IRC-GloCEd - Centro di Ricerca Internazionale sull’Educazione alla Cittadinanza Globale International Research Center on Global Citizenship Education

Coordinator - Prof. Massimiliano Tarozzi

Therefore, over the last ten years, Global Citizenship Education has become a key international issue topic not only in the political but also in the academic fields. On the one hand, it has assumed a strategic role within the educational policies of various national governments and international bodies, first and foremost UNESCO; on the other, it has become the subject of research and studies in academia. The reason for the growing interest in the topic can be traced back to two pivotal events: the first dates back to 2012 when the “Global Education First Initiative” (GEFI), launched by the secretary of UN Ban Ki-moon in September 2012 has set fostering global citizenship as one of the three the priorities; The second event dates back to 2015 when GCE was included as a complementary concept to education for sustainable development in the 2030 Agenda, where it is explicitly mentioned in Goal 4.7.

UNESCO has played a strategic role in the growing recognition of GCE as a theoretical framework for developing the knowledge, skills, values and attitudes students need to ensure a more just, peaceful tolerant, inclusive, safe and sustainable world. A holistic approach that interconnects local and global, social, cultural and economic dimensions, but also cognitive, socio-emotional and behavioural dimensions of learning. Due to its holistic nature, ECG contributes to making sense of and theoretically and methodologically framing different types of knowledge, skills and values. It is, in fact, an epistemologically multidisciplinary and multifaceted field that is rooted in three main axes:

1. Humanistic, based on the principles of common humanity, universality in diversity
2. Environmental, based on the principles of sustainable development

3. Political, based on the principles of social justice and equal rights.

  Therefore it encompasses several themes, which summarize the future research lines of the Center but are also contact points with all the other departments of the University of Bologna with which the Centre and the UNESCO Chair in GCE intend to establish collaborations, such as:

• human right issues (children, gender, and culture rights)
• environmental issues (sustainability, patterns of production and consumption, climate change, biodiversity)
• social and economic justice (poverty, health and well-being, inequality and discrimination, migrations)
• intercultural issues (identity, cultural diversity, world heritage, indigenous knowledge systems, peace).

The Project aims to continue the activities of the research centre activated in 2017 at the Department of Life Quality Studies of the University of Bologna and is embedded in the activities of the UNESCO Chair on GCED. The objective is to identify a reference within the FILO department for the activities of the UNESCO Chair to support future challenges, including:

1. continue to promote and disseminate the UNESCO approach to GCE within the academic community and contribute to its conceptualisation;
2. continue to promote GCE in higher education. Moreover, one of the founding purposes of IRC- GloCEd is to facilitate productive relationships between educational institutions, training agencies, NGOs, practitioners and policy makers, researchers and civil society.

Activities

Over the years, the centre has carried out a range of research activities and has received significant funding from national and international bodies, which has now been transferred to the Philosophy department. It is therefore necessary to ensure continuity in the visibility of this internationally recognised research unit. Below is a list of research projects and funding received by the Centre or UNESCO Chair.

The Centre actively cooperates with the following partners:

• The Italian Agency for Development Cooperation (AICS)/Ministry of Foreign Affair;
• Academic Network on Global Education & Learning (ANGEL);
• Asia-Pacific Centre of Education for International Understading (APCEIU);
• Ban KI-MOON CENTRE for Global Citizens;
• Global Education Network Europe (GENE);

• UCL Institute of Education;
• University of Alberta;
• Università di Verona;
• Regione Emilia-Romagna;
• Network of Italian UNESCO Chairs (ReCUI);
• Municipality of Bologna;
• Municipality of Rimini;
• WeWorld- GVC Onlus.

IRC- GloCEd it has been the site of internships for several students and has also hosted numerous visiting scholars.

Among the activities the Centre has carried out and will continue to carry out are:

• Carry out studies and empirical research, also applying for funding at national and European level
• organize conferences, seminars and workshops
• provide teacher training
• organize course and seminars for graduate and undergraduate students
• consulting institutions and political bodies
• organize master and host international students
• facilitate exchange of academic staff and students as well as non-academic institutions
• promote exchange with local authorities and NGOs.

In the middle of the Covid-19 Pandemic the Centre provided an online teaching training tool and delivered a free training course entitled: Doing school in times of pandemic. Strategies and resources for teachers. Below is the poster for the event.

International Scientific Committee

• Paola Berbeglia, Concord Italia
• Douglas Bourn, UCL Institute of Education
• Marco Catarci, Università Roma 3
• Massimiliano Fiorucci, Università Roma 3
• Isabella Loiodice, Università di Foggia
• Alessia Mariotti, Università di Bologna
• Marcella Milana, Università di Verona
• Pierluigi Musarò, Università di Bologna
• Milena Santerini, Università Cattolica di Milano
• Lynette Schutz, Unversity of Alberta
• Namrata Sharma, CUNY, New York
• Alessio Surian, Università di Padova
• Alessandro Tolomelli, Università di Bologna
• Carlos Alberto Torres, University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA)

Executive Committee

• Annalisa Quinto
• Francesca Rapanà
• Luca Vittori
• Raffaella Faggioli
• Gabriele Vitello