Democratic School Engagement and Civic Participation among European Adolescents: Analysis of Data from the IEA Civic Education Study

  Contents
  Effective Student Participation
  Democratic Participatory Learning in the Classroom
  The IEA Civic Education Study Data
  Description of the Analysis Presented in this Paper
  Between-country Differences and Associations with Democratic Participation
  Within-country Analysis of Democratic Learning and Participation at School in Relation to Participation
  References
  Appendix A
  Tables 1-3

Judith Torney-Purta
Carolyn Barber

In the 1980s and early 1990s, it became clear that establishing new democracies in Europe-and maintaining older ones-involves more than putting in place an amended constitution or hearing exhortations about democracy from a fresh set of leaders. Citizens needed to understand the workings of a democratic society and how individuals relate to each other and work together to affect change. These values needed to be reflected at levels ranging from the young person in school to the adult citizen, to the representations on local government bodies, to the national parliament.

Schools have a particularly important role to play in socialization of the next generation's political values, especially in countries where the older generation came of age under a different system. Not only do schools provide students with in-class education related to politics, government, civic involvement and tolerance, but they can also provide opportunities for individuals to learn about democracy more directly and to contribute to community decisions through student councils or other groups. In these settings students have opportunities to experience themselves as empowered participants. In other words, the school can act simultaneously as an educational and a social institution, where both learning and formative processes occur among students. With appropriate policy support, schools can become laboratories for the practice of citizenship and the development of values important for maintaining democratic societies. This is a major premise on which the Education for Democratic Citizenship initiative depends in promoting its objectives of strengthening rights and responsibilities, empowerment, participation, a sense of social justice and respect for diversity (Kerr, Mikkelsen, Pol, Froumin, Losito, & Sardoc, 2004, 2)

Effective Student Participation

Whether one uses the term culture, ethos, atmosphere, environment, or climate as a way of describing schools or classrooms, it is clear that this has become an important focus of researchers and those interested in school reform (Prosser, 1999, Reynolds, et al., 2002). Although it is often not easy to develop the school's defining norms, values, and patterns of interaction in ways that foster active engagement and participation, school reform programs will often be unsuccessful unless attention is paid to these and other aspects of the school climate (Martin, Howard, & Colia, 2004). Freiberg and Stein (1999) speculate that this is because "climate is a real factor in the lives of learners and…it is measurable, malleable and material to those who work in schools" (p. 17). Nearly every conference on the subject of preparing citizens notes that "democracy needs to be taught in a democratic atmosphere" or that it must be "modeled as well as preached." How schools' structures or teachers' pedagogies would have to change in order to achieve this atmosphere has been less clear. Fraser (1999) has called for separate assessment and interventions relating to classroom-level and school-level environment. This matches the views of many social studies and civic educators of the importance of a classroom process that emphasizes opportunities for active participation in discussion in an open and respectful climate, and the democratic climate of the school as a whole, usually emphasizing students possessing power over decisions within the school structure (Hahn, 1998; Torney-Purta, Hahn, & Amadeo, 2001). Open classroom climate, including the extent to which students perceived that they can disagree with each other and with the teacher and that controversial issues can be considered, was a predictor of both knowledge and participation in the IEA study conducted in the 1970s (Torney, Oppenheim, & Farnen, 1975).

In the large majority of European countries the importance of such student involvement is clear. In a recent survey of countries by the Council of Europe, all countries but one reported that pupil participation was based on laws or legal statues. In Spain, for example, the national constitution includes an article stating that students shall have opportunities to participate in the "control and management" of publicly-funded schools (Duerr, 2003). The case study from Italy for the IEA Civic Education Study Study includes the following quotation: The tone in which all relations are established in a school that is perceived as being "democratic…is not the effect of a particular form of teaching, but of a style experienced…Only on this basis will an in-depth and comparative study of the Constitution find that suitable terrain of affective dispositions and social attitudes which can be made into the basis for political awareness" (Visalberghi quoted in Losito, 1999, 405). Another IEA case study, from Germany, expressed similar goals but noted difficulties in transforming the school from "an institution predicated on a special relationship of power held by teachers to an institution guided by the aims of reciprocal communication" (Händle, Oesterreich, & Trommer, 1999, 265).

