School-Based Civic Education at the k-12 Level," sponsored by CIRCLE, the Carnegie Corporation of New York, and the Corporation for National and Community Service: Oct. 7-8 and December 10, 2002. These conferences convened researchers and practitioners to develop a consensus statement that was ultimately published as The Civic Mission of Schools (2003).

Co-organizer of a conference on "Building the E-Commons," funded by the Ford Foundation's Education, Media, Arts & Culture Program (Washington, DC, June 1-2, 2001). This conference brought together leading experts and stakeholders from politics, public broadcasting, landgrant universities, libraries, and other sectors to begin designing a Public Telecommunications Service."

Organizer of a conference on "Community Learning Styles," sponsored by the Charles Kettering Foundation and the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy (Washington, DC, June 25, 2001). This conference convened a diverse group of civic leaders to consider differences in the ways that their communities learn.

Organizing committee member and session moderator for a conference on "The Expressive Dimension of Governmental Action: Philosophical and Legal Perspectives," University of Maryland School of Law, October 13-14, 2000. (Moderated the panel on Simon Blackburn's paper.)

Other Talks and Presentations

"Making the Connections" (panel on relationships among engaged learning, civic engagement, and psychosocial well-being), Bringing Theory to Practice National Retrieval Conference, Washington, DC, June 13, 2011

The Case for Action Civics (panel), National Action Civics Conference, Chicago, June 10, 2011

"The Information Needs of Communities," BiblioNews conference, MIT, April 7, 2011

"Program Assessment and Metrics," American Enterprise Institute conference on Best Practices in Civic Education Programs, Montpelier, VA, March 23, 2011

"What is the Role of Public Education in Youth Civic Engagement?" (panelist), CUNY Graduate School, New York City, March 17, 2011

"If They Protest, Have We Succeeded?" (panelist), Harvard Graduate School of Education, March 8, 2011

"Civic Engagement and Higher Education in the United States: What Do College Students Gain From Civic Engagement Experiences?" The New School University, New York City, Feb. 9, 2011 (co-presenter with Constance Flanagan, University of Wisconsin)

 National Conference on Citizenship Civic Innovators Forum, "The Foundation of BIG Citizenship: Citizen-Centered Solutions" (moderator) and "An Evolving Relationship: How Philanthropy and the Executive Branch Work Together to Promote Civic Engagement" (panelist), Washington, DC Sept 16, 2010

Invited participant, session leader at the Aspen Institute Forum on Communications and Society (FOCAS), August 16-18, 2010

"Conceptions of Citizenship Online," American Democracy Project Annual Meeting, Providence, RI, June 19, 2010

"Reflections on Labor Disputes and Teachable Moments" (moderator of a plenary session organized because the conference hotel came under union boycott), American Democracy Project Annual Meeting, Providence, RI, June 19, 2010

 "Reforming the Humanities," Centro de Estudos Comparatistas, Faculdade de Letras, University of Lisbon, Portugal, May 20, 2010. 

"Civics: What are We Teaching Our Children and Our Teachers," American Enterprise Institute, Washington, DC, April 23, 2010

Panel discussion: "Civic Identity Development in Adolescence: Theoretical, Empirical, Normative, and Practical Issues," Society for Research on Adolescence, Philadelphia, March 13, 2010

Discussant, panel on "Features of the Learning Environment That Promote Student Voice," Society for Research on Adolescence, Philadelphia, March 12, 2010

"The Civic Mission of Schools," National Council for the Social Studies Annual Conference, Atlanta, GA, Nov. 13, 2009

"Youth in Action," Learn & Serve America Grantees Conference, Arlington, VA, October 15, 2009

"Everybody can Serve," National Conference on Volunteering and Service, San Francisco, June 23, 2009

Presidential Session: "Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Democratic Citizenship, Civic Learning, and Youth Political Participation," American Education Research Association Conference, San Diego, April 15, 2009

(With Constance Flanagan) "Young Adults and Civic Engagement," Future of Children Transition to Adulthood Conference, Princeton University, April 2, 2009

"The Millennial Pendulum," one of two talks at the New America Foundation event on "The Latest Generation: The Unique Outlook of 'Millennials' and How They Will Reshape America," February 18, 2009, broadcast on C-SPAN II.

"Political Participation among Young Voters," Annette Strauss Institute, New Politics Institute, Austin, TX, Nov. 15, 2008

Discussant on Jeffrey Henig's talk about charter schools, Inaugural Conference of the Mosakowski Institute for Public Enterprise, Clark University, Worcester, MA, Nov. 13, 2008

"What Happens on November 5th? Activiting Citizenship (No Matter Who Wins)," Bates College Harwood Center Civic Forum, Sept. 24, 2008

"America's Civic Health Index 2008" National Conference on Citizenship, National Archives, Washington, DC, Sept. 22, 2008

"Measuring the Impact of Youth Voluntary Service" (discussant/presenter), The World Bank, Washington, DC, May 8, 2008

"The Purpose of the University" (panel), Hillel National Summit on the University and the Jewish Community, Washington, March 27, 2008

