Anyone who has watched the game show “Are Your Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?” understands the no-win dynamics of this new program. Lose by demonstrating that you know less than a fifth grader and you are humiliated. Win and all you have done is outwitted a child. That hardly makes you an Einstein or an Enrico Fermi (both of whom were immigrant Americans– this is a column about immigration, after all.)

Oddly enough, there is, in fact, a connection between trivia games and U.S. immigration policy. In order to become a naturalized citizen of the United States, applicants must pass a trivia contest of sorts having to do with American government and history. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) made headlines in September of this year when it announced that it had come up with a new naturalization test. USCIS will administer the new test to citizenship applicants beginning in October, 2008

Earlier this year, 6,000 citizenship applicants volunteered to take a pilot version of the test at 10 test sites across the country during a four month period. The 100 new civics questions on the test were selected after USCIS, a panel of history and government scholars, and English as a second language teachers conducted a review of the responses to the 142 questions that were included in the pilot test.

The overall process of coming up with prospective new questions and getting a new test approved took six years and was accomplished at a price of $6.5 million. I would have been happy to come up with a new test for half the price, but unfortunately no one asked me.

USCIS examiners will select ten questions from a possible 100, and applicants must answer 60 percent of these questions correctly in order to pass. If the applicant fails the test, he or she is entitled to retake it at a later time. However, if the applicant fails the test on the second try, he or she must reapply for naturalization and pay the filing fee ($675) a second time. This is about twice the filing fee amount that was required before fees were raised earlier this year. I began my career in immigration law as an attorney with what was then called the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) and at that time (the 1970s) the application fee was a mere $15.

Unlike “Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?” the “naturalization game” does have a big upside for “contestants,” since the “prize” is being able to reside in the United States as a citizen for the rest of your life. Also unlike in the TV game show, the “naturalization game,” while it concerns trivia, is not trivial to those who play it.

Let us suppose you, the reader, are an applicant for U.S. citizenship about to take the naturalization test. I will be the USCIS examiner charged with administering the test.

Are you ready? Then here are the ten questions I’ve selected for you:

1. How many amendments does the Constitution have?
2. What is the “rule of law?”
3. The House of Representatives has how many voting members?
4. Who is the Chief Justice of the United States?
5. What is the name of the Speaker of the House of Representatives?
6. When was the Constitution written?
7. The Federalist Papers supported passage of the U.S. Constitution. Name one of the authors.
8. What did Susan B. Anthony do?
9. Name one U.S. territory.
10. Who was President of the U.S. during World War I?

USCIS says the test was designed to better measure applicants’ understanding of our system of government rather than their ability to simply memorize facts. Frankly, the great majority of questions in the new test, in my opinion, require applicants to regurgitate facts they have memorized. There are other questions in the test which are broader and more opened ended, such as, “What is the purpose of the Constitution?” These general questions require specific answers that even a native English speaker versed in American history and civics might stumble over. You can be the judge, however, and decide whether you have the basic knowledge you would need to pass the new test, by viewing it online at www.uscis.gov/newtest.

Carl Shusterman is principal of the Los Angeles-based Law Offices of Carl Shusterman (www.shusterman.com) a firm specializing in U.S. immigration and nationality law. He can be reached at carl@carlshusterman.com.