Civic Participation of High School Students - The Effect of Civic Learning in School

Educational Review
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Civic participation of high school students: the

effect of civic learning in school
Frank Reichert & Murray Print
To cite this article: Frank Reichert & Murray Print (2017): Civic participation of high
school students: the effect of civic learning in school, Educational Review, DOI:
10.1080/00131911.2017.1316239
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Download by: [The UC San Diego Library] Date: 19 May 2017, At: 17:30
Educational Review, 2017
https://doi.org/10.1080/00131911.2017.1316239
Civic participation of high school students: the effect of civic

learning in school
Frank Reicherta and Murray Printb
a
Faculty of Education, University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR; bSydney School of Education and Social Work,
Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia
ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

Building active and informed citizens is a major part of civics and Received 21 September 2016
citizenship education in order to enhance and sustain democracies. Accepted 3 April 2017
Civic learning and civic action opportunities within school contexts are
KEYWORDS
commonly claimed to promote an active and informed citizenry. In the Australia; citizenship;
present research, we examine the meaning of formal civics education civics; civic education; civic
and the role of students’ participation in a range of curricular and engagement; political
extracurricular activities. Multilevel analyses yield quite stable results participation; student
across two cohorts of Australian secondary students and reveal that participation
schools account for a surprisingly small share in students’ willingness
to participate in future civic and political action. Among the influences
at the student level, formal civics learning, participation in student
governance activities and in the community are the most significant
predictors of intended future participation, but some effects vary
conditional on whether more conventional or issue-related civic
participation is the focus of active citizenship. Implications of these
findings for democratic policy and practice are discussed.
Democracy has to be born anew every generation, and education is its midwife. (John Dewey
1916b, 410)
A century ago, John Dewey cogently argued for schools to serve as a key source for learning
about democracy:
[…] a government resting upon popular suffrage cannot be successful unless those who elect
and who obey their governors are educated. Since a democratic society repudiates the principle
of external authority, it must find a substitute in voluntary disposition and interest; these can
be created only by education. But [… a] democracy is more than a form of government; it is
primarily a mode of associated living, of conjoint communicated experience. (Dewey 1916a, 101)
Clearly, democracy is not a natural condition. It has to be learnt. And where, how much,
when, and in what ways it is learnt help determine a person’s understanding and practice
of democracy. In Australia, civic learning and civic action opportunities within school con-
texts are intended to promote the development of active1 and informed democratic citizens,
a major goal of Australian education (Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training
CONTACT Frank Reichert reichert@hku.hk

© 2017 Educational Review
2 F. REICHERT AND M. PRINT
and Youth Affairs [MCEETYA] 2008). But how can schools contribute to building citizens for
whom democracy is more than a form of government but a way of life?
The question of whether and how civic learning helps to develop citizen participation is
a contested one, and different studies have employed and examined different conceptual
and theoretical perspectives. Typically, civic learning in schools is conceptualized as the
study of civic education through school subjects such as Civics, Government, and Social
Studies. Most studies of civic learning have focused on the formal curriculum, that is, civic
learning activities through school subjects for which there are planned learning outcomes
(Geboers et al. 2013; Niemi and Junn 1998). However, school students can also learn and
practice civic action through the informal curriculum, defined as those school curriculum
learning experiences planned to achieve pre-determined outcomes that are not part of the
formal curriculum (Print 2007, 2009). Informal civic learning – that is, civic learning outside
school subjects, which for some scholars includes extracurricular activities that are beyond
planned learning in schools – exhibits potentially powerful, sustainable education in civic
values, knowledge and skills.
The present research aims to examine how formal and informal learning in school contexts
contribute to Australian secondary school students’ intentions to be active in civic and polit-
ical life. Using a broad understanding of participation and active citizenship (Flanagan 2009;
Kahne and Sporte 2008; Print 2009; Torney-Purta 2002), which encompasses students’ con-
tributions to their communities and political life now and in the future, this analysis examines
intended participation as the outcome of formal and informal civic learning, owing to the
limited opportunities that are available to students. Although intended and actual behavior
are strongly and positively correlated (Ajzen 2012), we acknowledge that the relationship
between both is far from perfect, which limits our study in so far as it establishes only ten-
tative causality.
More precisely, we want to know whether schools make a difference with respect to
students’ expected participation in civic and political activities, and whether and how formal
civic learning and informal learning activities positively relate to students’ willingness to
participate in civic and political activities in the future. Previous research has found differ-
ential effects of formal and informal learning on political participation, but which activities
precisely relate to what type of future participation is less clear, because most prior research
has either studied a limited range of activities or considered different activities in the form
of aggregate measures. Knowing more about the differential effects, if any, of different civic
learning activities would be extremely helpful to guide the implementation of civics and
citizenship curricula in schools. Finally, we are interested in the generalizability of our findings
with respect to different time periods.
Isso daqui pra baixo é basicamente a minha
revisão bibliográfica da relação entre
Background educacao politicae participacao já pronta
The theory supporting democratic education contends that civic engagement of citizens is
a necessary requirement for a sustained, successful democracy (Dalton 2004; Galston 2004;
Kahne and Sporte 2008; Print and Coleman 2003; Putnam 2000). Such engaged citizens will
not only appreciate their democracy but also ensure that it functions effectively through
the nature of their civic engagement. The literature on building civic engagement, especially
in school contexts, is substantial and on-going (Davies and Evans 2002; Flanagan 2009; Hahn
1998; Kahne and Sporte 2008; Niemi and Junn 1998; Putnam 2000; Reichert 2016a; Saha
EDUCATIONAL REVIEW 3
and Print 2010; Torney-Purta et al. 2001; Westheimer and Kahne 2004) and forms a theoretical
base to understanding the role of schools in building democratic citizens.
Formal civic learning and political participation

