The ECER symposium consists of 9 presenters from 9 nation states and presents findings from a pilot study for the Horizon 2020 call; 'Young People as Drivers of Social Change'. The research is important because in some parts of Europe the youth unemployment reaches 50% (Manos et al, 2014). The transition from education to work has become more difficult with young people only gaining temporary contracts for which they are over-qualified (European monitoring centre on change, 2014). This has consequences for starting independent lives, saving to buy a home, and impacts upon self esteem and often results in low motivation to start a family or participate culturally, economically and politically in their communities (Horizon 2020, 2013). This results in lower future earnings, insufficient social security protection, higher risk of poverty, and a loss of human capital in an unequal society (Horizon 2020, 2014). Young people with a migration background and/or disabilities also face multi-discrimination that needs to be addressed within whole communities rather than through exclusion and isolation (Horizon 2020, 2013). The impact of this is a 'lost generation' who will face their own societal and personal challenges whilst not being able to effectively support a growing elderly population in the future (Castellani, 2012). The impact will be lowered well-being for all European Citizens and Global European Citizens (Castellani, 2012). The young people need processes and practices that facilitate the growth of democratic values and norms related to the declaration of human rights, through democratic processes and practices of participation that will facilitate them becoming drivers of social change (Taysum et al, forthcoming).
Our findings presented at ECER in 2012, 2013 and 2014 and disseminated internationally have revealed education policy analysis of seventeen nation states. We revealed that in different nation states participation in education systems was influenced by conditions of a planned comprehensive education system underpinned by communitarian ideologies, or conditions of a marketisation of education underpinned by capitalist ideologies. We also explored shifts from the comprehensive ideal to the marketisation ideal and impacts on relationships between agents and groups with different interests within education systems. We considered the shifts between these positions on developing multicultural inter and intra generational identities, and how they related to economic transitions and economic growth. Having contextualised the research we conducted cases of action research where Higher Education Institutions worked in partnership with schools in each of the nation states and presented our findings to ECER in 2013 and 2014. We revealed young peoples' approach to and engagement with cultural, economic and political participation in their communities. Culturally, few young people spoke of activities, clubs, societies, or heritage trusts outside of their school community that they participated in other than computer games and social media, and some sports such as tennis and football. Economically, young people did not understand how their learning was preparing them to join the labour market in the roles they wanted. Politically young people did not understand their rights and responsibilities with regard to their learning in their school communities, or how they might be empowered to realize their rights and responsibilities in ‘big society as adults. Our research did not find that the young people had a sense of how they would engage politically as drivers of social change in the future. In this symposium we will present theories of participation that have emerged from our case studies, and using literature from their nation state located in a European context and a Globalized European context.
