Citizenship education: the search for meaningful delivery within an English high school

Allen, Eileen Marie (2009) Citizenship education: the search for meaningful delivery within an English high school. PhD thesis, University of Glasgow.

Abstract

This thesis examines the experience of one English high school in the birthing pangs of citizenship education, a mandatory entitlement introduced into English schools in September 2002. The project traces a series of developments over a period of four years and documents my search, as a practitioner-researcher, for a meaningful way to deliver citizenship education within my own school. Staff, parents, governors and students (aged 13 years to 17 years) all contribute towards this project in providing both qualitative and quantitative data. While this research uses a case study approach it also draws upon a sample that extends beyond the immediate school community - this is done in the quest to provide an understanding in the stimuli for active citizenship and probes the perceptions of Members of the Westminster Parliament in office between 2003 and 2004. While many of the findings are generated from a mixture of interviews and questionnaires, a period of quasi-experimentation within the classroom also provides data for discussion.
This research provides insight into some of the problems associated with launching a centrally-imposed initiative at school level. It adds to the literature on citizenship education by providing a variety of evidence from the perceptions of an educational community, as well as offering information on the possible effectiveness of differing approaches to citizenship education. In particular, it indicates that efforts to generate a culture of active citizenship might have greater appeal when schools can create not just confident, secure and value-conscious young people, but ones who move in circles outside of their comfort zones. This project also demonstrates the potential value of a mixed-methods approach to practitioner-research. As a separate feature it adds to the knowledge-base on political socialisation.

• Item Type: Thesis (PhD)
• Qualification Level: Doctoral
• Subjects: L Education > L Education (General); L Education > LC Special aspects of education
• Colleges/Schools: College of Social Sciences > School of Education
• Supervisor's Name: Carrington, Prof. Bruce
• Date of Award: 2009
• Depositing User: Dr Eileen Marie Allen
• Unique ID: glathesis:2009-697
• Copyright: Copyright of this thesis is held by the author.
• Date Deposited: 15 Apr 2009
• Last Modified: 10 Dec 2012 13:24
• URI: https://theses.gla.ac.uk/id/eprint/697