When students work successfully with others toward a common goal, the results can be substantial. It should not be surprising that recent country-level analysis conducted using data from the IEA Civic Education Study of 14-year-olds (Torney-Purta, Barber, & Richardson, 2004) found significant relationships between student participation and students' levels of trust in various social institutions, including schools. Countries in which students had higher confidence in the effectiveness of their participation in school decision-making had a higher average level of trust in schools. However, countries in which principals reported substantial religious and racial intolerance had students who expressed lower average levels of trust in schools.

Democratic Participatory Learning in the Classroom

Teachers have many opportunities to instruct students on the workings of a tolerant, cooperative, democratic society. Learning about such values and processes in a classroom setting gives students the background that they need to apply similar concepts to their own school's decision-making experiences.

Equally important in many countries is the instruction of students about democratic government processes. All subject areas can contribute to students gaining knowledge about democracy, acquiring skills related to applying this knowledge, and developing relevant attitudes. More specifically, in many countries the curricula in civics stipulates that all students should have the opportunity to learn about political and community life.

Using data collected among 14-year-olds in Norway as part of the IEA Civic Education Study, Mikkelsen (cited in Kerr, et al. 2004) noted that students with the highest scores on tests of civic knowledge and skills were those who reported the most open classroom climates for discussion. Students who felt most encouraged to speak their mind by teachers, were those with the most developed democratic competencies. This corroborates a long-standing set of cross-national findings relating opportunities to discuss potentially controversial issues in the classroom to students' knowledge and participation (Torney et al., 1975; Hahn, 1998). Classroom climate or ethos is an important component in the development of democratic competencies.

These issues and emphases are not new. Statements and prescriptions regarding the importance of students' experience of democracy have been considered for over twenty years and have caught the attention of social scientists as well as educators (Sapiro, 2004). Kerr and colleagues (2004), in a synthesis of regional policy reports, noted that there are still enormous gaps between policy and practice and between policy and outcomes. These authors recommend an ambitious agenda for policy and practice development that focuses on extending the participation of students in their schools, teacher training, and monitoring for the purpose of quality assurance.

Until recently, there have been little empirical data available across the European countries dealing systematically with classroom and school practices related to citizenship and democracy and how they are connected with attitudes and participation. The IEA Civic Education Study is such a source of data, and the remainder of this paper explores this data set in order to serve as an empirical basis for further efforts to reduce the gaps between policy and practice in initiatives such as Education for Democratic Citizenship. The specific focus is on assessing both the value of teaching/learning about democracy, and of practicing democracy in the classroom and the school.

The IEA Civic Education Study Data

The International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA), a consortium of educational research institutes in nearly 60 countries, has been conducting comparative education studies for nearly 50 years. In the early 1990s some member countries, spurred by recent massive changes in political and social structures, asked for a study of civic education that included measures of young people's civic-related attitudes and behaviors. Their aim was to study schools' intensions and practice relating to democracy. The IEA brought to this effort a wide network of research institutes in different countries and a wealth of technical and methodological expertise in cross-national comparative education research.

The first phase of the IEA Civic Education Study consisted of the collection of structured national case studies that were used as the basis for a consensus process to develop content specifications for a test of civic knowledge (with right and wrong answers), a survey of political attitudes and civic behavior, and surveys of the attitudes and perspectives of teachers and school principals. (Torney-Purta, Schwille, & Amadeo, 1999; Steiner-Khamsi, Torney-Purta, & Schwille, 2002). These data also provided contextual information and served as a basis for the conceptual framework used in interpreting the more quantitative data collected in 1999-2000. Although many factors influence the development of attitudes and behaviors, the role of the school has particular importance. Schools are also embedded in a broader culture with a variety of traditions and institutions that are influenced by the position of the country in the world as well as by economic, social, and political values. This requires an examination of school environments as well as the broader national context within which education occurs.

