Studies and reports
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View details of studies, reports and papers on pre and post-16 citizenship and read formal evaluation reports of the post-16 citizenship development programme.
Research report on young people's civic participation
The Citizenship Educational Longitudinal Study has published a report entitled - ‘Young People’s Civic Participation In and Beyond School: Attitudes, Intentions and Influences’ which discusses young people's civic participation including volunteering. The report, which was funded by the DCSF, investigates young people’s attitudes and intentions regarding political participation and informal civic participation and what the main influences are. Key findings show that young people's intentions to civic participation are more influenced by experiences in contexts such as school, family, peers and the local neighbourhood. Key recommendations from the report for practitioners include taking the opportunity provided by the new National Curriculum to develop more flexible citizenship education policies that respond to the backgrounds and community contexts of the students and the school; look to ease time pressures on key stage 4 students which could limit civic participation; and to provide more opportunities and exposure in the curriculum to news and current affairs and discuss experiences and attitudes to civic participation. The Citizenship Educational Longitudinal Study (CELS) began in 2001 and was designed to investigate the short and long term effects of citizenship education in schools on students over time. This report is the sixth annual report published in the CELS study.
Leadership and the learner voice
This collection of research reports examines leadership and the learner voice in the UK learning and skills sector. The reports highlight the value of students’ increased and continuous involvement in their own education and in the organisations where they study. They demonstrate that enhanced learner engagement often produces positive outcomes related to student learning, quality improvement and sustainable organisational change. Learner engagement has clear links to citizenship education by creating opportunities for developing political literacy and associated skills. Of particular interest is research by John Shuttle (Brighton and Hove City Council) exploring learner engagement and its impact on decision-making within FE and adult learning. This study identifies a clear demarcation between more mature organisations (which increasingly engage students at all levels of the institution) and those that merely inform or consult with learners.
LSC report on learner involvement
Since September 2007 all further education learning providers are expected to have a learner involvement strategy (LIS) in place. Following the publication of the handbook, Developing a Learner Involvement Strategy, the LSC commissioned an evaluation of the impact of LIS in further education and work based learning, which will run until May 2009. The evaluation has found that 65 per cent of providers have a learner involvement programme fully in place and over 70 per cent of these have a strategy. Important findings so far regarding the impact of LIS include an improvement in communication between staff and learners, changes in approach as a result of learner involvement and staff confidence in how they involve learners. For further information on this please see the article from the latest Citizenship News. The full evaluation of the impact of LIS is available on the LSC website.
Listening to the voices of young people - DCSF guidance
New guidance promoting young people’s participation has been produced by the Department for Children, Schools and Families. The guidance, Working together: Listening to the voices of children and young people, provides information on principles and practice and highlights the benefits of effective participation. Young people’s participation can also support active citizenship through hands on experience of the decision-making process, experience of rights and responsibilities and providing real life opportunities for engaging with the citizenship curriculum. The guidance shows how young people’s rights and wellbeing can be supported through enabling them to influence decisions which affect them.
Improving a sense of belonging – the Goldsmith report
Enhance the common bond of citizenship to strengthen our sense of belonging says Lord Goldsmith in his report Citizenship: our common bond published on 11 March. As part of the Governance of Britain green paper, published on 3 July 2007, the Prime Minister asked Lord Goldsmith to carry out this review of citizenship. The report makes recommendations about how to make it clearer who is a citizen and what it means to be a citizen, how to enhance our sense of shared belonging along all stages of a citizen's journey through life and how to engage newcomers to the UK in UK society. In particular recommendations include giving consideration to extending citizenship ceremonies to all young people and the introduction of deliberation days in advance of each general election for political debates and events. The report praises citizenship education’s emphasis on developing young people’s interest in civic participation through active citizenship and encourages continuing efforts to maximise capacity for this rather than introducing any form of compulsory civic participation. The report also recommends a reconsideration of the status of citizenship education in primary schools where it is not currently a statutory part of the curriculum. The report also suggests creating a national day similar to those held in Australia.
Personal, learning and thinking skills research
QCA has developed ‘A Framework of Personal, Learning and Thinking Skills (PLTS), 11-19’, comprising six groups of skills that, together with the functional skills of English, mathematics and ICT, are essential to success in learning, life and work. This framework includes a skill set focusing specifically on ‘effective participation’, as well as other skills that can be developed through citizenship activities and support citizenship learning. QIA has commissioned research, managed by LSN, to explore and illustrate ways in which these skills can be developed and applied across different citizenship contexts. See the interim report and the final report.
Research on Progression In Citizenship from Key Stage 4 to Post-16
Progress is being made in supporting progression from key stage 4 to post-16 citizenship, although links across pre-16 and post-16 are still limited according to a piece of research conducted by Trisha Fettes, University of Warwick. The study involved twenty centres including interviews with 15 post-16 managers, 9 key stage 4 citizenship coordinators and 329 responses to a learner questionnaire, a follow up survey and two group discussions with practitioners. Examples of practice were found that suggest that centres are becoming increasingly aware of the need to build upon their learners’ prior learning and achievements and to assess progress through post-16 citizenship programmes. This practice needs to be disseminated, and developed further, to show how coherence across the 14-19 age-range and different settings can be secured. High quality staff development was recognised as vital in successful implementation of citizenship 14-19 and capacity building for the future. See executive summary and full report.
