Hoover Institution (Stanford, CA) – The Hoover Institution’s Center for Revitalizing American Institutions (RAI) has launched a new online civics self-assessment tool called Civic Profile to help Americans reflect on a core question: What kind of citizen am I?
Under the leadership of Volker Senior Fellow Chester E. Finn Jr., the new online tool will enable users to test their knowledge and perceptions about civics and find their place within our vibrant democracy.
“In this anniversary year of the Declaration of Independence,” Finn noted, “as Hoover and other organizations deepen their commitment to advancing civic understanding and citizenship, this versatile new public-facing tool affords a unique opportunity for individuals to understand themselves as citizens; for educators to stimulate understanding and constructive interaction among their students; and for scholars, journalists, and analysts to access a great new source of data on the state of citizenship in today’s America.”
The Civic Profile is an educational and research tool that includes three interactive quizzes that gauges one’s civic identity across three dimensions: values, knowledge, and engagement. The tool does not assign grades or pass judgment. It’s designed to help users understand their civic strengths and recognize that democracy depends on many different voices, choices, and actions.
RAI is launching the Civic Profile as one of many efforts it is undertaking as the country faces declining trust in institutions, rising partisan divisions, and persistent gaps in civic knowledge. The center said the tool is also meant to support civic learning and participation as the United States celebrates its 250th anniversary year.
The project began in May 2024, when RAI’s Working Group on Civics and American Citizenship first explored the idea of an online citizenship self-assessment online application. It then developed an early version for testing. The dedicated team, comprising undergraduates, postdoctoral fellows, Stanford faculty, Hoover fellows, and external advisors and partners, prototyped the tool during the iCivics National Forum held at Hoover in March 2025. They then tested and refined the instrument nationally through multiple YouGov surveys in mid-2025.
The Civic Profile is intended as a living instrument, and RAI will update it to reflect new forms of participation and emerging civic challenges. It’s designed for individuals, for classroom and group use, and for researchers. Individual users receive results that summarize their civic values, knowledge, and patterns of civic engagement.
Students at the high school and college level can also make use of the Civic Profile. Classroom-ready teaching materials and lesson plans are being developed and will be posted on the tool’s resources page, with full educator materials expected for the 2026–27 academic year.
For research and public insight, the Civic Profile generates nationally benchmarked data that can be tracked over time, and the platform provides users with access to the research data through a dashboard that enables them to compare results using data visualizations. The tool will support longitudinal analysis of Americans’ civic life through regular publication of results alongside annual reports.
A cohort feature allows the quiz to be taken by individuals within a group, which then enables participants to compare their results with both their cohort composite and national averages. Classrooms, families, civic organizations, and workplaces can create a cohort before starting the survey.
All data submitted within the Civic Profile remain private. Users are not asked to provide their names, contact information, or demographic information when taking the assessment. Although aggregate data is available to the public, responses will not be shared in any way that allows others to identify individual participants.
Developers strove to avoid political bias in the application’s questions and outputs. The team that developed the tool reflects a range of ideological perspectives. Creators conducted multiple rounds of interviews and reviewed user feedback to test whether the language or framing was perceived as politically skewed. Civic values and engagement patterns outlined in the survey can correlate with political orientation, but the categories themselves are politically neutral.
The Civic Profile’s Knowledge section draws on many questions from the pre-2025 US Citizenship and Immigration Services Naturalization Civics Test, adapted for an online multiple-choice format. Recent survey findings suggest that two-thirds of Americans would not be able to pass the naturalization civics test. National surveys also show gaps in basic civic understanding, including knowledge of the three branches of government and awareness of congressional representation.
The tool’s offerings and capabilities will evolve and expand over time. Schools, colleges, and organizations have been invited to develop lesson plans and teaching materials, and those materials will be shared though the platform.
Discover your Civic Profile now!
Find out more about RAI’s Working Group on Civics and American Citizenship here.
