By referring to the conference’s theme, as well as to the role of media in the lives of children, adolescents, and emerging adults, the presenters reflect on strategies of empowerment in the context of media in education from different perspectives: These include the role of the formal and informal educational context with regard to (1) the discourses of “Open Education” via digital media, (2) the necessity for the promotion of media literacy as well as (3) advertising literacy for young persons and at least (4) educational media under the circumstance of the refugee movement towards Europe. The researchers’ projects include different perspectives from multiple European countries such as Germany, Austria and Portugal.

The symposium’s aim is to shed light on which elements of media, education and research enhance and/or limit the empowerment of children, adolescents, and emerging adults. It is in this vein that both – the formal and informal educational areas – should strengthen the media literacy of children and adolescents in order to become both critical media users and critical consumers of the market. Furthermore, media can also be used to cope with the challenges of growing up that are not medial in nature. This can be accomplished, for instance, when media as educational material is implemented. Furthermore, research on leading and leadership in education is abundant. Although there are multiple discourses, the vast majority of contributions are following functionalist or instrumentalist orientations and rather seldom critical or dialogic forms of discourse. Moreover, media dynamics and results from media educational research are widely underestimated in this context. Changes from former leading cultural media to transversal media systems are frequently ignored in research for reliable knowledge on ‘what works’ in educational organizations. In doing so, key international media companies play an important role with regard to educational research, policies, and practices as well as to administrative issues. In this context, the panel takes the role of opening up education into account.

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