Journal of Global Citizenship & Equity Education
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Promoting Global Citizenship Outside the Classroom: Undergraduate-Refugee Service Learning at Lehigh University
Full text linkGlobal citizenship education aims to develop students into engaged citizens of the world. As Richardson (2008) explains, global citizenship is one manifestation of social studies education that gives students a "wider and more sophisticated understanding of self and community". The Global Citizenship Program at Lehigh University requires students to examine the questions of meaning and value associated with the theme of citizenship within today's global world. Through a mandated service-learning requirement, first year Global Citizenship students were exposed to the global-local connection between themselves and refugees resettled in the Greater Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania, United States. The purpose of this study was to assess the efficacy of service learning as a facilitator for global citizenship awareness and self-concept for the students. This study is the result of a mixed-methods research design that incorporates both qualitative measures (e.g. document analysis) and quantitative data (e.g. psychometric and survey data) to create profiles of student growth and change. Through this analysis, it was concluded that service learning promoted concepts of social justice and global citizenship by the students, as well as leading to meaningful character development in realms such as empathy and tolerance for ambiguity
The Ethical Conundrum of International Health Electives in Medical Education
Full text linkThis paper discusses the ethical challenges of global health education programs and, specifically, International Health Electives (IHEs). The growing popularity of IHEs in medical school has ballooned in recent years largely from students who genuinely want to serve in resource-poor areas of the global South, and also from those students who wish to use the field experience to build a superior CV. Medical schools have responded to the demand, but ethical considerations have not kept pace. In fact, the practice of many of these programs has brought about complex ethical concerns of individual hubris of Northern medical students, and of structural dependency from resource-poor to resource-flush settings. In light of these two concerns, IHEs largely require restructuring. This paper proposes that program changes need to focus on the very ethical issues that the current programs perpetuate. While many IHEs do offer some pre-departure training on ethics, pre-departure training can be trivial if it focuses largely on the behaviour of individuals working in resource poor settings. I propose that a complete reorientation of moral ethics pedagogy and a fresh introduction of social theory training are needed so that the IHE experience is aimed at overcoming current global health inequities at the structural level
Refugees: the “Other” Human face, and the “other” academics, an African and Personal Experience
Full text linkFor many centuries, refugees have continued to move from one country to another, pushed away from their homes for many different reasons. This often results in aimless journeys around the world as they change into homeless wanderers. Wars, political conflicts, ideological differences, social rejections, natural disasters, and socio-economic failures are the main reasons, pushing thousands in different ways toward the unknown. If immigrants are indeed observed all over the world, the case of African refugees is very much outstanding. The Middle Passage shipped many Africans to the Americas during the slave trade era, and many still leave the continent today and go to all parts of the world. Immigration statistics project no change in this trend in the near future. This paper covers the main reasons for the African massive exodus towards overpopulated continents. It also expands on the conditions these generally unwanted immigrants face in hostile hosting countries, while offering a set of examples where good hearts and minds have facilitated both social insertion and human communications. The Scholar at Risk Network represents an exceptionally good example, and illustrates the author's personal example as an academic "other". Finally, the paper proposes what countries all around the world could do together to avoid large human flows
Introduction: Global Citizenship Education for Learning/Volunteering Abroad
Full text linkFor several years Canadian universities and colleges have been expanding opportunities for students to learn and/or volunteer abroad for academic credit. Many of these study abroad programs are directed to the European Union, Singapore and other “business opportunity” destinations. For this collection, however, we are concerned with travel and study in less developed countries – those countries deemed by the United Nations to be low income whereby the vast majority of residents of the country live, on average, on 2 per day. The focus on less developed countries exposes the specific ethical dilemmas one encounters abroad as a result of economic disparities, cultural differences, historical circumstances and social situations linked, for example, to the legacy of colonialism. This introduction provides context and background information on learn/volunteer abroad programs, the diverse opportunities available to college and university students, the potential impact of these programs, and the relationship (perceived or real) of learn/volunteer abroad programs, and global citizenship education
When All Else Fails: The Critical Role of Civil Society in Addressing Northern Ireland’s Segmental Autonomy
