Is my democracy your democracy? 

This is one of the main questions of our project, Changing Democracies. As part of the project, we collected testimonies from 31 people who openly shared their experiences with democratic transitions, reflecting on big picture questions and recounting daily experiences. The witnesses came from countries across Europe, including Poland, Lithuania, Romania, Greece, Croatia, Czech Republic, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, and the Netherlands. We have used their stories to critically reflect on what democracy means to us today.

Online Discussion Series

We are now organising a series of online discussion sessions in which students will have the opportunity to hear directly from some of these witnesses. Each session will feature one witness and will be focused on one of the following driving questions which were developed based on recurring themes we identified in the witness testimonies:

  • What makes you angry about the world today? 
  • Do you dare to challenge your teachers? 
  • What influences you in life? 
  • Do you know what your grandparents think of young people? 
  • What do you expect from democracy?

Further, over the past few months, we have developed an educational resource pack in collaboration with our project partners, tackling themes related to history, democracy and citizenship. To become familiar with the issues that will be discussed in the online sessions, we ask that each participating group complete the learning activity in the resource pack that corresponds to the theme of the session they plan to attend. The resource pack will be posted on our website by the end of November.

Format of Each Session

Before the session:

  1. Two groups of students and their teachers that have selected the same question will complete the corresponding learning activity in the educational resource pack.
  2. Each group will prepare 5 interview questions for the witness and submit them to us one week before the session.
  3. Each group will decide which student will ask the questions during the session.

During the session:

  1. Organisers will introduce the witness and get the session started.
  2. The witness will respond to around 5 of the 10 questions submitted.

Participation

Participation is open to groups of students, both high school and undergraduate university students, in both formal and non-formal educational settings. The dates of the sessions will depend on your availability. If you would like to participate, please have each person in your group fill out this form to indicate your availability and preferred theme: https://forms.gle/tdeN3T7wpjbPqtgs5