Teachers play a crucial role in the political socialization of adolescents. Using Q-Methodology, we explored high school teachers' conceptions of good citizenship in post-genocide Rwanda. Teachers ranked 50 statements, describing a 'good citizen', on a 9-column grid, anchored by 'least important citizenship behaviour' and 'most important…

The study evaluated 60 middle school students and 191 high school students on their willingness to recite or not recite the Pledge and their rationale. Overall, 60% of the middle school students and 68.6% of the high school students chose not to recite the loyalty oath. For the European Americans students, the most common rationale among the…

In June 2012, the Philippine government implemented what it called the K+12 Curriculum which reformed its basic education system by adding two more years of schooling to the then existing 10-year structure. Complicated by the long experience and participation of the Filipinos in the diaspora, the constantly lingering thought of leaving for greener…

This article looks at the way in which patriotism and citizenship were used almost interchangeably in educational circles during the first half of the twentieth century. It traces the development of patriotism, citizenship and civics teaching during this period by discussing the way in which the London County Council approached these areas in the…

In this essay Duck-Joo Kwak explores a moral perfectionist approach to citizenship education, which is distinct from liberal and communitarian models. One of educational challenges to this approach is how to cultivate our students' sense of membership, which is shaped by a thick sense of the good life, while being not merely compatible with but…

The author presents evidence of "glaring gaps in U.S. students' civic knowledge, motivation, and interest." From the inception of the United States through the mid-20th century, he writes, civic education was at the center of U.S. schooling. Since then, however, there has been a decline in civics instruction, fueled by increasing…

Public institutions of higher education are charged with "preparing the next generation of informed, engaged citizens for our democracy" (American Association of State Colleges and Universities [AASCU] 2003, 1). Many institutions have fulfilled this mandate by becoming educational partners with Debate Watch, a program of the Commission on…

How do researchers and practitioners understand and interrogate education reform when it is heralded as the solution to many problems, not all of which are educational? As importantly, how can applied educational researchers delve "beneath the skin" of "given" problems to solve or report, and suggest a range of explanations? In…

Educators, not to mention philosophers of education, find themselves in a difficult position nowadays. They are confronted with problems such as which kind of values one would want citizens to embrace, or to what extent social practices of a particular group may differ from what is generally held. In this essay, Paul Smeyers and Yusef Waghid focus…

The aim of this field study was to investigate the hidden curriculum of school rules delimited to the moral construction of "the good pupil" embedded in the system of school rules in two primary schools. According to the findings, the rule system mediates a moral construction of the good pupil to the children, and this actually includes…

This paper considers the social significance and interaction between sport and the allied themes of citizenship, civic identity and social control in contemporary Britain. It is set against a backdrop of an emerging cosmopolitanism and politics of difference and is posed in response to renewed interest in notions of "Britishness",…

With reference to the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, this article shows how the Chinese state continues to be a key actor in defining citizenship and citizenship education by promoting nationalism and nation-specific elements of citizenship education while linking its people to an increasingly interconnected world. In particular, this study examines…

This paper explores the construction of local and national identities among secondary school students in post-colonial Hong Kong. As a Chinese society that has undergone a prolonged period of British colonial rule, the reunification of capitalist Hong Kong with the motherland under socialism in 1997 has set the context for a negotiation of…

This study explores secondary social studies teachers' beliefs about the concept of citizenship. The development of citizenship in young people is an often-stated goal for schooling in the USA. The most prominent social studies professional organization, the National Council for the Social Studies, describes education for citizenship as the…

This case study examined how Singapore adolescents from different socio-economic, academic, and racial backgrounds positioned themselves as citizens within a highly-regulated, centralized educational context. Through interviews, classroom observations, and the author investigated students' conceptions of citizenship and their perspectives of the…