Most research in this area uses the formal curriculum as either the independent or dependent
variable. Niemi and Junn (1998), for instance, found that the amount and frequency of stud-
ying civic subjects correlates with political knowledge and civic engagement. Belgian stu-
dents similarly benefited from formal civic education in that they were more likely to have
participated in political activities (Quintelier 2010). In Australia, Saha (2000) showed that the
study of Australian government in school is positively correlated with actual and intended
normative civic behavior among secondary school students. The Youth Electoral Study like-
wise found that studying formal civics education is related to Australian students’ intention
to vote (Print 2009).
International research using the IEA Civic Education Study (CivEd) also showed that formal
civic learning, as measured by students’ civic knowledge – a common indicator of formal
civic learning (e.g. Quintelier 2010), was positively related to the likelihood that students
intended to vote in the future (Torney-Purta et al. 2001). In its successor, the International
Civic and Citizenship Education Study (ICCS), civic knowledge was positively associated with
future electoral participation and legal protest, but it correlated negatively with expected
active political participation and illegal protest (Ainley and Schulz 2011; Mirazchiyski, Caro,
and Sandoval-Hernández 2014; Schulz, Ainley, and Fraillon 2013; Schulz et al. 2010).
Longitudinal research in the United States provided some support for the importance of
school-based formal civic education, as it yielded positive effects on the likelihood to vote
in half of all time points analyzed by Bachner (2010; cited in Manning and Edwards 2014).
Callahan, Muller, and Schiller (2010), however, found that the number of civics courses taken
in school did not increase the likelihood to vote, while course grade in social studies, probably
reflecting civic knowledge and analysis skills, did. In a recent analysis of students in England,
Keating and Janmaat (2016) provided further evidence that demands us to be more humble
about the effects of formal learning on political participation: In their longitudinal analysis,
formal civic learning had no positive effect on electoral and non-electoral participation. Yet
the absence of formal civic learning in school reduced the likelihood of voting.
Other research has suggested that participatory approaches, including class voting and
fieldwork, are particularly likely to engage students in aspects of democratic practice and
can empower students to become more engaged (Hahn 1998; Niemi and Junn 1998; Print,
Ørnstrøm, and Skovgaard Nielsen 2002; Youniss, McLellan, and Yates 1997). Keating and
Janmaat (2016) further indicated that school-based participation might be a better predictor
of future political participation than the formal curriculum, and it may therefore be expected
that formal learning has weaker, or even no effects on future political participation of young
people, compared to informal civic learning.
Informal civic learning and political participation

The informal curriculum is a potentially powerful source of building civic action amongst
young people and consists of two sets of related activities. Instrumental activities, such as
student governance, school papers, and student elections, can develop civic engagement
and stimulate civic action (Kirlin 2002; Print, Ørnstrøm, and Skovgaard Nielsen 2002; Saha
and Print 2010). Expressive activities, such as sports, clubs, and social activities, are perceived
as contributing less to building civic engagement, though they fall along the same partici-
pation continuum (Keeter et al. 2002; Kirlin 2002; Print and Coleman 2003).
How participation in school matters: three perspectives

