THIS EDITION Volume 21, No. 1 January 30, 2003

Front Page

Foreign students rate high on citizenship test

Compiled by Kira Eastwood
Special to the News-Register

From the Pilgrims, our first “boat people,” to the latest Haitian and Cuban balseros (“rafters”), our nation has always been a nation of immigrants.

Today, about 8 percent of the U.S. population are foreign-born. Immigration policy is one of the many responsibilities of our federal government. To ensure that our new citizens understand us, the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) administers a citizenship test. Dr. Gabriel Bach’s Government students took such a test a week ago.

Questions covered issues such as the flag, branches of government, voting age, election of the president, the Supreme Court and election terms.

Of the 214 students who answered the survey, 110 (approximately 61 percent) were born and raised in the United States, and 83 (roughly 38 percent) were not.

Of those surveyed, 104 (or 49 percent) were female and 110 (or 51 percent) were male.

The hypothesis was that the 61 percent of U.S.-born citizens would pass the survey without any difficulty and score higher than the non-U.S.-born. The results were surprising.

When asked about the number of states in the U.S. and stars on the American flag, 94 percent of the students were correct regarding 50 stars, yet only 89 percent had the correct answers regarding the states, with U.S.-born female students scoring the highest.

Eighty percent of the students knew what the minimum voting age in the U.S. is, with U.S.-born female students outperforming.

The lowest number of correct answers related to complex issues – the election of the U.S. president and to the succession if the president and vice-president die. Forty-four percent only understood that the president was not elected by the people (61 percent of U.S. citizens to 39 percent of foreign students), and overall, only 36 percent (67 percent of U.S.-born students) knew about the succession process.

Overall, U.S.-born students had 70 percent correct answers, a passing score. But guess what? The foreign students had 69.5 percent of the correct answers.

Our government class’ hypothesis does not stand. Foreign students have done unexpectedly well, considering that most of them did not study U.S. government in their high schools and did not grow up in the United States.