Nurturing Democracy

“The tone of modern political discourse [in Australia] has caused younger generations to become disillusioned with government, and by extrapolation, with democracy.”  SOURCE 

“In a result that confirmed the surprise findings of our 2012 Poll, only 59% of Australians say that ‘democracy is preferable to any other kind of government’, and more than one in eight (13%) say that ‘for someone like me, it doesn’t matter what kind of government we have’. Less than half (48%) of 18–29-year-old  Australians say they prefer democracy over any other kind of government.”  SOURCE

Today I was immensely proud of the students at our school and impressed with the generosity of local people seeking election to parliament. Our Student Representative Council (SRC) hosted an educational forum, attended by 300 students in our school hall, involving the nine of the eleven candidates contesting the federal electorate of Throsby in the upcoming election. It is the kind of event that, our school believes, begins to address the malaise evident in our Australian democracy if the Lowy Institute data is to be believed. It was the  beginning of a more authentic engagement, for the young men and women at our school, with the ongoing dialogue that makes society civil. It is the beginning of a tradition at our school that will nurture our democracy locally and we hope the model gains widespread traction with other schools.

Candidates for Throsby
Candidates for Throsby (via ABC Election Guide)

Context

Two years ago, while on a leadership exchange to Denmark during their national election campaign, I was impressed with the authentic, active nature of the student engagement with the political process.  The Danish students were active participants in the civic life of their community, organising forums, asking intelligent questions of the candidates about issues being debated across their country and generally valuing their democracy.

In fact, I was so impressed it has become a passion to implement these ideas at our school and hopefully, to demonstrate that the model can work for schools across Australia where many feel civics and citizenship courses lack authenticity and genuine impact. For the last two years our school has had a program involving many political leaders, at all levels of government, working with the Student Representative Council. Recent research into youth and democracy (see quotes and sources above) in Australia make it clear in my mind why we need to nurture our democracy.

Nurturing Democracy Program

Since 2011, Dapto High School has implemented a program to improve outcomes, specifically for civics and citizenship, called Nurturing Democracy. This has involved the Student Representative Council meeting local, state and federal political leaders. These leaders, from a range of different political parties, have shared their time, insights and experiences with students in workshops and presentations.

The focus is on Australian democratic processes and how one contributes, to make a difference, for our communities. One local ward councillor, Vicki Curran, ran a workshop supporting the students to make a written submission about several issues of importance to our community to the council. Students then addressed the council about this submission at a public forum. Several of our students advised the foreign minister, Bob Carr, about Asian Education initiatives. Gareth Ward, the Member for Kiama, spoke engagingly to the whole school, then delivered a great workshop with the SRC. The Lord Mayor, Gordon Bradbery, was truly inspirational with our students as he detailed his personal journey within the context of his vision for our local area. There have been other politicians and community leaders involved during the last two years, including our local federal member, Stephen Jones and an ex-student of our school, Ryan Park, the Member for Keira.

Throsby Candidates Forum

Today, our school, inspired by the Danish model, had the opportunity to see candidates for the federal seat of Throsby, where our school is located, engage in a dialogue with each other and our students. The candidates discussed issues and answered question, following a code of conduct that modelled intelligent, respectful discourse for our students so they could see an appropriate clash of ideas and perspectives.


cc licensed ( BY NC SA ) flickr photo shared by Darcy Moore

Our forum today had candidates on stage, briefly outlining their policies, asking direct questions to each other about policy, before answering questions from students. Time limits were strictly enforced:

  • Each candidate had a maximum of 2 minutes to briefly outline their vision for Throsby
  • Each candidate had 1 minute to make a point and ask another candidate a question
  • There was a 1 minute response time for each question
  • The moderator called for questions from the audience to candidates
  • Response time was 1 minute
  • The candidates made a brief 1 minute closing statement

The time limits were very short but the aim was for students to be able to understand, succinctly framed, key issues and differences in political perspective. Some of the many topics discussed included youth unemployment, marriage equality, environmental issues, political integrity and the ideological differences between parties and candidates.