Saha and Print (2010) identified three general theories that explain why the experience of
school government is related to subsequent adult political and civic engagement. These
explanations are not mutually exclusive and can be extended to participation in schools
more broadly. Set in broader theories of how future citizens are prepared (Print 2009) and
the role of the school in educating democratic citizens (Dewey 1916a), these theories are
applicable in this context.
The structural perspective emphasizes the role of social capital, which is supposed to pro-
mote political engagement (Putnam 2000). For Putnam (2000, 19), social capital “refers to
connections among individuals – social networks and the norms of reciprocity and trust-
worthiness that arise from them”. Social capital, in this understanding, is by and large about
the social networks acquired through membership in various organizations, foremost com-
munity organizations, and collective activities. Putnam (2000) argues that American civil
society is in decline owing to changes in the structures of modern societies, but this decline,
he further argues, can be stopped through institutional structures that facilitate collective
action. When applied to school students, participation in schools – especially in structured
forms such as student governance – would enhance students’ social capital (Print and
Coleman 2003) and, in turn, increase “the likelihood of political engagement as an adult”
(Saha and Print 2010, 23).
The participation perspective is basically a habituation paradigm arguing that participation
in school civic-related activities increases knowledge and leads to future political engage-
ment: “The exposure to these political activities while in school serves to socialize young
people into patterns of political behaviour” (Saha and Print 2010, 23). Through participation
in informal civic learning activities in school students develop skills, such as leadership abil-
ities, that are helpful in influencing decision-making processes in community contexts (Hahn
1998; Niemi and Junn 1998). Through this applied learning, a commitment to a certain type
of behavior is acquired, and the specific skills that are developed through informal activities
in school should be related to future participation in political activities that require similar
skills.
Finally, the developmental perspective, which deliberately puts itself in contrast to the
structural perspective, claims that participation in schools would help building a civic identity
(Saha and Print 2010; Youniss, McLellan, and Yates 1997). Theoretically, engagement in “organ-
ized norm-bearing groups” (Youniss, McLellan, and Yates 1997, 621), such as school govern-
ments and community service activities, by students means that they are part of and can
contribute meaningfully to society, thus enabling them to see themselves as political actors.
In this perspective, activities that increase the likelihood of future participation are charac-
terized by organization, shared goals and cooperation. Youniss, McLellan, and Yates (1997)
show that participation in school government or community service projects is associated
with a higher likelihood to vote and participate in community organizations as an adult.
They argue that this positive relationship is because participation in school government and
community service enables students to develop a sense of agency and social relatedness,
which makes them feel responsible and influential actors for the benefit of the common
good.
Informal civic learning matters: empirical evidence

The literature on the informal curriculum is broad and the activities considered in these
studies are often either combined into one or two measures or not considered as distinct
activities. Also, most research has not examined the role of informal learning in relation to
the theoretical perspectives introduced earlier. One potential drawback, furthermore, is the
frequent consideration of volunteering and service learning, which sometimes is even com-
bined with student government activities. The latter is problematic because volunteering
and service learning are at the crossroads between the formal curriculum (is it required?)
and informal as well as extracurricular activities (is it voluntary service in school or volun-
teering outside school?) (Print 2009).
In summary, previous research shows that student participation in the informal curriculum
is positively related to engaging young people in (normative forms of ) later political and
civic life (Ainley and Schulz 2011; Keeter et al. 2002; Kirlin 2002; McFarland and Starmanns
2009; McFarland and Thomas 2006; Mirazchiyski, Caro, and Sandoval-Hernández 2014;
Youniss, McLellan, and Yates 1997). Hart et al. (2007) found that participation in the informal
curriculum as well as community service were associated with higher rates of volunteering
and voting in presidential elections in early adulthood. McFarland and Starmanns (2009)
found the types of student councils highly variable as was the nature of student engagement,
while Quintelier (2010) showed that membership in school councils and service learning
were positively related to actual political participation of Flemish youths. Similarly, Kahne
and Sporte (2008) found that service learning, peer support for academic achievement, and
after-school activities in school and other clubs were positively related to students’ commit-
ment to civic participation, above and beyond their prior commitments and classroom-based
learning. Callahan, Muller, and Schiller (2010), in their study, also found that volunteering as
an adolescent increased the likelihood of voting in the US presidential election. Finally, an
Australian study yielded that pupils who participated in school elections were more knowl-
edgeable and prone to engage in the political realm (Saha and Print 2010).
International research using CivEd also shows that the culture of the school and partici-
pation opportunities within schools are significant in engaging young people (Torney-Purta
et al. 2001). However, participation in student councils was positively and significantly related
to the intention to vote in elections as an adult only in a few countries (Amadeo et al. 2002;
Torney-Purta 2002). The findings of the ICCS indicate that active civic participation at school
was common and a valuable predictor of intended later civic behavior (Schulz et al. 2010).
Specifically, research using the ICCS database showed that overall student participation in
school was positively associated with expected engagement in normative forms of partici-
pation (Ainley and Schulz 2011; Mirazchiyski, Caro, and Sandoval-Hernández 2014), though
the respective effects may be mediated by other variables such as political and civic efficacy
(Schulz, Ainley, and Fraillon 2013). Interestingly, community participation was positively
correlated with students’ expectations to participate in active forms of political participation,
but not with the intention to vote (Ainley and Schulz 2011; Schulz, Ainley, and Fraillon 2013;
Schulz et al. 2010). Students were also more likely to intend to participate the higher the
school average of students was who were involved in school decision-making activities (Isac
et al. 2014).
Limited impact of civic learning in schools?

