Page 271 - Štremfel, Urška, ed., 2016. Student (Under)achievement: Perspectives, Approaches, Challenges. Ljubljana: Pedagoški inštitut. Digital Library, Documenta 11.
P. 271
ticipation was not recognised as active citizenship – Nazi Germany and 271
communist European countries point to mass participation without necessar-
ily having democratic and useful consequences.
The formal framework of civic education thus begins within the formal ed-
ucation system. The role of an active citizen is also influenced by other factors,
be it individual or social (a country’s GDP, average education level etc.). The first
insight into the issue of what we call social and civic competencies or the ac-
tive citizenship concept, is represented by the knowledge of this area.
The project ‘Raising Awareness and Opportunities of Lifelong Learning for
Low Achievers’ is specifically targeted at low achievers and this chapter there-
fore presents the characteristics of students with low civic knowledge scores. It
also points to the issues that low civic knowledge of individuals can present for
the development of contemporary democratic societies. The project is based
on the data by International Civic and Citizenship Education Study (ICCS). Even
though the EU’s strategic goals include fostering active citizenship, no specif-
ic metric or reference benchmark has been made on the European level for ac-
tive citizenship.6 For this reason the metric in this paper hereafter will be de-
signed in a way that it is composed of students who failed to reach the first
proficiency level of civic knowledge in the ICCS study.
International Civic and Citizenship Education Study
and Low Student Achievements
Despite the lack of a specific benchmark within the European framework,
CRELL designed two composite indicators of active citizenship and civic skills.
The first refers to active citizenship, meaning the activities of adults, and the
second to the civic skills of students. The latter was designed on the basis of
data obtained by an IEA International Civic and Citizenship Education Study
(Progress towards the Lisbon objectives in education and training: Indicators
and benchmarks, 2009: 92).
The ICCS international study is coordinated by the IEA. Slovenia took part
in data gathering in 1999 (when the study was called CIVED) and 2009 and is
scheduled to take part in 2016. This paper focuses on the data obtained by the
2009 study.
The ICCS study is based on a research framework which considers both
the context of civic and citizenship education that describes the constructs
that must be included in the student cognitive test and a questionnaire; and
a contextual framework, which includes factors that could influence student
achievements and explain the differences between them. The youth devel-
op their understanding of their role as citizens in a contemporary society on
6 Some authors (e.g. Idnurm and Toots, 2013) use data obtained by the ICCS study alongside data ob-
tained by the PISA study when examining low achievement groups.
facilitating civic knowledge – a path towards active citizenship
communist European countries point to mass participation without necessar-
ily having democratic and useful consequences.
The formal framework of civic education thus begins within the formal ed-
ucation system. The role of an active citizen is also influenced by other factors,
be it individual or social (a country’s GDP, average education level etc.). The first
insight into the issue of what we call social and civic competencies or the ac-
tive citizenship concept, is represented by the knowledge of this area.
The project ‘Raising Awareness and Opportunities of Lifelong Learning for
Low Achievers’ is specifically targeted at low achievers and this chapter there-
fore presents the characteristics of students with low civic knowledge scores. It
also points to the issues that low civic knowledge of individuals can present for
the development of contemporary democratic societies. The project is based
on the data by International Civic and Citizenship Education Study (ICCS). Even
though the EU’s strategic goals include fostering active citizenship, no specif-
ic metric or reference benchmark has been made on the European level for ac-
tive citizenship.6 For this reason the metric in this paper hereafter will be de-
signed in a way that it is composed of students who failed to reach the first
proficiency level of civic knowledge in the ICCS study.
International Civic and Citizenship Education Study
and Low Student Achievements
Despite the lack of a specific benchmark within the European framework,
CRELL designed two composite indicators of active citizenship and civic skills.
The first refers to active citizenship, meaning the activities of adults, and the
second to the civic skills of students. The latter was designed on the basis of
data obtained by an IEA International Civic and Citizenship Education Study
(Progress towards the Lisbon objectives in education and training: Indicators
and benchmarks, 2009: 92).
The ICCS international study is coordinated by the IEA. Slovenia took part
in data gathering in 1999 (when the study was called CIVED) and 2009 and is
scheduled to take part in 2016. This paper focuses on the data obtained by the
2009 study.
The ICCS study is based on a research framework which considers both
the context of civic and citizenship education that describes the constructs
that must be included in the student cognitive test and a questionnaire; and
a contextual framework, which includes factors that could influence student
achievements and explain the differences between them. The youth devel-
op their understanding of their role as citizens in a contemporary society on
6 Some authors (e.g. Idnurm and Toots, 2013) use data obtained by the ICCS study alongside data ob-
tained by the PISA study when examining low achievement groups.
facilitating civic knowledge – a path towards active citizenship
