Citizenship test gets a makeover

A draft of a new civics test for naturalization applicants was unveiled Thursday by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.

The new test was designed with more open-ended, meaningful questions that may have more than one possible answer, said Sharon Rummery, USCIS spokeswoman. It's meant to require a deeper understanding of the American system.

"People will really get some civic knowledge by studying for the test, a good grasp of the fundamentals of democracy," she said. "The old test was based more on memorization."

For example, the old test asked for the names of the three branches of government, she said, and the new test asks why there are three branches of government.

The new test also keeps some of the basic facts from the existing test, with questions such as who is the current president and who was the first president.

"Our goal is to inspire immigrants to learn about the civic values of this nation so that after they take the oath of citizenship they will participate fully in our great democracy," USCIS director Emilio Gonzalez said in a statement.

But Alyssa Williams, who teaches citizenship for the University Neighborhood Partnership, said the new test is somewhat disappointing because it includes too many advanced questions for applicants who may have arrived in this country without the knowledge of what a law is, or how a law is made.

"They've included too much detailed info," she said. "Like name two Cabinet-level positions. It's hard to teach a student what a Cabinet member is."

She said the pilot also keeps in place some of the more trivial questions, such as asking for the names of three of the original 13 states.

However, Rummery said the test wasn't designed to be more difficult, only to build more understanding of concepts.

"One reason for piloting is to see if some (questions) are too tough," Rummery said. "If they are, they will be dropped from the test."

Matthew Burbank, associate professor of political science at the University of Utah, said he hoped the new test would be more relevant by combining a knowledge of facts with deeper understanding of the current system, along with historical figures and events.

"If they're talking about the Declaration of Independence, it's important for people to understand what it is, and why it's different from the Constitution," he said.