The second phase of the IEA Civic Education Study began in 1997. An International Steering Committee, together with National Research Coordinators, constructed items, and then pre-piloted and piloted an instrument that would be suitable for adolescents. Nationally representative samples of students in the modal grade for 14-year-olds (a total of about 90,000 students from 28 countries) were tested in 1999; upper secondary students ranging in age from 16 to 19 (a total of about 50,000 students from 16 countries) were tested in 2000. In addition to the data collected from students, the attitudes and perspectives of teachers and school principals were assessed in order to provide insight into how education is delivered.

The IEA Civic Education Study's initial analyses concentrated on developing scales of knowledge and attitudes (based on Item Response Theory) and then looking at between-country differences in one scale at a time (Torney-Purta, Lehmann, Oswald, & Schulz, 2001; Amadeo, Torney-Purta, Lehmann, Husfeldt & Nikolova, 2002). Distillation and summaries of this basic analysis have also been published in international journals (Torney-Purta, 2001; 2002). A publication summarizing the basic analysis for the European countries showed how the European countries scored on the knowledge and attitude scales, highlighting the low level of interest in conventional political participation in Northern Europe (Torney-Purta, 2002).

Description of the Analysis Presented in this Paper

To supplement this analysis we have chosen to look primarily at democratic participatory experience within the school among European countries, to examine only data from students (not from teachers or school heads/principals) and to restrict our analysis to the 14-year-olds tested by IEA. However, a scan of results showed that most presented here are highly similar for students in the older population of 17-18 years olds.

This paper presents two types of analysis. First, in order to give a context for understanding democratic participation across Europe, correlations are presented between country averages or means for several indicators of democratic school participation and country averages on scales measuring perceptions of citizenship and expected civic participation (in conventional activities such as voting, in community activities and in activist protest-like activities). These will be referred to as 25-country correlations, or the between-country correlations, because country averages from all 23 European countries that participated as well as the United States and Australia are included. Excluded from these correlations are Chile, Colombia, and Hong Kong. These correlations are reported in Table 1.

Second, in order to suggest directions for the development of policy and practice, an exploration of within-country correlates of these attitudes and expectations will be presented within nine of the participating European countries (Bulgaria and the Czech Republic from the post-Communist countries, Denmark, England, Norway, Sweden, and Switzerland from the long-standing democracies, and Italy and Germany from the democracies established after World War II).

The two indicators from the IEA instrument chosen as outcomes for the regression analyses are expectation of participating as an informed voter, and expectations of community participation. The indicators of democratic participation used as predictors are at three levels: curriculum, classroom culture, and school culture. These can be thought of as related to different types of community in the schools, and include:

Four other indicators, having to do with students' acceptance of norms of citizenship (either conventional or oriented to social movements), belief in the value for democracy of elections and free speech, and frequency of reading newspapers will also be used as predictors in these analyses. Detailed information and sources of the variables can be found in Appendix A.

Between-country Differences and Associations with Democratic Participation

This section reports national-level correlates of three types of learning about democracy at school. The three types are explicit teaching in the curriculum, a classroom culture or ethos that encourages participation in respectful discussion of controversial issues, and a school culture or ethos that gives students opportunities to participate in school governance and confidence in the value of this participation.

Country-level Correlations with Curricular Practices

The analysis summarized in this section deals with the perception of explicit curriculum-based teaching (and learning) about democratic practice and its relation to outcomes in the form of attitudes and intentions to participate. Countries where the average student reports of learning in school about voting and learning about cooperation or getting along with diverse others are countries in which norms of both conventional and social movement citizenship are more likely to be accepted, in which students are more likely to be participants in conventional political activity and in the community, and in which students are more likely to be convinced about the value of elections and free speech in democracy.