"Millennials Talk Politics" (panel), NASPA (Student Affairs Professionals) 2008 Annual Conference, Boston, March 10, 2008

"Who Knows Best How to Educate You for Citizenship?" Syracuse University, February 18, 2008

"Building Citizen Competence," World Bank conference on "Generating Genuine Demand with Social Accountability Mechanisms," Paris, November 1, 2007

"Assessing Civic Learning: What Do We Know about What Students Know?" (panel), American Association of Colleges & Universities, Networking for Academic Renewal Conference, Denver, CO, Oct. 19, 2007

"Politics and the Internet: Medium of Maximum Individual Choice," Federal Library and Information Center Committee (FLICC) forum on Social Computing and the Process of Governance, Library of Congress, Washington, DC, Oct. 12, 2007

"Classroom Teaching Practices and Student Civic Engagement--New Evidence from the 2006 Civic and Political Health of the Nation Survey," 7th International Research Conference on Service-Learning and Community Engagement, Tampa, Florida, Oct. 7, 2007

"K-12 Civic Education and Service-Learning - An Introduction to the Current Literature, Resources and Tools," 7th International Research Conference on Service-Learning and Community Engagement, Tampa, Florida, Oct. 6, 2007

"Opportunities for Youth Civic Development," plenary panel (with James Youniss), Learn & Serve America Grantees Meeting, Arlington, VA September 27, 2007

"The Rationale for Service-Learning," PANIM's National Educators' Institute for Jewish Service-Learning, College Park, MD, August 19, 2007

"Issue-Based Civic Education," presentation at the Council for Citizenship Education, Washington, DC, August 2, 2007

"The Future of Democracy" (book launch with a speech), Council for Excellence in Government, Washington, DC, July 26, 2007

"From Periodic Projects to Lasting Solutions: Citizen-Centered Civic Engagement" (panelist), National Conference on Volunteering and Service, Philadelphia, July 16, 2007

"A New Progressive Era?" Labor and Employment Relations Association National Policy Forum, Washington, DC, June 14, 2007

"Democracy in Action," cyzygy '07 (the City Year national convention), St. Anselm's College, Manchester, New Hampshire, June 12, 2007

"America's Civic Health Index," Pennsylvania State University, April 14, 2007

"Research on Civic Engagement," Tufts University, February 9, 2007

"Civic Renewal: Some Issues in Moral Philosophy and Political Practice," Duke University, January 30, 2007

Panels on public policy and on youth voting at the Fourth Annual Congressional Conference on Civic Education, Washington, DC, November 19 and 20, 2006.

Closing plenary panel, Campus Compact's 20th Anniversary Visioning Summit, Chicago, Oct 17, 2006

"Policies for Civic Education," University of Georgia (conference on "Youth Indifference to the News"), Oct. 10, 2006.

"The State of Civic Health," President's Council on Service and Civic Participation, Washington, DC 2006, Oct. 12, 2006

"The Civic and Political Health of the Nation," National Press Club, Oct. 3, 2006.

Upper Midwest Campus Compact/Spencer Foundation meeting on civic engagement in higher education: facilitated a plenary discussion of research: Madison, WI, April 28, 2006.

Society for Research on Adolescence, panel on "Civic Engagement in Minority and Immigrant Youth" (discussant), San Francisco, March 26, 2006.

Launch of the National Advisory Council of the Campaign for the Civic Mission of Schools, National Press Club, Washington, DC, April 17, 2006. I spoke along with Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, Gov. Roy Romer, and others. The event was televised by C-SPAN and covered in a nationally syndicated column by David Broder.

"The Arts of Patriotism: Difficult Dialogues": panel presentation at the Annual Conference of Imagining America, New Brunswick, NJ, Oct. 1, 2005.

"Latest Research on Civic Education," Third Annual Congressional Conference on Civic Education, Washington, DC, Sept. 26, 2005.

"Civic Education," presentation to the American Bar Association Commission on Civic Education and the Separation of Powers, Washington, DC, Sept. 15, 2005.

"The National Perspective": presentation at a conference on Rethinking Civics Education: The Third Branch in American Democracy, hosted by the Judicial Conference of California, WestEd, and WGBH-Boston, San Francisco, April 28, 2005

"The Problem of Online Misinformation and the Role of Schools," conference on Fast Communication and Quality of Information, University of Tilburg (Netherlands), December 21, 2004.

Panel moderator, session on "research," Second Annual Congressional Conference on Civic Education, Washington, DC, Dec. 6, 2004.

"The Prince George's County Information Commons," American Library Association Workshop on Libraries and the Information Commons, Cerritos, CA, Oct. 29-31, 2004.

"Youth in Politics" panelist, National Symposium of Youth Civic Engagement, University of Virginia Center for Politics, Charlottesville, VA, September 14, 2004.

"Best Practices Supported by Research," at the Summer Institute of the Annenberg Foundation Civic Education Initiative, Washington, July 19, 2004

"Kids, Communities, and the 'Scholarly Communication Commons'", presented at the Workshop on Scholarly Communication as a Commons, Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, March 31-April 2, 2004.

