Citizenship Foundation: educating for effective citizenship

Date Published

2008

Target age

KS3 - KS4

Details

Publisher:

Citizenship Foundation
(Email the publisher)

Description

It is almost a decade since Sir Bernard Crick's report Education for citizenship and the teaching of democracy in schools made the case for placing citizenship education at the heart of both the statutory curriculum and the broader life of the school.

In 2005, with funding from the Esmee Fairbairn Foundation, the Citizenship Foundation set up a research and development project to investigate ways in which a 'Citizenship Manifestos' can help schools to bring this sense of wider purpose to their Citizenship programmes.

A Citizenship Manifesto is a short, public document that sets out a school's vision for Citizenship. Rather like the manifesto of a political party, a Citizenship Manifesto outlines the school's democratic values and its intended programme of Citizenship activities for the coming year or years - in the form of a promise or pledge. Developed through the collective effort of representatives of a range of the school's 'stakeholders' - students, staff (teaching and non-teaching), governors, parents and community members - Citizenship Manifestos not only raise the profile of and bring structure and coherence to the school's Citizenship programme, but they also open up its benefits to the community beyond the school gates.

One important outcome of this project has been the publication of a guide for secondary schools explaining what is involved in developing a Citizenship Manifesto and why they might want to commit to one. The guide brings together the insights and experiences of the twelve schools involved in the project in a practical, easy-to-use format.