Kulturelle Vielfalt - mehr als ein Slogan

Proposals for the implementation in Switzerland of the UNESCO Convention on the Diversity of Cultural Expressions

A common project of the Swiss Coalition for Cultural Diversity and the Swiss Commission for UNESCO

Education

Text of the Report
Additions and Discussion
Download: Report of the expert group (English text as PDF file)
Download: Original report of the expert group (PDF)

Report

Cultural diversity is cultivated first at school. But other channels play an active role such as cultural activities promoted by local authorities and civil society.

I. Restore public education to its role as a vital institution of democracy

The school has a mission: to transmit the culture, knowledge and values of our country by which it defines it, humanizes it and ensures its well-being. The school plays a key role in the perpetuation of democracy through the education of future citizens.

1. We must reject the proposed privatization of education as conceived by the GATS

Public education is the result of the general will of the people; this is why it is entrusted to a State institution and its teachers are certified by appointment. Its contents must not be subordinated to private interests or regulated by the law of supply and demand.

2. Refocus education on general culture and reinforce the irreplaceable role of teachers

The school must provide the knowledge and tools to understand the world in all its diversity. Faced with the enormous wealth of information means (Internet, images, TV, media), we must train young people, set on a solid base of knowledge, to master the sources of information by sorting, arranging and maintaining a critical distance.

The desire to “standardize” teaching does not fulfil legitimate educational needs. It is through teachers, their culture and their professionalism, that knowledge is transmitted, and not through systems. The methods and procedures lie within their jurisdiction and should remain as flexible as possible to meet the wide variety of situations that characterizes our society.

3. Enhance the value of scientific humanism and artistic education

The scientific approach has suffered from a double devaluation: rejected by some circles due to consequences considered to be harmful (nuclear, GMO...), or reduced to its commercial potential.

Science as a method of investigating the world and a critical approach to reality is a fundamental tool for educating with a humanist objective. Its weakening opens the door to irrational excesses.

An over-valuation of knowledge that is “useful” to the labour market has led to the introduction of specialization at the expense of disciplines such as the arts. It is an illusion to try to anticipate what would be useful for the labour market.

Vocational training is a segment that connects the school to the professional world. It will be that much better when it is based when needed on solid general knowledge.
The arts are as important as other disciplines in the training of the mind to guarantee adaptability to a variety of future work situations and to life itself.

4. Tackling illiteracy is a priority

Modern civilizations are founded on the written word. All ability to study, be informed and think is based on it. Illiteracy is a major factor of social and cultural exclusion:

We need to identify the mechanisms that lead to illiteracy through major surveys, to determine the endogenous and exogenous factors in order to redefine the priorities of the primary school.

The Swiss Conference of Cantonal Ministers of Education (EDK) is indiscriminately introducing two foreign languages in the 3rd and 5th grade of primary school at breakneck speed. At the crucial moment when the difficulty in reading - which affects one out of five or six pupils - should be detected and compensated by appropriate measures. This measure fatally penalizes the weakest pupils; yet the very disappointing results obtained so far from early education do not support the official line.

The expert group, consisting of persons all practising several languages, was very sceptical of an introduction to foreign languages by teachers who do not speak them fluently.

5. Give priority to the mastery of the first language

The regional language of the place of study is simultaneously the language of integration, study and conceptualization. It must be mastered in all its oral and written aspects. It is probably the teaching of the first language that has suffered the greatest decline in the past decade.

6. Ensure diversity of educational materials

There is a parallel trend to the desire to “standardize education” in the standardization of educational material, particularly in language teaching, that is more in line with commercial imperatives than educational needs.

It is important to maintain the greatest possible diversity of information sources.

The external channels: local authorities and community-based activities

Recent findings of PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment) have shown to what extent the family and social environment play an important role in success or failure at school. Therefore, public education must also be able to rely on external channels.

7. Reduction of the educational divide and failure at school is achieved by reinforcing extracurricular support and a true cultural policy at local authority level

The policy of democratization of studies in the years 1960-80 focused on all approaches to compensate for deficiencies in the family environment to achieve academic success: creating libraries, services to help study (support, advice, etc.), resting places for children who cannot return home, school kitchens at low prices, advice for parents, etc. Yet it is this support that suffered most from the economic policies of the 1990s.

Apart from this, the school is not the only place for cultural education. Youth centres, community centres, welcoming newcomers should also be part of the cantonal and local authority policies to complement academic effort.

We must preserve and develop local cultural institutions and maintain a stimulating environment with the advantage of reaching young people in their environment.

8. Strengthen collaboration between the school and cultural institutions

Since the 1960s, museums, concert venues, institutional theatres and cultural centres developed policies to sensitize the public to culture with the sponsorship of public authorities, primarily of the cities and municipalities and secondly by the State. These cultural institutions contribute to the promotion of culture.

One of the great achievements of the democratization of studies has been the opening of cultural institutions to schools. Many young people, insufficiently exposed to culture, owe their first access to it to the school.

9. Encourage community-based cultural activities

Switzerland is blessed with an important and very diversified civil society that simultaneously plays a role of stabilizing democracy and integrating people. Many local organizations offer the opportunity to practice a cultural activity in amateur theatre, music, dancing, and film clubs. They should be encouraged.

Encouragement of activities undertaken voluntarily by civil society is expressed especially by the removal of discriminatory clauses prohibiting their subsidising.

II. The place and role of language learning in Switzerland

National languages, cultural languages, languages of international communication, immigrant languages, each have their place in our country. The reversal of historical priorities in the 1990s and promises for the labour market that owed more to publicity than actual opportunities introduced considerable confusion.

