Voices blog

“If youth charities can run schools can we expect these will have pupil voice and empowerment at the centre of the way they run?”

That was the content of a message posted to Twitter on Friday by Fiona Blacke. Presumably she was writing in response to the government’s scrapping of the £2million Academy sponsorship fee, currently required of voluntary and private sector organisations that want to sponsor schools. (More about the Academies programme.)

Asher Jacobsberg of involver picked up on this and asked if there was any interest in a consortium to “try it out”. He marked the message for the particular attention of a number of charities, including ourselves.

Clearly any project proposal for this would need to go through the proper internal channels, but it is an interesting topic for discussion:

• is there a case to be made for a flagship school centred on pupil voice and democratic principles;
• what would such a school look like;
• could one be run successfully by a consortium of enthusiastic voluntary organisations;
• if not, what possibilities are there for supporting other sponsors in achieving similar goals?

What do you think?

Can’t see this video? Watch Will youth engagement save democracy? on Viddler

Back in November the Battle of Ideas Festival staged a lively debate on the question ‘Will youth engagement save democracy?‘. The panel comprised LibDem MP Lynne Featherstone, politics teacher Kevin Rooney, and Citizenship Foundation CEO Tony Breslin. This video contains the opening remarks from the three of them.

Lynne Featherstone claims that voters are lazy and the idea of having to walk to a polling booth is antiquated. (Personally I don’t think the system should be changed simply to pander to people’s apathy.)

Kevin Rooney dismisses the issue of youth dis-engagement out of hand, citing Tiananmen Square and Irish political history as examples of how youth are deeply engaged. Quite extreme examples I think: such emotive subjects are, I would suggest, always likely to impassion large numbers of people. He also suggests that schools have no part to play in helping young people understand politics. But surely aspects of civic society are not mutually exclusive? How can we expect people to suddenly understand and engage in their society when those responsible for their formative education tried to distance them from it?

Tony Breslin says that although youth engagement won’t save democracy, without it “the future of democracy is - by definition - doomed”. He goes on to argue that schools have a duty to support the civic education of young people. Of course I broadly agree with that, or I wouldn’t be working here.

Obviously these are only some of their remarks, and the comments I’ve made are my own. Please watch the video to make your own mind up about the roles of citizenship education and youth engagement in the democratic process.