Full text linkNorthern Ireland remains a deeply divided society. The education system mirrors the broader societal divisions between Catholics and Protestants and the vast majority of students experience an education that remains almost wholly segregated based on religious identification. This paper places that segregation in a political context, by analyzing how the type of political system has impacted education reform as it relates to the development of an integrated education sector. Northern Ireland provides a unique opportunity to test the impact of political systems on education reform because, over the past ninety years, the state has been governed under majoritarian home rule, direct control by an external actor, and consociational home rule. Despite the deeply segmented education system, a group of parents began a concerted push for integrated education beginning in the 1970s. Over the course of three decades, their advocacy spurred substantial reform and served as the catalyst for an integrated education sector that now serves more than five percent of elementary and secondary students. The successes and failures of that movement provide strong empirical evidence that no matter the political system in place, civil society is critical to promoting integrated education reform in deeply divided societies
Urban Reality of Type 2 Diabetes among First Nations of Eastern Ontario: Western Science and Indigenous Perceptions
Full text linkThis paper presents an anthropological investigation of perception and management of Type 2 Diabetes among First Nations people in an Eastern Ontario urban setting. Applying the concept of structural violence and based on the semi-structured interviews conducted with urban First Nations people and health care professionals, findings of this study reflect that diabetes is entangled in a complex web of social and cultural circumstances that make the coping and management of this disease very challenging for today's First Nations people. Results also document the shared social, cultural and historical circumstances which have contributed to the emergence of diabetes among First Nations people. Diabetes in this regard can be viewed as a reflection of economic and social conditions, but also low self-esteem and self-worth arising from a colonial past. These perspectives have repercussions for reaction to diabetes diagnosis and coping strategies around diet, physical activity and medication. Existing levels of diabetes management strategies, including treatment, support and education meet the urban First Nation peoples' need to some extent. The paper concludes with the recommendations for development of future health and social programmes that engage stakeholders and pay considerable attention to their strengths and needs
Global Citizenship Education (GCE) in Post-Secondary Institutions: What is protected and what is hidden under the umbrella of GCE?
Full text linkIn this article, we examine how educating for global citizenship has increasingly become a shared goal of educators and educational institutions interested in expanding their own and their students’ understanding of what it means to claim or to have global citizenship in the twenty-first century. While this trend may be considered a uniform response to urgent global issues and contexts, through document analysis of various policies and programs of Global Citizenship Education (GCE) in North America, it is evident that global citizenship is far from a uniform idea and, in fact, is a much contested term. There is a general consensus, however, that higher education institutions have a role to play in preparing citizens who are informed and able to participate in our complex globalized and globalizing world. Post-secondary institutions join other social institutions in working toward understanding their role in addressing social, economic, and political issues of our times. As global citizenship educators grapple with and respond to the global unevenness of internationalization, the legacies of colonialism, and ideologies that support a system that benefits the few at the expense of the many, educators look to global citizenship education efforts to open educational spaces for working for a more just and peaceful world
Global Citizenship and the Ethical Challenges of ‘Sport for Development and Peace’
Full text linkRecent years have seen increased recognition, promotion and institutionalization of the role of sport and physical activity amidst struggles for just and sustainable development on an international scale. This paper explores the ways in, and extent to, which global citizenship – the idea that humans are citizens of the world with global rights and responsibilities – underpins this institutionalization and popularity of Sport for Development and Peace (SDP). These connections are then used to put forth a series of critical and ethical complications regarding the mobilization of sport towards meeting international development goals. In particular, the paper argues that any progressive and ethical invocation of sport as a means of supporting sustainable development depends more on the ways in which global citizenship is interpreted and acted upon by SDP stakeholders than it does on the global popularity of sport as an entry into the field or context of international development
Motivations for Learn/Volunteer Abroad Programs: Research with Canadian Youth
Full text linkThis paper examines the motivations expressed by Canadian youth who took part in learn/volunteer abroad programs in the global south. The findings indicate that many of the motivations identified by the participants (testing an academic background or career choice, skills development, language acquisition, cross-cultural understanding and even the desire to help others) generally fit under the category of personal growth. The findings also highlight the extrinsic, egoist and self-oriented nature of these motivations and reflect a one-directional flow of benefits from the global south to the northern-based volunteers. A feminist post-colonialism analysis is used to reflect on the implications of self-oriented motivations of Canadian youth travelling to the global south, especially when funding for many of the volunteers who travel to the global south is provided by the Canadian International Development Agency – money that is earmarked for addressing poverty in the global south and not the personal growth of Canadians