First, there is a significant positive correlation of learning about voting and elections in school to the average student score on expecting to vote (Table 1). Pointing out countries with that are high and low helps to make these results concrete (The paper originally prepared for the Council of Europe contains scatter plots). In countries such Cyprus and the Slovak Republic, many students expect that they will vote and many students say they have learned in school about voting, with a similar trend but slightly lower averages for voting in Greece, Poland, Romania and the United States. In Bulgaria, Estonia, and Switzerland few students say they learn explicitly about elections and voting, and few expect to vote. The most obvious outlier is the Russian Federation, where relatively many students say they learn about voting in school, but where relatively few expect to vote. Students in Finland, Slovenia, and Denmark expect to vote even though they are rarely learn about voting and elections in school.

An even higher correlation exists between learning about voting and holding norms relating to conventional political participation by citizens. In Cyprus, Greece, Poland and Romania students believe that conventional participation is important and have learned about voting in school. Students in French Belgium, Finland, Czech Republic, Denmark, England and Estonia do not accept the norms of citizenship for adults as involving voting, joining a party, following political issues, and political discussion, and they also report little instruction in school about voting and elections. It seems that students in Finland and Denmark accept the importance of voting but not the importance of these other conventional political actions. The Russian Federation is again an outlier; relatively many students say they learn about voting in school but relatively few accept the conventional political behaviors as important for adults. Lithuania is an outlier of a different sort; although few students report learning about voting in school, relatively many accept conventional citizenship norms.

For comparison, we correlated country averages on learning about voting with expectations of activism (particularly protest activity). Cyprus and Greece are again high on both, while Finland is low on both. As for outliers, Italy is high on activism but only moderate in reporting learning about voting at school; while Romania, the Russian Federation, and the Slovak Republic are high on learning about elections and voting in school but rather low on activism.

To summarize, in some countries (such as Cyprus and Greece), both learning in school and the political culture outside of school appear to foster conventional political activity and the potential for protest activity. In Italy, an activist political culture seems to encourage the willingness to protest. In Russia, schools are teaching about the importance of voting, but the political culture appears to dampen students' willingness to engage in voting or in other political actions. In some other countries, such as Finland, Denmark, and Slovenia, students learn little about voting in school but are still relatively likely to vote, although they neither accept norms about the importance of other conventional political activities that go beyond voting nor think they will engage in protest activities. In Lithuania, norms of conventional political activity appear to be accepted even in the absence of much instruction in school.

We next move to another type of learning experience at school. There exists at the country level a relationship between learning about cooperation and diversity in school and the expectation of volunteer or charity participation in the community. Again Cyprus is high on both, as are Romania and Portugal. The Czech Republic and Finland are low on both. In Greece although schools stress cooperation and understanding those with different views, most students do not expect to volunteer or collect for charity. Learning about cooperation and diversity is also associated with the expectation of political activism.

In summary, looking at relations at the country level, there is evidence for the value of teaching explicitly about voting and for teaching about cooperation and diversity in the community. In a few countries it seems that political culture or other factors outweigh the effects of teaching, and it is important to look at some within country effects before making recommendations for policy and practice.

Country-level Correlations with Classroom Climate

None of the participation outcomes is associated at the between-country level with classroom climate. Previous research leads us to believe that it may nevertheless be the case that an open classroom climate for discussion is related within countries to some of the other outcomes of interest. That will be explored in a later section.

Country-level Correlations with Participation in a School Council

Many would argue that membership in a student council is one of the major ways in which students can experience democratic participation at school. Countries where a high percentage of students participate in student councils also have many students who expect to participate in activist activities. Once again, this correlation is anchored by Greece and Cyprus, where both school council membership and activism are strong. Anchoring the other end of the continua are the Czech Republic and Finland, where student council participation and activism are both low. Italian and French-Belgian students are likely to expect to participate in non-violent protests even though they are unlikely to be participants in a student council. Students in Norway, Sweden, and Russia are likely to participate in a student council but are low on expected activism.