House of Commons Education and Skills Committee Citizenship Education Report
The House of Commons Education and Skills Committee report on citizenship education together with formal minutes, oral and written evidence was published on 8 March 2007. The wide-ranging report took evidence from many stake-holders including the Post-16 Citizenship Support Programme and called for Ministers to maintain robustness and resolve on citizenship education, warning against it being seen as an ‘add-on’ to the rest of the curriculum. The Government published its response to the House of Commons citizenship education report on 22 May 2007 in which it said ‘Ministers remain resolutely committed to citizenship education’. In response to the committee’s support for the Post-16 Citizenship Support Programme and call for further developments in this area, the Government responded positively, saying for example that the support programme is ‘well-placed to help post-16 learners build upon the enhanced focus on diversity within the National Curriculum, following the recommendations of Sir Keith Ajegbo’s review [of citizenship and diversity in the curriculum.’
Towards Consensus
In the Toward Consensus report Ofsted announces that the teaching of citizenship is improving with much good practice to be shared. Findings show schools with strong leadership, specialist teachers and offering qualifications are doing particularly well and the Post-16 Citizenship Development Programme was cited as having been successful. The Towards Consensus report press release has more details.
The National Foundation for Educational Research have been commissioned by the DfES to undertake a citizenship education longitudinal study over an eight year period tracking a cohort of young people entering secondary school in 2002 when citizenship became a statutory school subject. "Active Citizenship and Young People: Opportunities, Experiences and Challenges in and beyond school" is the fourth annual report from the citizenship longitudinal study. It highlights excellent progress including more time dedicated to citizenship lessons, increased pupil awareness of citizenship, importance of youth voice, increased confidence of teachers and increase in the number of schools with formal assessment of citizenship.
Citizenship Education and the Department of Constitutional Affairs
A new Public Legal Education Task Force has been set up by the Department for Constitutional Affairs (now part of the Ministry of Justice). It will identify strategies to increase citizens’ awareness and understanding of their legal rights and responsibilities and how they can put this into practice in their daily lives. The National Foundation for Educational Research has done a mapping study on citizenship education to inform the work of the Task Force.
Work-based learning and post-16 citizenship
The objectives of this research on work-based learning and post-16 citizenship, carried out by Trisha Fettes (September 2005), were to identify the critical success factors for citizenship in the work-based route, issues relating to citizenship development in work-based contexts and possible ways of addressing these issues.
Assessing post-16 citizenship
This report on assessing post-16 citizenship by Martin Cross (August 2005), investigates the use of a five stage process for assessing citizenship designed and trialled by QCA. The report considers use of the active learning cycle, progress file, the key skill of improving own learning and one-to-one tutorials.
Post-16 citizenship in the youth and community sector
A review of practice in youth and community pilot projects in the Post-16 Citizenship Development Programme by Professor Andrew Miller (June 2005). See also a PowerPoint presentation by Tony Gallagher HMI on Citizenship: a youth work context.
International citizenship education study
View England's results from the IEA international citizenship education study exploring what citizenship and education means to 14 year-olds, DfES Research Project.
Changing perceptions of citizenship
The negotiating transitions to citizenship study funded by ESRC examines young people's experience of citizenship and how their perceptions of themselves as citizens change over time.
Young people and social action
The young people's involvement in social action study funded by ESRC highlights how 12-27 year-olds participate in society and how to encourage young people to take part in social action. Summaries of other ESRC research on citizenship are also available.
Defining active citizenship
This paper on defining active citizenship (2002) by Professor Sir Bernard Crick explores the meaning of the term 'active citizenship' with am emphasis on the importance of working together for a common purpose.
Discussion paper for citizenship
This discussion paper for citizenship (2001) by Julia Fiehn, previously the project manager of the Post-16 Citizenship Development Programme, identifies some key issues on citizenship education to provoke discussion.
Crick report: citizenship for 16-19 year olds
The influential Crick report on citizenship for 16-19 year olds (2000) recommended that citizenship should be acknowledged as a Key Life Skill, that an entitlement to the development of citizenship should be established for all students and trainees in the first phase of
post-compulsory education and training and that all young adults should have effective opportunities to
participate in citizenship activities.
Crick report: pre-16 citizenship
The final Crick report on pre-16 citizenship (1998) of the advisory group on citizenship recommending the implementation of a statutory requirement for citizenship education in schools.
Programme Evaluation
National evaluations of the post-16 citizenship development programme
Ofsted evaluation
A report from Ofsted and the ALI provides an evaluation the fourth year of the Post-16 Citizenship Development Programme. It describes the benefits of involvement in citizenship programmes in a range of settings, with examples of good practice from school sixth forms, sixth form colleges, GFE colleges, youth services and training providers. It explores the issues at the centre of future citizenship development, such as entitlement in the curriculum and assessment, and makes recommendations for action.
NFER evaluation
The National Foundation for Educational Research was commissioned by the DfES to evaluate the progress of the Post-16 Citizenship Development Programme at the end of each of its first three years of development. Click below to read their methodology and reports.
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Useful reading
A list of useful books on citizenship and a range of citizenship articles about democracy, active citizenship, participation and post-16 education are available on this website.