JSSE - Journal of Social Science Education

Participation in non-formal education and community education

João Caramelo — 2020-01-02

Do non-formal and informal adult education affect citizens’ political participation during adulthood?

Robin Busse — 2019-04-01

Purpose: While research on political participation hardly takes into account the effects of non-formal or informal education, the effects of formal education are well investigated. The aim of this paper is to determine the extent to which non-formal and informal education contribute to adults’ participation in different political activities when formal educational background and other socioeconomic factors are controlled.

Method: This paper uses data from the German National Educational Panel Study (NEPS, N=9,084). Binomial logistic regressions are used for the analyses, and average marginal effects (AMEs) are used for the model’s output.

Findings: The findings reveal that non-formal and informal adult education significantly affect different political activities. However, the effects of non-formal and informal adult education differ with regard to the different forms of political participation. The results underline the importance of differentiated analyses of political participation and non-formal and informal adult education. In addition, the results show that some types of non-formal and informal education have a greater impact on adults of low socioeconomic status.

Research limitations: This paper cannot account for self-selection effects because adults’ participation in different political activities was collected only in one wave.

The Young Mayor project in Portugal

Mariana Rodrigues — 2019-04-01

Purpose: To investigate the effect of Quality of Participation Experiences (QPE) on young people’s perceptions about the Young Mayor project’s impact.

Design/methodology/approach: This study explores statistical analyses (i.e., cluster analysis and linear regression analysis) of a survey sample (N = 961) involving young people aged between 12 and 18 years to assess differences between groups reporting different levels of QPE (i.e., low, medium and high).

Findings: Participants who had participation experiences with higher developmental quality (i.e., with effective and meaningful opportunities for action and reflection) are more involved in the Young Mayor project, have more positive perceptions about it, and report more civic and political participation experiences in their communities.

Research limitations/implications: The cross-sectional design of this study does not allow to make causal inferences. Therefore, a longitudinal study should be conducted to clarify the relationship between the dimensions under analysis, promoting a better understanding of the impacts of the Young Mayor project on young people’s attitudes and perceptions.

Practical implications: Local projects should promote participation experiences with higher developmental quality to foster their impacts on young people.

Picking up the pieces from austerity

Conor Joseph Magrath — 2019-05-20

The role of immigrant associations in the social inclusion of young people with migrant background

Carolina Jardim — 2019-04-01

Purpose: This article account for an investigation on the role of immigrant associations in the promotion of social inclusion of young people with migrant background.

Design/methodology/approach: After selecting nine immigrant associations located in Portugal, we carried out a broad set of interviews with the coordinators of those associations and with young people that are Afro-descendants and Eastern-European-descendants aged between 15 and 25 years.

Findings: Immigrant associations have three different focuses to respond to young people’s needs fostering their social inclusion. Most afro-descendants associations focus mainly on the promotion of young people’s school success and in the development of leisure activities, youth volunteering and geographic mobility. On the other hand, Eastern European associations and Guinee Bissau association focus mainly on the transmission, maintenance and expression of immigrants’ cultural heritage.

Archaeology goes to high school

Liia Vijand — 2019-12-09

Purpose: The study investigated how various school subjects can be integrated into archaeology teaching and how this could lead students towards empathy and a more sustainable worldview.
Design/methodology/approach: To meet the purpose of this multiple-case study, optional archaeology course development (2011-2019) and students’ questionnaires and feedback group A (2018) and group B (2019) and various empirical material, was analysed in cross-case methods.
Findings: Archaeology interdisciplinarity and analysing long-term human behaviour supports an understanding of human nature, emphasizes empathy and tolerance, and encourages social cohesion.
Research limitations/implications: The study was carried out in Estonia as a multiple-case study and further research, especially in the empathy part, is needed for further conclusions.
Practical implications: Archaeology is interdisciplinary and therefore as a school subject it links together various and sometimes abstract subjects. It gives an understanding of long-term human behaviour, which allows developing students’ empathy and tolerance.

A Yhteiskuntaoppi

Jan Löfström — 2019-07-22

Purpose: This country report aims to provide a view of the current state and recent developments of the school subject social studies in Finland.

Approach: This report draws from research in social studies education that has been done in Finland in the last 20 years, and it also presents selected highlights from the national core curricula and the matriculation exam.

Findings: Social studies has recently got the status of independent school subject and it has got more teaching resources which suggests decision-makers consider it important. It does not have a clear epistemological homebase, as school subjects like history or physics, for example, which poses challenges when defining what kind of academic studies are the most pertinent to a social studies teacher, for example

Obituary for Andreas Fischer - 1955-2019

Reinhold Hedtke — 2019-12-09

Bookreview

Stephan Benzmann — 2019-12-20