Despite that evidence on the effect of civic learning on future civic and political participation,
Lopes, Benton, and Cleaver (2009, 9) found no empirical support for the relevance of “a
school’s approach to the delivery of citizenship education” among English students. That is,
neither a formal nor an informal learning approach predicted ninth-grade students’ intended
participation. This finding supports multilevel results that yielded no discernible disparities
between students in different schools. By way of example, a study in Belgium found that
schools accounted for less than 7% of the differences in students’ political participation
(Quintelier 2010), and scholars in the United States “discovered that only 2.2% of the variation
in students’ commitments to civic participation was between schools” (Kahne and Sporte
2008). International comparative studies also found little variance at the school level (Isac
et al. 2014; Mirazchiyski, Caro, and Sandoval-Hernández 2014). Hence, it may be more impor-
tant what students actually do in their schools, while schools’ approaches towards citizenship
education, a macro-level variable, may be of little relevance in the promotion of politically
active citizens.
From their review, which excluded studies on intended participation, Manning and
Edwards (2014) indeed concluded that there is little evidence for the influence of citizenship
education on electoral participation. Yet they were more optimistic with respect to less
institutionalized political activities. These scholars also raised major concerns about the
methodological limitations and the inconsistency of the implementation of civic learning
programs, though.
A review of studies in America, however, suggested that different (formal and informal)
curricular activities could promote differential kinds of civic and political behavior (Lin 2015).
In their comprehensive and more sophisticated, seminal meta-analysis, Geboers et al. (2013)
also reported differential effects of different types of citizenship education. They distin-
guished between curriculum in school (i.e. formal learning in the classroom setting), curric-
ulum out of school (e.g. organized government visits), extracurricular activities (e.g. voluntary
service activities), and pedagogical climate (i.e. teacher practices that aim at influencing the
organization of the classroom). They found that among adolescents aged 13 to 16 years,
curriculum in school and extracurricular activities were most likely to facilitate democratic
activities. However, these scholars understood student governance as part of extracurricular
activities. Hence, it may be less surprising that the latter yielded no negative effects.
Conversely, curriculum out of school activities yielded more negative or no effects than
positive effects, and pedagogical climate had a few more positive than no or negative effects
on behavioral outcomes. The present analysis adapts and modifies the conceptualization
proposed by Geboers et al. (2013), as their conceptual framework provides a reasonable way
of thinking about different formal and informal civic learning opportunities.
Method
All three theoretical approaches that were introduced earlier provide valuable perspectives
on the relevance of student school participation, and the present analysis aims to link these
perspectives to the variety of student participation that occurs in schools. While the
meta-analysis by Geboers et al. (2013) accounted for many different forms of participation
at school, most individual studies focused on one specific form only. Other studies used a
combined measure of a range of student activities, which makes it impossible to understand
the unique role of different types of student participation. In our analysis, we examine which
forms of participation in schools are most promising for future participation. Australia, as
an established democracy, provides an appropriate case for this research due to recent
developments in civics and citizenship education.
Specifically, there have been concerns about low levels of political literacy and active
citizenship among young Australians over the past two decades (Civics Expert Group 1994;
Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters [JSCEM] 2007). CivEd also found that
Australian students’ willingness to participate in politics in adult life was comparatively low
(Mellor, Kennedy, and Greenwood 2002; Torney-Purta et al. 2001). It thus comes without
surprise that the public focus has shifted towards schools and how these can build active,
informed citizenship amongst the young. After the end of Discovering Democracy in 2004,
a large-scale policy initiative with the goal of raising the levels of political literacy and par-
ticipation among Australians, public efforts on civic learning were minimal (Print 2016). Only
after 2008, when the Melbourne Declaration made the development of active and informed
democratic citizens a major goal of Australian education in all states and territories (MCEETYA
2008), civic education came back to the public agenda. However, not much else happened
before 2010, while the time between 2010 and 2015 was coined by the development of the
first national Australian Curriculum on Civics and Citizenship (Australian Curriculum,
Assessment and Reporting Authority [ACARA] 2016). Earlier versions and a draft shape of
this curriculum were discussed widely in the public, and after its endorsement in 2015, the
implementation of this curriculum has begun in 2016.
Furthermore, the period since 2010 in Australia is highly special in that Australians have
witnessed three changes in government that were not due to federal elections, but party
leadership battles. As a consequence, we can conduct comparative analyses for two different
cohorts of 10th graders to examine the stability of the (ir)relevance of different types of
school participation, with one of the cohorts being surveyed at the beginning of a period
of political turmoil and the other being surveyed three years later. Stability here means that
the effects of the predictor variables would be insignificantly different between both cohorts.
Research questions and hypotheses

