High School no 5 in Szczecin, Szczecin, Poland
Institute of Sociology, University of Szczecin, Szczecin, Poland
The Teacher Training Center at the West Pomeranian Maritime and Polytechnic Education Center, Szczecin, Poland
We will implement the participative budget in the Helena Raszka Primary School No 7 and the 5th Secondary School in Szczecin. In both these schools pupils engage in voluntary work and participate in debates. But after talking to them, we know that they still lack competencies necessary to pursue activities in areas they are interested in. Very few of them are aware of the youth participatory budget. We wish to change it, especially given the fact that the Centrum Edukacji Obywatelskiej study results indicate that co-deciding on school matters translates into higher civic engagement in adult life.
Hence, we will organise classes devoted to self-governance and participatory budget principles and implementation. We will divide pupils into age groups and ask them to prepare several ideas for utilising the budget under the supervision of school employees. Then they will be broken down into workgroups implementing the budget and selected idea together with coordinators and mentors. We will also run workshops on children’s rights, democracy, as well as assertive and empathic communication in schools. We will run outdoor integration workshops on relation building and group communication.
Our partners include two schools whose pupils will participate in the project. The third partner is Sociology Institute at the Szczecin University that will support us with its experience in social research and diagnosis so that we can address pupils’ needs more effectively. The last partner is the Ośrodek Doskonalenia Nauczycieli by the Zachodniopomorskie Centrum Edukacji Morskiej i Politechnicznej. It will inform other Szczecin schools on the project and will also co-organise meetings presenting the project and its outcomes.