The future

Our school will have a discussion about the forum and students will have an opportunity to provide anonymous feedback. The buzz during the event and in ‘the sanctuary’, our outdoor space where we gathered informally with the candidates, told me the students were excited and stimulated.


cc licensed ( BY NC SA ) flickr photo shared by Darcy Moore

My Danish colleagues, students and friends know that the experience of seeing how their democracy was nurtured in the school system was the most exciting experience of my exchange. Today, the students at our school gave me the best birthday present I’ve had for a long while and I thank them. Bradley Chapman who MC-ed the event is to be especially congratulated, as are our school captains, Shruti Rajah and Jake Ramirez, for their reliability and excellence.  All of the students who asked questions and the SRC were totally impressive in their leadership of the student body.

Well done and thank you.

Featured image courtesy of Caitlin West

Updates: ABC Splash featured the event and the local paper ran a very positive story. You may wish to read my post-exchange briefing paper too.

[gview file=”http://darcymoore.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/Democracy-in-Denmark.pdf”] in the way of context.

Share

Comments(3)

    • Aleksander Koed

    • 11 years ago

    Dear Darcy

    I am indeed very surprised to read that as few as half of the Australian youth prefer democracy to the alternatives. In the words of Winston Churchill: “It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried”. A such “Churchillian” attitude towards democracy is, I believe, prevalent among Danes of all ages. Sure, politicians are often criticized for being populist, incompetent or worse, but the notion that a different form of government would be superior is very rarely expressed.

    I congratulate you and Dapto High School on this great event. Promoting democracy in schools is key if we want any of the leaders of tomorrow to choose public service, which is (in itself) not exactly glamorous.

    Your exchange in Denmark was very inspiring for us, the students of Viborg Katedralskole at the time. I am pleased that you brought back something as well, and I wish you and your quest for promoting democracy all the best.

    … and finally: Happy birthday to you, Darcy! 🙂

    Best regards
    Aleksander Koed

    • Paul

    • 11 years ago

    As always, very interesting Darcy. I too am concerned about the lack of interest in politics (and not just amongst the young). Anything we can do to reduce this must be a good thing. Your model would appear to be a step in the right direction.

    I was waiting upon a small piece of research before I replied. I have just searched the National Curriculum’s Shape Paper on ‘Civics and Citizenship’. There is one reference to ‘vote’ (glossary), one for ‘voting’ (under numeracy) and three for ‘elections’ (glossary, principle-in-text and a useful-looking reference (Saha, L & Print, M 2010, ‘Students, schools elections and political engagement: A cradle for democracy?’, International Journal of Educational Research, vol. 49, no. 1, pp. 22-32.). Given that this is supposed to be our overarching educational focus and we are trying to produce world class education, I wonder how we can reconcile the rhetoric and reality. Perhaps we can’t and we are not meant to. What would happen if our politicians were suddenly faced by a concerned, educated public? Far more difficult to lead!

    The implications for this go beyond the notion of voting. We see the backlash to issues like global warming, fluoridation and other environmental issues where a lack of educated thought would be useful to demand action of our politicians.

    I wish you luck.

    • carlaleeb

    • 11 years ago

    A much needed project Darcy . I will pass this on to exec.

    I have had some interesting discussions in History ( and English) this year , the election has prompted many questions from students about “why bother to vote” , partly due to the fact that we have been learning about Vietnam , Democracy , Communism and they have lots of questions about ideology , but also because of events in the media over the last few months. The worrying trend for our Community is the number of students who think it’s not worthwhile voting or voice their percieved family or community belief that it isn’t . That said , amongst seniors , it has been interesting to hear some strong voices for the democratic process .

    As Paul alludes above , there appears to be a missed opportunity in the New Curriculum to nourish democracy and grow infomed citizenship.

    There was something to be said for the role of the old “Subject Social Studies” and General Studies . On of the reasons I enjoyed teaching in NZ was the civics and citizenship emphasis in Social Studies, as distinct from that in History and Geography .

    Our students need to understand and feel a part of the democratic process, be aware of the rights and responsibilities of citizenship, on a national and global level.

    The future of democracy appears to increasingly rest in innovative and participatory programs such as the one Dapto has grown.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *