Page 30 - Šolsko polje, XXX, 2019, št. 5-6: Civic, citizenship and rhetorical education in a rapidly changing world, eds. Janja Žmavc and Plamen Mirazchiyski
P. 30
šolsko polje, letnik xxx, številka 5–6
firmed that young people are not satisfied by the state of democracy in
Croatia. They consider politics as a dishonest occupation and they do not
have trust in the government, parliament and political parties. Despite
that, in relation to the generation of youth surveyed in 2004, both citi-
zenship and political activism was somewhat increased. The generation
of youth surveyed in 2013 has less trust in political parties but have twice
the number of members joining political parties, so the authors conclud-
ed that in the overall atmosphere of political clientelism, a not so small
portion of the youth see political engagement as an effective way of resolv-
ing their existential issues. At the same time, young people do not know
enough about the ways in which democracy functions, they believe less
and less in basic constitutional principles and they are more and more in-
clined to authoritarian solutions. Only one quarter think that democracy
is the best form of organizing social and political life, and more than one
third support the concept of ‘great leaders’. Three quarters of students are
not inclined to the idea of lowering the active right to vote to the age of
16, which could be attributed to their unpreparedness to fulfil their role
as citizens. More than half think that schools should prepare students for
the challenges of active citizenship and that the CCE as a school subject
would encourage them to further engage in society.
The presented national research and results, along with the formal
CCE evaluations16, point to several important conclusions:
– Students are interested to learn about HRE and EDC contents but
their competences in this area, as measured in different ways during
the years, are not satisfactory: in terms of knowledge, students show
low (national assessments) to medium (ICCS 2016) familiarity with
basic CCE concepts.
– Students do not reflect democratic values and beliefs connected to
high-functioning democratic societies in some HRE and EDC tar-
geted areas (for example, trust in institutions, overall engagement or
recognition of equal rights of different groups).
– Teachers are constantly expressing the lack of detailed and focused
teacher training education; a large number of those that were organ-
ized did not meet the expected level of quality. Personally motivated
and organized learning is still prevailing among teachers.
– Teachers prefer teaching contents in relation to, for example, hu-
manitarian actions, culture and/or ecology over the ones from the
political realm. Group work, peer learning, project and research ap-
proach are methods that are being used more and more in classes,
16 Conducted in school years 2012/2013, 2013/2014 and 2014/2015 by the NCEEE.
28
firmed that young people are not satisfied by the state of democracy in
Croatia. They consider politics as a dishonest occupation and they do not
have trust in the government, parliament and political parties. Despite
that, in relation to the generation of youth surveyed in 2004, both citi-
zenship and political activism was somewhat increased. The generation
of youth surveyed in 2013 has less trust in political parties but have twice
the number of members joining political parties, so the authors conclud-
ed that in the overall atmosphere of political clientelism, a not so small
portion of the youth see political engagement as an effective way of resolv-
ing their existential issues. At the same time, young people do not know
enough about the ways in which democracy functions, they believe less
and less in basic constitutional principles and they are more and more in-
clined to authoritarian solutions. Only one quarter think that democracy
is the best form of organizing social and political life, and more than one
third support the concept of ‘great leaders’. Three quarters of students are
not inclined to the idea of lowering the active right to vote to the age of
16, which could be attributed to their unpreparedness to fulfil their role
as citizens. More than half think that schools should prepare students for
the challenges of active citizenship and that the CCE as a school subject
would encourage them to further engage in society.
The presented national research and results, along with the formal
CCE evaluations16, point to several important conclusions:
– Students are interested to learn about HRE and EDC contents but
their competences in this area, as measured in different ways during
the years, are not satisfactory: in terms of knowledge, students show
low (national assessments) to medium (ICCS 2016) familiarity with
basic CCE concepts.
– Students do not reflect democratic values and beliefs connected to
high-functioning democratic societies in some HRE and EDC tar-
geted areas (for example, trust in institutions, overall engagement or
recognition of equal rights of different groups).
– Teachers are constantly expressing the lack of detailed and focused
teacher training education; a large number of those that were organ-
ized did not meet the expected level of quality. Personally motivated
and organized learning is still prevailing among teachers.
– Teachers prefer teaching contents in relation to, for example, hu-
manitarian actions, culture and/or ecology over the ones from the
political realm. Group work, peer learning, project and research ap-
proach are methods that are being used more and more in classes,
16 Conducted in school years 2012/2013, 2013/2014 and 2014/2015 by the NCEEE.
28