We might have expected that expectations of voting would be correlated with widespread student council experience. That correlation is not significant, however. That appears to be largely because of one outlier. Student councils are very rare in the Slovak Republic; however, the expectation of voting is very high. Cyprus and Greece are again high on both variables, while Switzerland and Bulgaria are low on both student council membership and expected voting. Sweden and Russia are outliers - high on student council membership but relatively low on expectation of voting.

To summarize the country-level relationships with student council membership, Cyprus and Greece are generally high on student council membership as well as on participation measures. Sweden and Russia show an interesting pattern, as students are highly participative in school councils but apparently uninterested in participation either in voting or protest activism outside school. They do not carry the experience of governance in schools into expectations for participation outside the school.

Country-level Correlations with Confidence in the Value of Participation

The argument is often made that student councils and other student groups are not well organized or focused on problems that matter to students in their schools. In order to address this issue a scale assessing students' confidence that participating in school councils or student groups can make a difference in improving the school was administered. Confidence in the Value of Participation at school is a quite powerful measure of democratic participation in the school context (derived from Yeich & Levine, 1994). Countries where students have this confidence about school participation are likely to hold norms of both conventional and social movement citizenship, and to expect to participate in all three types of political activity. It also shows the familiar high/high pattern in Cyprus and Greece and the low/low pattern in French Belgium, Czech Republic, and Finland. The Nordic countries are of interest here. Although students in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark are confident about the value of their participation in school, they do not have a strong belief in the norms of conventional political participation for citizens outside the school (voting, joining a party, keeping up with issues, participating in discussion).

There is a similar pattern for students' expectations about their own participation in the community. Notably, Italian and French-Belgian students are much more likely to expect to protest than would be expected from their levels of confidence in their school participation.

To summarize the results from confidence in participation at school, there is a positive and strong correlation between the extent to which students believe that they and the groups they join can make a difference in what happens at school and several indices of participation. The results are more substantial than those for student council membership. This suggests that it is not membership in a governance organization that is important but rather an experience of student empowerment in that organization.

Summary of 25-Country National-level Correlations

Looking across the five indicators of democracy at school, there is empirical evidence about the importance not only of teaching about democratic processes but also of practicing them in schools, in particular giving students the opportunity to develop a sense of confidence that their actions can make a difference. For the majority of countries it is possible to predict how strongly the average student will support participation from knowing the percentage of students who are in student councils and the extent to which students as a whole expect that practicing democracy at school can make a difference. Explicit teaching about voting/elections and about cooperation, understanding other with diverse views, are also important. The question answered by analysis in the next section is whether the value of these indicators of democratic participation (derived from between country analysis of average scores) can be corroborated by analysis of variation among students within countries.

Within-country Analysis of Democratic Learning and Participation at School in Relation to Participation

The within-country examination of correlates of democratic participation at school took place in two parts and involved the analysis of data from nine countries. We limited our analysis to two student outcomes: Expectation of Informed Voting and Expectation of Community Participation. We used as potential predictors for both outcomes the three indicators of democratic participation (Open Classroom Climate for Discussion, Student Council Membership, and Confidence in Participation at School). We also used two other predictors for all three analyses: students' beliefs in the basics of democracy, and the frequency with which the student reported reading national and international news in the newspaper. One of the measures of citizenship norms (either conventional or social-movement related) was also included for each analysis. Finally, we used the explicit teaching measures that best matched the outcomes (e.g., learning about voting for voting expectations).

The patterns of predictors were relatively similar between countries but different for the two outcomes. In predicting Informed Voting (Table 2), the most important predictor was Belief in the Basics of Democracy (in all countries except England, where reading the newspaper was most important). In predicting Community Participation (Table 3) the following tended to be among the top three: Norms of Social Movement Citizenship, Learning Cooperation at School, and Reading the Newspaper. The patterns were somewhat variable, however, indicating the community participation may be of a different character in different countries.

Looking across these two tables, Reading the Newspaper was important as a positive predictor of Informed Voting and of Community Participation. Belief in the Basics of Democracy was the most important predictor for Informed Voting only. It was either non-significant or negative as a predictor of Community Participation.