10. Priorities for the teaching of national languages, those of citizenship

While it is important to give consideration and welcome immigrant populations (especially by promoting the transmission of their culture of origin) and to ensuring openness to the world through international languages, the historical continuity and stability of countries are based on citizenship and languages.

That a majority of the German-speaking region of Switzerland identifies itself with English before French cannot remain without consequences for the long-term cohesion of Switzerland and its historical choice of a multilingual identity that has assured us a century and a half of civil peace. The highly polarized vote of the Federal Assembly of 2007 on the priority of national languages or the freedom given to the Cantons cannot be the last word.

The UNESCO Convention focuses on the primacy of the identity aspect of cultural goods and languages on their market value; this argues in favour of priority being given to teaching of the second national language.

The conflict between the second national language and English is a false problem that comes from confusion about the objectives of the acquisition of one or the other. Most students are required to use English during their studies. So far, they manage very well with what they learn in secondary school and that they may supplement by targeted university courses in the field of study.

The exclusive adoption of so-called communicative methods (which efficacy is not proven) occurred at the expense of their cultural aspect that was considered a teacher’s hobby. We must give back to literature, especially, its place in language teaching.

11. A way forward: the mobility of the young as trainees

The Swiss Conference of Rectors of Universities of Teacher Education (COHEP) has made several recommendations aimed at encouraging the mobility of young trainees. It instructed its “mobility team” to clarify the terms with an initial implementation in bilingual Canton of Valais where teachers during their training now spend one year out of three in the other language region of the Canton (Brig and/or Monthey). The Canton of Fribourg is moving in the same direction.

12. For a Swiss Erasmus

Meanwhile, in March 2008, the Swiss Society of Teachers of Secondary Education (SSPES) adopted the project ‘For a Swiss Erasmus’, a result of the work over many years of its Commission for modern languages. This involves encouraging students through incentives to spend part or all of their study time in another language region so that in the medium term, this mobility would become widespread. The end of adolescence is a time of life that is particularly conducive to mobility. The advantage for the country of a course of study in a second national language is twofold: to train elites familiar with both a national language and the lifestyles of those who speak it.

Within a generation, we could create a “quality standard” which would make it quite natural for students to spend part of their study time in a second national language.

13. For a comprehensive language strategy that reflects reality

Today, school has been extended to 18-20 years for more than 80% of young people. Everything is not definitive at 12 years old, or even 15 years old, a fact that must be taken into account before introducing the teaching of two languages early on and that would heavily penalize students with difficulties learning the first language.

We must relieve the primary school of inordinate pressure with respect to languages, reestablish what it can do, and give absolute priority to the first language and the reduction of the “educational divide”.

III. Intercultural relations: enhance the acceptance of other cultures

By the school

14. The school is the melting pot of cultural diversity

The school is the core of socialization of new generations. Children and young people live in the ‘now’, and their ‘now’ is their actual environment. Their school experience is thus absolutely crucial. It is a melting pot of cultural diversity with three conditions:

a) A teacher trained in cultural diversity and tolerance
We need to be extremely attentive to the cultural and civic training of teachers and those responsible for schools by integrating in their training, knowledge of the issue and dialogue mechanisms to defuse conflicts of identity and to promote intercultural education.

b) A school experience respectful of all and free from stigma
The safest vector of tolerance between cultures lived within the school is a peaceful coexistence between students with their own cultures, accepting differences without stigmatizing them. This cohabitation must be guaranteed by rigorous attention to all manifestations of intolerance and a clear demarcation of identity claims that are opposed to humanist values. This is not promoting just anything, but rather defending without compromising cultural diversity based on knowledge.

The school should be a place of active tolerance, i.e. all players must be trained in and adhere to the values of the “social contract” that unifies society.

c) Integration into the teaching of values supporting respect for diversity
A modern education, incorporating advances in anthropology, should show any human being in its cultural and “physical” diversity without wanting to establish a hierarchy; this represents a significant contribution to both tolerance and the perception of diversity.

By creating an environment respectful of mankind

15. Education in diversity in a suitable environment

The school alone cannot deal with antisocial behaviour of children living in criminogenic cities; tolerance and civility also depend on controlled neighbourly relations. Urban and cantonal authorities as well as civil society organizations have an educational duty to create the conditions for peaceful neighbourhood relations.

For an ecology of one’s living environment

The rise of sensitivity to ecology is a factor favouring reflection and developments that take into account the population-environment relation and cultural needs. The living environment is an essential element of integration or discrimination. If one settles ethnic minorities in a location that is, in addition, poorly designed, this immediately gives rise to the ideological confinement of a monoculture and manifestations of exclusion.

The importance of neighbourhood associations in cities or municipalities.

By focusing on the immediate environment, neighbourhood associations open a space for expression by the population as it really is, regardless of origin.

For an experience of cultural diversity

16. Any event, any performance that reflects cultural diversity works in favour of public education.

Without going into detail, we note that many “underground” or “alternative” music movements that have mobilized some of the youth since the 1980s have largely contributed to a familiarity with other forms of cultural expression that were not transmitted through education and our family traditions.

Original text: French

Experts

Erica Deuber Ziegler. Art historian. jeziegler@vtxnet.ch

Christa Dubois-Ferriere. Professor of German. christa.dubois-ferriere@edu.ge.ch

Ninian Hubert van Blyenburgh. Lecturer at the Universities of Geneva (History of Anthropology) and Neuchâtel (Museum Studies). ninian.hubert@unige.ch

Gerald Morin. Film producer (Almaz Film) and professor of film at ECAV (Academy of Arts Valais) Sierre; Editor of the magazine “CultureEnjeu”. ger.morin@gmail.com

Marco Polli (Commissioner). Retired professor of German, philosophy and computing, retired. Secretary General of the Swiss Federation of Amateur Theatrical Companies. Linguist. mpolli@infomaniak.ch