Panel presentation on the civic mission of higher education, at a conference on "Public Work in Higher Education: Theory and Practice of Civic Engagement," University of Minnesota, March 18, 2004

"The Latest Studies on Youth Civic Engagement and Voting," presentation at the National Association of Secretaries of State New Millennium Young Voters Summit, Washington, DC, February 17, 2004.

"The Civic Mission of Schools and Higher Education," presentation at the national Learn & Serve America grantees meeting, Washington, Dec. 10, 2003

Presentation on The Civic Mission of Schools, U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools National Conference on "Meeting the Challenge: The Science and Practice of Safe and Drug-Free Schools," Oct. 27, 2003.

Panelist, First Annual Congressional Conference on Civic Education, Sept. 22, 2003.

Panel moderator, National Conference on Citizenship 50th Anniversary Meeting, Sept. 16, 2003.

"Evidence About Civic Education in Schools: A Researcher-Practitioner Dialogue," Annual Scientific Meeting, International Society of Political Psychology, July 8, 2003.

"Building the Electronic Commons," Center for the Study of Law and Society Luncheon Series, co-sponsored by the Berkeley Center for Law and Technology, Boalt Hall School of Law, University of California-Berkeley, April 21, 2003.

Presentation on youth civic engagement research, National Asian Pacific American Legal Consortium conference, April 12, 2003.

Panel presentation on the intellectual roots of deliberation at the Society for Values in Higher Education's Conference on Discussion, Dialogue, and Deliberation, April 2, 2003.

"Local Governments and Independent Civic Websites," presentation at the American Society for Public Administration Annual Conference, February 17, 2003

Remarks at the launch of the Civic Mission of Schools report, Willard Hotel, Washington, DC, February 13, 2003

Panel chair for "Communitarian Approaches to Cyberspace" at the American Association of Law Schools Annual Meeting, January 4, 2003.

Panel presentation on a panel entitled "Philosophical Perspectives," in a conference on The Rule of Law and the Information Age: Reconciling Private Rights and Public Interest, Catholic University Law School, Oct. 10, 2002. I was also interviewed for a Webcast.

CIRCLE introductory press conference at the National Press Club, January 9, 2002 (speaker).

CIRCLE press conference to release youth poll, National Press Club, March 4, 2002 (panelist)

Panelist at a session on engaging young voters, Bipartisan Conference of the Virginia House of Delegates, Staunton, VA, April 19-21, 2002

"Building the E-Commons," lecture in the Albert J. Shipka Speakers Series at Youngstown State University (Ohio), February 5, 2002.

"The State of Civic Culture and Trust in the United States," a presentation for the Civil Society Task Force (organized by Grupo Esquel, www.esquel.org), Washington, DC, September 22, 2000

Formal comments on a paper ("Information Technology and the Social Construction of Information Policy") presented at the "Accounting, Information Technology, and Public Policy" conference in College Park, August 12, 2000

Briefing on civic renewal at the annual board meeting of the Kettering Foundation, June 2000.

"Jane Addams’s Work," lecture at Rutgers-Camden, November 17, 1999.

"Index of National Civic Health": presentation at the World Bank Conference on Civil Society, Foreign Aid and Sustainable Development, June 21, 1999

"The Press in a Deliberative Democracy: On Public Journalism and its Critics," invited paper delivered at the University of South Carolina College of Journalism and Mass Communication, October 13, 1998

"Public Journalism": presentation at a Maxwell School conference on citizenship and civil society, October 1995

Media

CIRCLE's research has been cited in most national news organs, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, and Los Angeles Times. I have been interviewed on CNN, Al-Jazeera, CBS radio news, CBS television news, NPR's "All Things Considered," and many local television and radio shows. Between July 2008 and the 2008 presidential election, CIRCLE was cited in 1,253 newspaper, magazine, broadcast, or web stories, including 829 print media articles

Other Professional Activities

"Peter Levine's Weblog": a "blog" on civic engagement, with an entry posted every work day since January 2003. Receives more than 200 visits per day.

Author of regular posts (five in 2010) on The Huffington Post.

Coordinating editor, Journal of Public Deliberation.

Editorial Board, Rhetoric and Democratic Deliberation series, Penn State University Press

Manuscript evaluation for the Journal of Public Deliberation, The Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, Journal of Business, Ethics, Politics & the Life Sciences, Mass Communication & Society, Journal of Applied Sociology, International Journal of Public Participation, Eidos, and other journals.

Member of the research team for a project at the University of Tillburg (Netherlands) Faculty of Law, entitled "Globalization and the legitimacy of power of non-governmental organisations." Funded by the Dutch Organisation for Scientific Research (2004-5).

Grant proposal review for CIRCLE, the Campaign for the Civic Mission of Schools, First Amendment Schools Project, Carnegie Corporation of New York, Netherlands Government, J-Lab, and others.

Grants and Contracts

Grants and contracts obtained for CIRCLE at Tufts University, for which I am principal investigator (2008-present)

Grants and contracts for CIRCLE when I was its director and principal investigator at University of Maryland (2006-08)

Grants and contracts obtained for CIRCLE, when I was co-principal investigator and deputy director (2001-6):

Other grants