It is the three indicators of democratic participation at school in which we have the greatest interest. In all nine countries either Confidence in Participation at School or Open Classroom Climate accounted for significant amounts of between student variance within countries on both outcomes, holding the other predictors constant. In many countries, both school and classroom climate were significant predictors.

In contrast, participating in a Student Council was a significant but small within-country predictor in only about half the countries for Informed Voting, and only in England for Community Participation. It appears that membership in a student council by itself has a minimal effect upon democratic outcomes. It needs to be enhanced with a sense of confidence that participation can make a difference.

It is also important to note two other patterns. First, among the most important predictors of each of the outcomes was explicit teaching relating to that indicator. In our desire to improve the participatory aspects of schools, we should not lose sight of the value of curriculum-based instruction. Second, reading about national and international news in newspapers is a significant predictor of fairly substantial size of both participation indicators. This suggests that media education may be an important direction to explore.

Discussion and Recommendations

For many years those concerned about fostering democracy, the assumption has been that democratic participation in schools is valuable. For the first time, the IEA Civic Education Study has allowed an empirical examination of that assumption. The national-level correlations allowed us to identify those countries with particular issues (overall lack of confidence in participation at school, for example, or a level of attitudes or expected participation lower than what would be expected on the basis of school factors). The predictor analysis showed that within the countries more democratic participation is associated with positive outcomes for students. Explicit teaching about democracy also has considerable value, as does reading the newspaper. Some of these effects appear to be mediated through students' acceptance of norms (beliefs that adult citizens should vote or discuss politics or that they should volunteer or join civil society organizations) or by beliefs in democratic values.

Examining the individual items in the Open Classroom Climate scale reminds us why these are important, but also suggests challenges to policy and practice. Students who had high scores on this scale agreed that "students feel free to disagree openly with their teachers about political and social issues" and also that "teachers encourage the discussion of political social issues about which people have different opinions." Although many teachers across countries agree in principle that such discussions are valuable, not every teacher is sufficiently skilled to guide such a discussion.

Looking at the individual items included in the Confidence in Participation at School scale is also encouraging and at the same time sobering. "Electing student representatives to suggest changes in how the school is run makes schools better" and "organizing groups of students to state their opinions could help solve problems in this school" are two of these items. Although many educators will agree in principle that these are valuable, others will argue that adults know best and students should be ceded power very gradually.

We also need to consider which of these factors are amenable to policy influence, and what types of policy can both encourage more democratic participation and assist teachers in gaining the skills to foster and use these experiences in a productive way. Based on these empirical findings, recommendations of several types emerge. The most important is to encourage debate on these issues by policy makers and the examination of policy opportunities, policy constraints and ways forward in capacity building. Additionally, several other recommendations can be made at the school, student, and teacher levels:

References

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Judith Torney-Purta
and
Carolyn Barber
Department of Human Development
College of Education
University of Maryland
College Park, MD 20742 USA

jtpurta@umd.edu

Appendix A: Descriptions of Variables Used in Analysis

Participation in student council: Dichotomous item asking students whether they have participated in a student council, student government, or student or class parliament. Reported at the country level as percent who have participated.

Confidence in participation at school: IRT scale measuring the perceived effectiveness of student groups in making decisions in school.

Classroom climate for discussion: IRT scale measuring perceived openness of classroom climate for discussion of topics from various points of view.

Explicit teaching about voting/elections: Four-point item measuring whether students feel that they have learned about the importance of voting in school. Reported at the country level as percent "agreeing" or "strongly agreeing" with the statement.

Explicit teaching about cooperation with diverse groups: Three-item scale measuring students' perceptions of their opportunities to learn about understanding cooperating with others with different ideas in the school and community.

Student Attitudes and Outside-of-School Practices:

Norms of conventional participation: IRT scale measuring students' beliefs in the importance of paying attention to and discussing politics, and respecting government.

