Foundation Investigates Human Rights in School Books

Following a project carried out from 2002 to 2004, in which school books were analysed in terms of human rights issues, the History Foundation (Tarih Vakfi) has started a new project.

 Now, books prepared for a new curriculum are to be analysed.

Volunteer training carried out 

The aim is to complete the analysis of the new books by April 2008. The foundation will rely heavily on voluntary help, and thus carried out a two-day workshop for project volunteers at the Turkey Human Rights Foundation (TIHV) Ankara centre.

The volunteers are mostly made up of teachers, undergraduate and graduate students, as well as parents. The workshops were attended by around 70 people. Ayse Erzan, member of the project managing board, as well as seven members of the advisory board, Ayse Gül Altinay, Sedat Aslantas, Melike Türkan Bagli, Kenan Cayir, Betül Cotuksöken, Gürol Irzik, and Mutlu Öztürk spoke of "criteria of qualitative analysis."

The findings resulting from the project will be evaluated by academics and published as a book. Volunteers and academics have come together in Istanbul once before, and will meet in Istanbul and Ankara in January.

Before: 190 books, 4,000 problems... 

The project is being organised by the History Foundation in partnership with the Turkey Human Rights Foundation, supported by EU grants. The first project was carried out in order to improve the content of school books and curricula, and in order to educate new generations who would respect differences, different beliefs, cultures and identities, and who would be pacificist and creative.

At the time, 190 school books of primary and middle school (i.e. of the first eight years of school) were examined in terms of form, content and pedagogical methods, within the main criteria of human rights and a culture of democracy. In total, 4,000 problems were found.

Analysis of changes and continuing problems 

The second project now aims at examining the curriculum changes of the last years in a systematic manner in order to identify improvements as well as continuing problems.

The project also foresees two panels for teachers, educators and schoolbook writers, a survey to measure how teachers and students evaluate coursebooks in terms of human rights, and an international symposium on the issue. (GG/TK/AG)