Available November 3, 2026
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What’s the difference between deliberation and debate? And how can teaching students to practice deliberation help them form valuable civic and life skills? That’s the work Mia Charity leads through the Close Up Foundation, and describes that work in conversation with NAIS president and host Debra P. Wilson on this episode of New View EDU.
Coming from the perspective of more than 20 years in various roles at Close Up, Mia discusses the value of civic education to the future of young people. She shares her belief in programs and opportunities that encourage proximity to others whose experiences are vastly different from our own, and that instill the curiosity and listening skills needed to understand disparate points of view. Mia talks about the ability to find common ground in caring about civic issues through the lens of personal experience. She speaks about helping students understand how big-picture issues may affect them and their loved ones, but also the importance of building community among young people so they recognize that even things that don’t feel personally relevant are important to others.
Mia also speaks to the important shift from a mindset of debate—where “winning” an argument feels like a central goal—to deliberation, where students learn to listen more deeply and think about multiple perspectives. She says youth are more likely to have the curiosity and open-mindedness needed for deliberation and can learn to build on that skill more easily than many adults. Mia observes that adults often project their own ideas about polarization onto kids, inadvertently stifling their natural perspective-taking. She encourages schools to open more opportunities for students to practice deliberation, community-building, and personal agency to help them build the skills they need to become productive citizens in the future.
Key Questions
Some of the key questions Debra and Mia explore in this episode include:
- What’s the importance of the kind of civic education organizations like Close Up provide? How do these experiences prepare students for the future?
- What parts of deliberation and dialogue are easy for most students, and where do they tend to struggle? How can we help?
- What are the key aspects of teaching students to approach the world with a more deliberative mindset? How do we help them develop a framework they can carry with them beyond civics in the classroom?
- What can schools do more of to help students develop civic deliberation and dialogue skills?
Episode Highlights
- “I think some of the common threads are that, you know, we all have different ways that these issues that seem so big, health care, immigration, you know, those sound like really big issues. But when you start breaking them down and helping people understand how government and public policy really impact and touch their lives, I think once you can make that connection, people understand why they should care. … Like you think of these things as public policy, but you know, they're real—health, housing, real day-to-day life issues that are wrapped up into policy and community and all the things that are around you, but that's not it, right?” (8:12)
- “I think the framework of deliberation has helped with listening and receiving information in a way that, like, OK, well, I'm not just trying to win an argument against you. I'm listening, and maybe what you're saying adds to how I think about an issue. … There's a willingness from that framework to listen better, to take in pieces that maybe you hadn't thought of before. And so because it's, you know, we're talking about high school and middle school students. They're used to coming into conversations that way versus adults who, even if I said explain deliberation versus debate, still maybe come into those conversations wanting to prove that whatever they're saying is correct.” (13.54)
- “Critical thinking is in your science class, that's in your math class, that's in all of your classes. And so how do we start defining those skills a little bit differently to help young people recognize like, no, that's something you're gonna do as a good citizen. That's, it applies to your next job. It applies to whether you're going to college or not, and it applies as a life skill that you're learning how to get new information, analyze it, and engage with people who might think differently from you. Because I don't know any of us who get to go exclusively live in a bubble.” (21:12)
Resource List
- Keep up with the work of the Close Up Foundation.
- Read about their inaugural Next Gen Roundtable event.
- Check out the upcoming NAIS Student Civic Leadership Summit (January 2027).
Full Transcript
- Read the full transcript here.
Related Episodes
- Episode 84: Good Conflict
- Episode 76: The Promise, Possibility, and Power of Adolescence
- Episode 66: Schools in a Time of Hope and Cynicism
- Episode 64: Pluralism in Education
- Episode 62: Wisdom Road
- Episode 56: Helping Students Shape Dynamic Futures
- Episode 17: The Opportunities and Obligations of Citizenship in K-12 Education
About Our Guest
Mia Charity is president of the Close Up Foundation, a national, nonpartisan 501(c)(3) nonprofit education organization based in Arlington, Virginia. She assumed the role of president in March 2023 after serving in various leadership positions, including chief development officer and chief external affairs officer, over more than a decade.