Norms of social-movement participation: IRT scale measuring students' beliefs in the importance of protecting communities, human rights, and the environment.

Beliefs in the basics of democracy: Two-item scale measuring students' beliefs that free speech and elections are valuable to democracy (1 = very bad for democracy; 4 = very good for democracy.

Newspaper reading: Two-item scale measuring how frequently students read national and international news in the newspaper.

Expectations for Future Participation:

Expectation of informed voting: Two-item scale of student expectations of voting in national elections and collecting information about candidates prior to voting.

Expectation of community participation: Two-item scale of student expectations of volunteering in the community or collecting money for a social cause.

Expectation of activism: Two-item scale of student expectations of participating in a non-violent protest and collecting signatures for a petition.

Tables

Table 1: Illustrative Correlations between Country-Averages in Civic-related Experiences and Country-Averages in Student Civic Outcomes

Experience Outcome Correlation
Learning about Voting

Expectation of Voting

Norms of Conventional Citizenship

Expectation of Activism

55

.71

.51

Learning about Cooperation and Diversity

Expectation of Community Participation

.58
Participation in Student Council

Activist Participation

Expectations of Voting

.43

n.s.
Confidence in Participation

Norms of Conventional Citizenship

Expectation of Activism

.61

.54

Table 2: Standardized Regression Coefficients for Predictors of Informed Voting in Nine Countries

Bulgaria

Czech Republic

Denmark

England

Germany

Italy

Norway

Sweden

Switzerland

R²

.20

.20

.22

.23

.21

.18

.24

.20

.15

Confidence in Participation at School

.15

.08

.11

.19

n.s.

.11

.11

.06

.08

Open Classroom Climate for Discussion

.08

n.s.

.14

.08

.10

.11

.10

.14

.08

Participate in Student Council

n.s.

.05

n.s.

.06

.07

n.s.

.10

.05

n.s.

Belief in Basics of Democracyl

.18

.28

.21

.15

.21

.18

.21

.21

.22

Read Newspaper

.18

.14

.12

.21

.14

.13

.20

.14

.10

Norms of Conventional Citizenship

.16

.11

.17

.12

.16

.12

.09

.14

.11

Learned about Voting at School

n.s.

.16

.09

.10

.17

.14

.16

.08

.14

Note: p < .01.

Table 3: Standardized Regression Coefficients for Expectations of Community Participation in Nine Countries

Bulgaria

Czech Republic

Denmark

England

Germany

Italy

Norway

Sweden

Switzerland

R²

.13

.12

.16

.18

.16

.17

.13

.13

.14

Confidence in Participation at School

n.s.

n.s.

.06

.08

.09.

n.s.

.06

n.s.

.09

Open Classroom Climate for Discussion

.14

.06

.07

.16

n.s.

.11

.09

.10

.07

Participate in Student Council

n.s.

n.s

n.s.

.05

n.s.

n.s.

n.s.

n.s.

n.s.

Belief in Basics of Democracyl

n.s.

-.06

n.s.

n.s.

n.s.

n.s.

n.s.

n.s.

-.06

Read Newspaper

.11

.19

.19

.16

.14

.17

.15

.09

.10

Norms of Social Citizenship

.14

.20

.23

.11

.24

.16

.16

.22

.25

Learned Cooperation

.16

.08

.12

.16

.15

.20

.14

.16

.10

Note: p < .01.

 

Keywords: Civic education, democratic citizenship, competencies, methods, processes, Education for Democratic Citizenship, EDC, teaching citizenship education, teacher education, democracy

 

 © 2006 sowi-online e.V., Bielefeld  Leading Editors of JSSE Special Edition 2005: Ruud Veldhuis, Bruno Losito, Cesar Birzea  WWW-Presentation: Norbert Jacke  Processing: Claudia Hartmann; Hans-Erich Webers  URL: http://www.jsse.org/2005-se/torney_purta_barber_iea_analysis.htm  Publishing date: 2005/02/16