Introduction

What is the School Development Project "Basic Values"? (SDP. BV)

The Comenius School Development Programme of the European Union provides grants for schools that want to exchange experiences on a commonly chosen theme and to learn from different approaches. The theme "Basic Values" is very general but it can be applied on many practical aspects of school life. Although the programme is focusing on the staff members (board of management and teachers), pupils should also be involved.
The Europroject network "Education without frontiers" exists since 1989 and has gradually expanded from 8 schools in 6 countries to 21 schools in 20 countries in 2007.

Eleven schools from the Euronetwork "Education without frontiers" submitted the application for the SDP "Basic Values" in January 2004. Nine schools got the grant. The two schools that did not get the grants, Danderyds Gymnasium (Sweden) and Second Lyceum of Kalamaria (Greece), participated in most of the meetings. In the second year of the project Cygnaeus-lukio (Finland) could join. Strabrecht College (Netherlands) coordinated the project.

What are the aims of the School Development Project "Basic Values"?

To raise awareness of the cultural diversity between schools in Europe, to promote respect for that cultural diversity and to learn from the different approaches regarding basic values policy in the partner schools.

To make the board, teachers, pupils and parents aware of the importance of basic values in school life in a positive and productive way.

To promote educational practice, aiming at fighting any kind of intolerance and violence present either at school or in any other social context.

The headmaster of the Strabrecht College, Mr. Leenderd van der Deijl, introduced the topic and the aims of the project at the kick-off conference in Geldrop (October 13-16 2004).

I believe that all over the world schools consider it to be their mission and task to transfer not only knowledge and skills but values as well. Education is about helping young people to develop themselves to become grown-up people, who are well equipped to find their own way in society. And obviously, it is simply not enough to have much knowledge. Surely, it is just as important that young people learn to think about moral issues, to ask themselves questions about how to act and react to ethical issues, both in their own lives and in society as a whole. This is the area of this project, this is the area of basic values. If you think back to the time that you were a pupil yourself at school, who did you consider to be good teachers? In most cases the really good teachers were those who not only inspired you to like their subjects but who set an example with their life styles, who talked with you about the issues of life, moral issues, the difficult questions of life. And I think that all schools in some way or another try to set an example to our students in those 4 to 7 years that they stay in our schools. We try to inspire them to become moral persons, to develop convictions, moral standards, a critical mind etc. And is that not the reason that our schools have decided to participate in this conference, in this project?

We have not initiated this project to look for the answers to moral dilemmas in the first place but to look for ways how to deal with them in our schools. How can we make sure that the issue of basic values is given the right priority in our schools? Can we develop practical tools to give this part of our education the place it deserves in our curriculum? And of course, can we learn from each other as schools from different European countries. Surely the answer to that question is "yes".

The international/European dimension gives an added value to this project and a special flavour. Apart from discovering that there are many similarities between our schools, I’m sure that another discovery during this project will be that there are differences as well, which should be the start of an interesting discussion and a search for the reasons why these differences exist.