Following the global pandemic, there has been increasing recognition of the levels of uncertainty facing children and young people and the urgent need for our national and local governments to become more responsive to the interests of the young, as demonstrated by initiatives such as the EU Strategy on the Rights of the Child (2021). Drawing on findings from a 45-month international comparative research study, funded by the Leverhulme Trust, this paper suggests that although it is children and young people’s fundamental right to participate in matters that affect them (UN, 1989) this is often overlooked. The study indicates that policy making with children and young people at local and national level require the creation of spaces and places of belonging and collaborative, democratic decision making for our youngest citizens in their schools and local communities and shows how a Relational Toolkit can help. The research took place across four case studies; learning spaces from Barcelona, Berlin, New York and Rio de Janeiro. The case studies come from diverse spaces and places, yet all their approaches clearly illustrate the belief that education is place making and vice versa, with a deliberate blurring of the boundaries between formal spaces of education and the students’ daily lives and experiences in their wider community. Their approaches show the potential for children and young people as expert decision makers and collaborators for fairer places. The study uses relational theory (Holland et al, 1998, Warren et al, 2009) to better understand participant identities and the associated notions of power and positionality that emerge in times of uncertainty in urban education contexts. This paper highlights how socio-educational relationships can generate the type of ‘relational goods’ (interpersonal trust, emotional support, care and social influence) (Cordelli, 2015) required for more reciprocal relationships between policymakers, communities and children and young people. One of the key findings of the research was the need to develop decision making spaces and places where children and young people have a feeling of “communal being-ness” (Studdert, 2005, p.5) now in the places where they live. As a result, the Relational Toolkit was developed. Using evaluation activities based on identifying relational outcomes, and a Ladder of Engagement adapted from the work of Arnstein (1969) and Hart (1992), the Toolkit deliberately challenges traditional conceptualisations of children and young people as future citizens and instead repositions them as power-full (Ralls et al, 2022) Citizens of Now.

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