Minister of National education Nabi Avcı attended the closing session of the conference on Democratic Citizenship and Training on Human Rights Project held in İstanbul.

“Democracy is not just a concept but it is also a culture of living”

Minister Avcı said “this project has shown to all of us and especially to our students once again that demoracy is nıt just a political concept but it is also a culture of living. We once again witnessed how important democracy is both in the management of schools and management of education. I home these practical applications will continue at a growing pace.” Minister Avcı went on to say “schools will become more appealing to students and will also be a place where teachers find peace once our administrators, politicians and our governors digest and fully adopt democratic culture and not only those involved in tuition. This project has contributed to this and will continue doing so in the future.”   

Human Rights, Citizenship and Democracy courses

Pointing out that drafts and proposals on all projects, regulations and tuition programs are published in the official website of the Ministry of National Education Minister Avcı said “we want everyone led by our teachers as well as our students, parents, nongovernmental organizations and academicians to see these and evaluate them, criticize them and offer their own views. Then we can revise our drafts and proposals”  and added “here I call it in short ‘citizenship courses’ and report that as of next school year we will start such courses teaching the fourth graders democracy, human rights and citizenship after our teachers study the issue.”

Minister Avcı thanked everyone for their contributions to the Project led by European Council Democratic Citizenship and Participation Director Jean-Cristophe Bas, the Charge d’Affaires of the European Union Delegation for Turkey Bela Szombati, Country Coordinators for Democratic Citizenship and Human Rights, the Director General of the Turkish Education Board and the European Union and Foreign Relations General Director.

Later Minister Avcı toured the exhibition where the printouts of the works at the schools participating in the Project were displayed.

270 thousand students selected the course 

Within the scope of the project the tuition program and the textbook for the Democracy and Human Rights course was redesigned. The program based on students was applied at eleven high schools in ten provinces. 60 teachers, 4.500 students and 9th to 11th graders participated in the Project. During the current school year 270 thousand students selected the Democracy and Human Rights courses. This course was the most selected course at the high schools during this school year.

The Human Rights, Citizenship and Democracy course which will be a compulsory course for the 4th graders next year is currently in draft form.  The course will be given 32 weeks and two hours each week and has been design to relate to the Daily activities of children at the age of 10