NECE Focus Group Meeting 2015
“Hard-to-reach learners and youth”
19 – 21 October 2015
Thessaloniki, Greece
www.nece.eu
#NECE2015
A workshop report by Ivo Pertijs
Hard-to-reach learners: beyond ‘them’ and ‘us’
More than 30 practitioners, researchers, policy makers and representatives of nongovernmental organisations gathered at the Goethe-Institut Thessaloniki to discuss hard-toreach learners and their role in citizenship education. Many participants considered
themselves as ‘hybrids’, being for example a researcher and a practitioner or working for a
non-governmental organisation and being a researcher. During the forum it became clear
that creating bridges between the different actors in the field of citizenship education is of
great value. By sharing thoughts right at the start of the forum, immediately new thoughts
and mattering questions appeared. This would characterize the work of the focus group in
Thessaloniki: (a focus on) formulating the right questions instead of answering the questions
instantly. This method proofed to be very valuable and fitted with the aim to offer time and
space to discuss the project and to explore further opportunities for the future.
Food for thought
One of the first concerns to be mentioned was the relationship between practitioners and
researchers. Practitioners usually ask ‘how’, while researches frequently ask ‘why’. These
questions are often disconnected. Another thought that came to the group’s mind was the
fact that citizenship education can give skills for negative empowerment. If this is the case,
what should be the values of citizenship education? Should citizenship education be valuebased? Values and conflict should be made visible, was one of the preliminary conclusions,
but the debate continues about how to do this and if there should be space for negotiation(s)
or not.
This issue of identities and hard-to-reach learners sparked a vivid discussion about borders
and nations. Obviously, the existence of multiple identities makes it complex to cross identity
borders. The participants noted that borders were permanently moving. One should be
aware of that when imposing borders and boundaries. Borders are defined by struggle (act
by ethnic groups). “All countries had different borders one hundred years ago”, one
participant noted. “A nation is a myth, and ‘us’ and ‘them’ is a part of this myth. You can
cross borders between an area or within a nation.” An important notion: citizenship education
is not to deconstruct the myth, but to play with myths and identities!
#NECE2015
1
Burning issues
After the first meetings a number of burning issues had to be defined by the group in order to
specify its needs, but new and essential questions popped up.
From theory to practice and vice versa: The disconnection between the academic world and
schools reappeared in the group discussion. A slow reaction by researchers to practical
issues caused unwanted delays. When practitioners become researchers, action focussed
researchers, action focussed research is quickly and often easily spread via social media like
Twitter, although this has possible negative side effects as well. Nevertheless, examples
from Great Britain and Ukraine showed that it was possible to bring theory and practice
together. One of the recommendations made by the group is to match practitioners and
researchers more often, for example via speed dating. Another option is to create a system
of buddying (teachers and researchers).
Methods: During the workshops a wide variety of methods were presented by the
participants, but nevertheless a lively discussion emerged when the group talked about the
applied methods to reach hard-to-reach learners. How can we use creativity as a
methodology for citizenship education? How to address the narratives of fear beyond merely
rational arguments? But also, how should citizenship education be implemented at
universities? The participants concluded that citizenship education is a key competence that
should be delivered across schools and communities. Big political issues about power,
identity and conflict should be covered by citizenship education. One of the participants
stressed that it is important to start philosophy lessons at a young age to develop skills of
critical thinking for later citizenship education. Schools should ask the right question(s). “A
good question starts with why”, one participant underlined.
Capture connections: A very practical matter was addressed at this part of the discussion:
how can we capture all the connections we gain here and sustain communication? The
group agreed that the developed tools should be saved and archived, because normally they
get lost after the end of the project.
Social inclusion: The issue of social inclusion raised many (theoretical) questions. What’s in it
for the majority? How to deal with resistance from hard-to-reach learners without
marginalizing them? We as ‘agents’ of which change? One of the conclusions: be aware of
the limits of education!
