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UNI lands $1.2M to train Iowa educators on teaching civics
‘We are deeply grateful to Governor Reynolds for her support of our grant application, and to the U.S. Department of Education for investing in this vision’
Oct. 9, 2025 11:35 am, Updated: Oct. 9, 2025 12:25 pm
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CEDAR FALLS — A year after the University of Northern Iowa established its new Center for Civic Education in response to directives from the Board of Regents and lawmakers, the center this week landed a $1.22 million American History and Civics Education-Seminars grant from the U.S. Department of Education.
That money will support the new center’s creation of a new “Iowa Civic Educators Institute” aimed at strengthening civic education across the state — not just at UNI.
“The Iowa Civic Educators Institute is an opportunity to provide content-rich professional development to Iowa's current and future teachers that will strengthen civic learning for students across Iowa,” UNI Center for Civic Education Director Allison Rank said, invoking UNI’s history as a teachers college and contemporary reputation as an esteemed producer of educators.
“Money and time are two significant barriers for teachers interested in this kind of extensive professional development,” she said. “Through this grant, we'll be able to provide (institute) participants a stipend, as well as cover programming costs.”
The institute’s programming for both up-and-coming and in-service teachers will include seminars, workshops, and curriculum development aimed at deepening educators’ understanding of the “American political tradition, constitutional principles and Iowa history, while equipping them with strategies to teach civic knowledge more effectively.”
It will focus on two primary outcomes, according to UNI:
- Improving educators’ knowledge of the “American political tradition and the ideas, traditions, institutions, and texts essential to American Constitutional government and our American history and heritage”;
- And creating and distributing course materials connecting updated Iowa standards — including the study of Iowa politics and history — to the first principles of America’s founding.
The institute’s seminars on civic virtues, balancing individual rights with community membership, the civic experience, and Iowa as a constitutional subject will reach educators in three categories:
- In-service teachers — those teaching high school social studies — will participate in a 60-hour program involving reading groups, workshops, and a summer institute;
- Preservice teachers — UNI social science and history teaching majors — will participate in four-week intensive sessions;
- Elementary educators can participate in daylong literacy workshops focused on incorporating civic content into literacy instruction.
The content — while not disclosed specifically — will be both “historically grounded and classroom ready,” according to UNI.
“This grant affirms the national importance of that work,” UNI President Mark Nook said of the job of preparing “informed and engaged citizens.” “We are deeply grateful to Governor Reynolds for her support of our grant application, and to the U.S. Department of Education for investing in this vision.”
Cyclone Civics
UNI’s Center for Civic Education was the first to launch across Iowa’s public university system after the Board of Regents in November 2023 issued 10 diversity, equity, and inclusion-related directives.
Number nine on that list was to, “Explore a proposal, including cost, to establish a widespread initiative that includes opportunities for education and research on free speech and civic education.”
UNI, in response, debuted its center in September 2024. Iowa State University in November 2024 likewise introduced a Cyclone Civics program — which evolved into a full Center for Cyclone Civics, following regent approval in April 2025.
That center, according to Iowa State, aims to:
- Promote civic literacy, defined as a basic understanding of government, U.S. history, and American philosophical traditions;
- Develop civic skills needed for a functioning democracy, including media literacy, critical thinking, problem solving, and the ability to find common ground;
- And create a civic disposition — or “attitudes and beliefs that support American democracy and a sense of civic duty.”
The center has a handful of events this fall, including a talk later this month from Reverend Otis Moss III, who’ll discuss ways Black communities “created a spiritual world view to handle existential issues facing our democracy.”
“He will discuss how Black leaders used their faith to find strength to confront civic challenges and celebrate the ideas of love, justice, resilience, and self-determination,” according to the center’s website. “Those lessons can be used today as we examine our moral and internal compass as individuals and a democratic society.”
In November, the center will put on four performances of “Urinetown,” a comedic musical that satirizes the legal system, capitalism, social irresponsibility, populism, bureaucracy, corporate mismanagement, and municipal politics.
UI Center for Intellectual Freedom
Initially, the University of Iowa in April 2024 reported its compliance with the ninth directive as “nearly completed,” with a “Civic Dialogue Initiative” ready to pilot in fall 2024.
That pilot program aimed to train residence hall assistants on managing civil dialogue with first-year students. In pitching the program, UI President Barbara Wilson said it would operate like a field experiment — with some residence hall floors getting it and others not.
“And we’re going to measure all kinds of outcomes — including roommate disagreements and all sorts of things that maybe we could do better on,” Wilson said, noting plans for an optional first-year seminar course as well. “If we can show with data that this works, than this is just the beginning.”
Later that year, when the universities reported back to the board on its DEI directives, UI officials did not mention the Civic Dialogue Initiative. And the university did not answer questions from The Gazette about when and how it was conducted, who participated, and what data was collected.
Earlier this year, during the Legislative session, lawmakers asked whether UI had plans to establish a center similar to those at UNI and Iowa State. UI lobbyist Keith Saunders told them the campus was moving forward with a proposal to launch a “Center for Civic Dialogue and Leadership,” to be housed in the provost’s office and directed by the associate provost for undergraduate education.
But that center never got off the ground, given the Legislature’s passage of House File 437, which required the creation of a UI Center for Intellectual Freedom.
That center — to be led by an advisory council and director chosen via national search — will “educate students by means of free, open, and rigorous intellectual inquiry to seek the truth.”
Regents — with the help of Gov. Kim Reynolds — last month identified 26 advisory council members, half based in Iowa and half from outside the state.
All but two on the council are men; 11 are Republicans, three are Democrats, and 12 identify as independents — although at least seven of the independents have expressed conservative ideology publicly or on social media or have made donations on the political right.
The new council — which is subject to open meetings laws — has not yet met, and the Board of Regents told The Gazette it has not yet set a date for a council meeting.
Vanessa Miller covers higher education for The Gazette.
Comments: (319) 339-3158; vanessa.miller@thegazette.com
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