Our democracy places high demands on its citizens. Political decisions have an impact on many different areas of life, they often affect future generations or neighboring countries and they are influenced by international and global developments. Civic education enables people to recognize and represent their interests, to participate in political processes and, in doing so, to meet their fellow human beings and their concerns with respect. By promoting civic education, we strengthen our democracy.
We promote civic education by...
... initiating and promoting educational offers for different target groups.
We focus both on offers that use newly developed and innovative teaching and learning formats as well as on the further development and dissemination of internationally established methods and principles that are still little known in Switzerland. In our educational work, we emphasize interactive learning environments in which democratic processes can be experienced and democratic manners and participation can be practiced. In this understanding, the field of civic education overlaps with areas such as human rights education, the promotion of participation and the like.
[more on our understanding of civic education] (in German)
[more on projects and activities]
... providing scientific support for civic education.
Scientific research is invaluable for the development and planning of content and didactics as well as for the evaluation of educational offerings. In the social and political sciences and humanities, questions that are central to our democracy are discussed. For example, comparative research shows how different democracies are composed. Findings from this research can help to reflect upon one's own democracy. Current and relevant discourses from political science should thus be transferred to civic education. We make a contribution to enabling this in educational offers for different target groups.
Scientific methods are also valuable for the evaluation of educational opportunities. It is important to us that educational formats are evaluated regularly, that these evaluations comply with social science standards and that the results of the evaluations are incorporated into the further development of the offerings.
[more on projects and activities]
... network and exchange with actors from practice and science.
We foster the professional exchange in a national and international network. In particular, we participate in exchanges between actors from the out-of-school and actors from the school sectors and in exchanges between actors and supporting organizations in areas whose topics and methods overlap with those of civic education. These include human rights education, the promotion of participation, tolerance training, projects that address democracy as a way of life and approaches from the field of peacebuilding.
You can access our [association statutes] here (in German). If you have any questions regarding the statutes, please contact the board.