TITLE: What Are Argentinean Public Schools Teaching Their Students About Citizenship Education? : A Textbook Analysis of Argentinean Civics Education in 2015 Authors: Lewis Rincon Castano and Dr. Tony Lian-Ren Lin. Summer Research Leadership Alliance Mellon Initiative, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA 2019 Abstract This research is a part of the Moral Ecology Project at the Institute for Advance Studies in Culture (University of Virginia) and Universidad Catolica de Argentina that analyzes public, private, and religious (Catholic, Protestant/Evangelical, Jewish, and Muslim) schools from low- and high-income communities in Greater Buenos Aires, Argentina. The study’s purpose is to examine the contrast in their schools’ curriculum and provide recommendations in regard to citizenship education. Civics education is one critical area in the school curriculum for youth formation and the integration of national cultural values. School curriculum including textbooks have a significant effect on what young students are required to learn. The topic of this paper addresses the current content of the textbook Política y Ciudadanía (Politics and Citizenship) that is required curriculum for Argentinean high school students. From General Peron’s government to modern Argentinean democracy, the idea of citizenship substantially changed. New themes such as an acknowledgment of human rights and gender equality are present in the new curriculum. Yet, the content of the current high school textbook continues to uphold previous civic values from the Peron period like a defense of national sovereignty. This study is an examination of the current civic education values and similarities with previous governments in the school curriculum of Argentina’s public schools with a focus on two questions: What does Política y Ciudadanía communicate in regard to citizenship to public-school students? What similarities are shared in the current school curriculum with previous governments? |