Current societal challenges such as the war in Europe, the pandemic and global warming highlight the importance of all students – regardless of age and choice of study – being prepared for their roles as democratic citizens by being given opportunities to develop their citizenship knowledge. In this context, critical literacy as a means to counteract fake news and conspiracy theories is an essential prerequisite for democracy (Barzilai & Chinn 2020; Osborne et al. 2022).  In this newly started project, we focus on citizenship education for vocational education and training (VET) students in upper secondary education. In Sweden, VET students have been identified as less likely to participate in democratic processes in society. Our definition of citizenship education builds on Bernstein’s (2000, xx-xxi) Pedagogic rights, i.e., i) individual enhancement (confidence for critical understanding), ii) social inclusion, and iii) participation, which includes the ability to take part and act in democratic processes. The concept of ‘citizen’ is understood here as being situated and dependent on which other identities – such as gender and sexuality, age, social class and functional ability – are attributed to individuals and groups (see Yuval-Davis 2008). This is significant in the study, as the VET programmes to a large extent are gender-differentiated contexts. Arnot (2009) shows in her analyses of citizenship, education and gender how discourses about citizens often become gendered because different knowledge and abilities are associated with identities.

As upper secondary vocational education is organized very differently in different national contexts (Kap 2015) also within Europe and the Nordic countries (Jørgensen et al. 2018) it is difficult to make international comparisons of vocational students’ citizenship education. Generally, VET students devote only a small proportion to citizenship education (Nylund et al. 2017). VET programmes include compulsory short courses in History, Social studies, Religion and Science studies and citizenship formation is a clearly stated motive behind the inclusion of these four subjects in the VET curriculum (Ledman 2014). We refer to these subjects as citizenship oriented. Studies have shown that VET programmes are often characterised by socialisation into workplace and industry cultures, and that knowledge content is contextualised in accordance with prevailing conditions, rather than being aimed at promoting critical thinking and questions about how things could be different (Nylund et al. 2020; Rönnlund et al. 2019). Research on vocational students' citizenship formation has been done in vocational subject-teaching contexts (Rosvall et al. 2020) and in the citizenship-oriented subjects separately (e.g., Ledman 2015, Nordby 2019, Kittelmann Flensner 2015; Sigauke, 2013). However, there is a lack of knowledge about the conditions these four subjects together create for vocational students' citizenship formation and how the students themselves perceive the development of their citizen identities.

The aim is to shed light on the vocational students' citizenship formation process during their three-year education, in relation to the content made available to them through the citizenship-oriented subjects. i) How do the students perceive the content and teaching approaches of the citizenship-oriented subjects and how do these subjects promote critical thinking and social inclusion, and prepare them to act as citizens? ii) What opportunities for citizenship formation - in the form of pedagogical rights and social positions - do teachers of History, Science Studies, Social Studies and Religion create for vocational students in their teaching? iii) What overall conclusions can be drawn about the vocational students' citizenship formation process with regard to a) differences between the various VET programmes, and b) about how citizen identities are formed in relation to social positions (gender, class, ethnicity) and professional identities?

The project includes longitudinal interviews with students (DS1) and teacher interviews, in combination with observations and analysis of teaching material (DS2). The programmes initially selected for the study are the Health and Social Care Programme, the Industry Programme and the Trade and Administration Programme. DS1) Group interviews with students are conducted once a year for three years. The interviews are designed as targeted open interviews, as a tool to understand the respondents’ thoughts and to elicit their subjective experiences (Lantz, 2007). We want to capture the students' experiences of the teaching and content of each subject, and how they perceive that the different kinds of knowledge provided by the four subjects can be related to each other and implemented in other contexts. The analysis draws on Pedagogic rights (Bernstein 2000) and we will identify instances of teaching where the students perceived a) they gained critical understanding b) experienced that they were part of a group and social community and c) experienced teaching that provided knowledge and a will and perceived ability to exert influence in working life and society. In this first stage, we will use classification and framing to identify teaching content and approaches. In a second stage, we will apply a comparative analysis and focus on differences and similarities between the different programmes, student groups and subjects. DS2) builds on interviews with teachers of social studies, history, religion and science studies, in combination with observations of their teaching and analysis of their teaching materials and teaching plans. The interviews focus on how the teachers plan and carry out their teaching of the vocational students based on the conditions provided by the steering documents, the organisation of the teaching and perceptions and expectations of the students. This is followed by observations of 2-3 lessons (cf. Adolfsson & Alvunger 2017). Overall, the empirical material provides in-depth knowledge of what the students experience in the context of citizen-oriented teaching. We highlight processes in the pedagogical recontextualisation arena (Bernstein 2000) and identify which pedagogical codes and opportunities for citizenship formation dominate the teachers’ teaching practices, and how these vary between programmes and subjects. We also use gender regimes as a model for analysing the local power order through four dimensions (Connell 2009) and by analysing the empirical evidence intersectionally (Yuval- Davies 2008), since we want to shed light on the teachers’ perceptions of citizenship education and vocational students in the different programmes.

The preliminary results from pilot interviews with teachers indicate that in all four subjects it is important to anchor the teaching in the contexts the students are in. Students’ response to citizenship education seems to differ depending on vocational cultures in the programmes and the different conditions of the schools and the local communities. Furthermore, all teachers acknowledge that there are differences in opportunities for citizenship formation between the various VET programmes. When comparing the Industrial programme with Health and Social Care programme, the latter programme gives the students more opportunities to practice democratic rights. In a survey we conducted in a study preluding this project, we found that the majority of the students had a positive attitude the content of the citizenship oriented subjects, and that they were likely to perform formal democratic rights, as voting. However, a significant part of the students (around 25%) did neither perceive themselves as participants in society, nor interested in or having competence to be involved (Knekta et al. forthcoming). By the longitudinal design and student interviews, we will be able to gain a deeper understanding of VET students citizenship formation, both in relation to subject education and specific programme. The focus on the students’ citizenship formation through their perspective on knowledge and how citizen identities are formed in relation to social positions (gender, class, ethnicity) and professional identities contributes to broadening the understanding of citizenship education for VET students.

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