‘Don’t know much about history’

It was hard not to hum Sam Cooke’s famous musical verse as Richard Brake delivered today’s special Shaftesbury Society lecture for the John Locke Foundation.

Brake is director of university stewardship for the Intercollegiate Studies Institute. He’s drawing attention to a recent study called Failing Our Students, Failing America. It shows that college freshmen average a failing score of 50 percent on a national test of basic civic knowledge. College seniors fare only slightly better, compiling average scores of 54 percent.

• In this video clip, Brake describes the study’s finding of “negative learning.”

3:30 p.m. update: Watch the entire speech here.