Results and discussions
While the first day of the focus group was centred around the question ‘why?’, the second
day had to give answers to the question ‘how?’. The outcome of the workshop was not only
solutions, but also various questions emerged during the discussions.
One of the workshops was about schools as providers of citizenship education for or with
hard-to-reach learners. A main point of concern was how to decide what the quality of
citizenship education is. In other words, when can citizenship education be qualified as
successful? For example, what if a student is following good citizenship education and
decides to become radical? If you choose those radical values, is this fine or not? This is a
challenging question. The group started to move to various approaches. One of the
conclusions was that one shouldn’t shy away from difficulties. “We felt it would be good to try
the criteria. Could this be shared on a European basis? Are we still miles away from
European citizenship education?”, a focus group member wondered. The participants of this
workshop concluded that if you offer high quality citizenship education, you will be able to
reach the hard-to-reach learners.
In another workshop on hard-to-reach tools participants were presenting their projects. One
of the issues the participants were discussing was the use of different methods to reach out
#NECE2015
2
to the hard-to-reach groups. “Not purely discursive, but use for example theatre, films and
literature to reach the hard-to-reach learners”, one of them said. “Tools by itself cannot do
everything. It cannot be simply transferred, without basic understanding. Who will you
choose as an audience? That matters.”
The focus of the last workshop was on social inclusion. The participants had started by
discussing how to define social inclusion. “There are different approaches, but the common
thing is that social inclusion is an ongoing process. It needs a systematic approach”, one of
the participants said. There has to be an understanding that social inclusion is part of a
change. “That change has to be on both sides. This is a process where you enable and
include the hard-to-reach groups.” What is in it for the majority? “If more people are included,
there will be more debate, more opinions, more negotiations and more tension.” If we give
space to the minority, it should be attractive for the majority as well. Otherwise they will have
the feeling that they are losing their privilege. This might lead to more racism and hatred, for
example against Roma or refugees. One of the participants gave an example. “Ten years
ago there were special places for Roma. I wondered ‘why special places for Roma?’ My
teacher explained that otherwise they might beat me up later. So one fear was changed with
another.”
An important matter was addressed in the discussion: by naming hard-to-reach learners, we
are excluding them already. This suggests that something is wrong with ‘them’ and we
should help ‘them’. This raises many political and ethical questions. Why do we name
ourselves mainstream and who decides this? Asking the question ‘why’ proofed to be much
easier than to answer these challenging questions.
Resistance
Though a lot of questions had been raised, a number of very concrete solutions to specific
problems were provided as well. A key question was how to bridge expectations and needs.
One of the participants talked about the use of different tricks. “Migrants present themselves
often as being in trouble, but in practice this is not the case. A migrant might say ‘They didn’t
choose me because I am an immigrant’, but some migrants don’t recognize the problem.
‘Make yourself more successful’, sounds much more sexy. After that they spread the
information. Sometimes it is about patience.” Another participant explained that the
resistance can also come from parents, for example the parents of Roma children. In this
particular case, the parents had to be approached to reach the children. A possible way to fix
resistance among hard-to-reach learners is to invite outsiders and to think out of the box, for
example by organizing a performance.
Conclusions
After several days of dynamic and sometimes provocative discussions and after having
raised many new questions concerning approaches of hard-to-reach learners, the focus
group came to several conclusions. A lot of good practices were shared and the focus group
feels the urge to collect and to archive the materials online. Subgroups with a specific task
could emerge within this focus group to prepare materials for the next meeting. Members of
the hard-to-reach group are going to write a book that will bring together the themes of
citizenship education and marginalized hard-to-reach groups. The book is going to be part of
the discussion at the next focus group meeting. Often underestimated values of this kind of
focus groups are the strength of the network and the fact of sharing thoughts that go beyond
hands-on projects. As one of the participants said, there were a lot of ‘hidden treasures’ of
ideas, thoughts and experiences within this group that popped up during personal talks or at
a dinner. These ‘treasures’ not only created food for thought, but also gave an impetus for
setting up new and exciting projects.
#NECE2015
3