Culminating Project #1 Constitution Rubric

Rubric for Constitution Project

I have purposely not given specific guidelines on how your constitution should look because I encourage creativity and demand effort.  You have to put the work in i.e. I won’t accept some words randomly written on lined paper. 

This portion has two parts:

1.     The first part is composed of the answers to the questions below. 

2.     The second part is your constitution.

Use your imagination.  You have just been handed the power to create your own government and that is a lot of power. What would your government look like and why.

1.     Answer these questions below to guide you in creating your constitution.  Then, use the answers for the written portion of the assignment.

a.     Pick a political philosophy (direct democracy, republic, dictatorship, socialist, communist etc) and design a government body around with laws.

Answer these questions below to see what kind of political philosophy you might agree with:

                                                        i.     What are your beliefs on equality?

1.     What laws would you create to protect/define equality?

2.     What would your government look like to protect and enforce the equality laws you make?

                                                       ii.     What rights to you believe we should have?

1.     What laws would you create to protect/define rights?

2.     What would your government look like to protect and enforce the rights your citizens should have?  For example: will you have a Supreme Court to protect rights, a Congress to make them and Executive to enforce laws?  If you are dictator, will you have a strong police force?

3.     Are your rights “unalienable” rights?

4.     Do you have a Constitution and/or Bill of Rights? Why or Why not?

                                                     iii.     What do you define as liberty?

1.     What laws would you create to protect/define liberty?

2.     What would your government look like to protect and enforce the liberty?

                                                     iv.     What do you think is opportunity? (think education, small business loans things that help people move out of poverty)

1.     What laws would you create to protect/define opportunity?

2.     What would your government look like to protect and enforce the opportunity?

b.     Compare and Contrast your government/constitution to the United States Constitution.  Specifically, explain how your laws and government differ or are similar to the American Constitution and Bill of Rights.  Does the “central” government is Washington D.C. hold more power than the state or does the state hold more power than the “central” (Washington D.C.)? Why? Why not?

c.     Cite at least 3 founding ideals and why you agree or disagree with them.

Everyone must create a constitution for themselves, but if you get lost feel free to talk to me for guidance.

Checklist (I will use this to grade your project)

Student    Teacher

_______   ________  Constitution has a political philosophy(direct democracy, socialist, etc)

_______  ________   It must be clear what kind of government you have made (democracy etc) and why you have made it that way.

_______   ________  Does your government have a structure like a Congress/Supreme Court etc  

                             (a way of running)?

_______   ________  Are the laws of your constitution understandable, easy to follow and enforceable?

_______  ________   How is it different from the American Constitution?  Give examples. 

_______  ________   Did you answer all the questions above?

	Exceptional	Proficient	More Effort Needed
	100   points	80   points	30   points
Focus	Totally on topic; all parts of the assignment are fully addressed	Mostly on topic; all parts of the assignment are generally addressed OR one aspect of the assignment is not addressed	Vaguely or not at all on topic; many parts of the assignment are not addressed or are only superficially addressed
Substance	10 points	8 points	3 points
	Fully developed ideas with coherent reasoning and/or supporting	Ideas not completely developed; some sloppy reasoning or poorly selected examples	Ideas not developed; lacking sufficient detail to understand the thoughts behind the words
Clarity	5	3.5	1.5
	Logical organization of ideas; complete sentences; very few spelling and grammar errors	Somewhat logical sequence of ideas; mostly complete sentences; some spelling and grammar errors	Disorganized thoughts; multiple sentence fragments or spelling and grammar errors that distract from the ideas being expressed

Creativity Bonus – You may earn up to 3 extra credit points for taking an exceptionally creative approach to the assignment or for being particularly insightful.