Three research questions guide our analysis. The first question asks what kind of civic l earning –
formal learning versus various informal learning activities – positively relates to students’
willingness to participate in civic and political activities in the future (research question one
[RQ1]). Previous research has focused on restricted types of school participation or used aggre-
gate measures of school participation, preventing respective insights. That is, many studies
have only examined the role of participation in student government and/or volunteering and
service learning activities (for a rare exception, see Kahne and Sporte 2008). Other informal
activities, such as peer support, classroom voting etc. have either not been considered in
addition to those activities, or a range of activities has been patched together in just one
measure that makes it impossible to examine the unique effects of distinct activities. Even
Geboers et al. (2013), in their meta-analysis, considered student government not independent
of other extracurricular activities, while participation in student governments arguably is more

structured and organized than other forms of informal civic learning in schools, and might
therefore be of more relevance for future civic participation, as argued by the developmental
perspective.
Hence, it is important to study the “net” effects of many and different civic learning activ-
ities, as an answer to RQ1 would be extremely helpful to guide the implementation of civics
and citizenship curricula in schools. According to the participation perspective, participation
in school should directly influence students’ future participation. Through such applied
learning, a commitment to specific types of behavior is acquired, and the specific skills that
are developed through those activities in school should be related to the types of future
political activities that require similar skills. Alternatively, the developmental perspective sug-
gests that organized forms of participation that require cooperation and enable students
to develop a sense of agency and responsibility for the common good, such as in school
governments and community organizations, are particularly powerful in predicting future
participation. In this view, and that is the main difference to the structural perspective, the
influence of student participation in organized informal learning is indirect and mediated
by realizing that they can contribute meaningfully to their community, and that their par-
ticipation can make a difference (“civic efficacy”). Activities that do not enable students to
see themselves as agents for the common good should therefore be less influential in pro-
moting civic efficacy and, consequently, be of limited relevance for future civic and political
participation.
Secondly, we want to know whether schools make a difference with respect to students’
expected participation in civic and political activities (RQ2). Based on previous research (Isac
et al. 2014; Kahne and Sporte 2008; Lopes, Benton, and Cleaver 2009; Mirazchiyski, Caro, and
Sandoval-Hernández 2014; Quintelier 2010), we may not anticipate a substantial impact of
schools. However, the structural perspective emphasizes the significance of structural factors
such as neighborhood and school environments. According to this perspective, we would
expect that students are more likely to intend future participation if they are enrolled in
schools that are more likely to provide social networks and where student participation is
more common. That is, a “culture of participation in school” should be contagious, because
such schools provide better networks for students, which would facilitate future participa-
tion. Although the structural perspective seems to attribute a stronger impact of participa-
tion in organized forms of student participation, the networks provided and the relatedness
to others are particularly important and independent of the type of activity. The other per-
spectives do not emphasize aspects at the structural, school level in the prediction of future
participation.
Finally, we are interested in the generalizability of our findings with respect to different
time periods (RQ3). Specifically, the period between 2010 and 2013 in Australia was charac-
terized by political turmoil with extensive media and public attention and scrutiny on
Australian government. During that time the Australian Prime Minister changed twice due
to party leadership battles, not elections. An internally divided Labor Party also led the first
hung parliament in decades, which was constantly attacked by a strong opposition. Despite
being only a short period of time, those events might have affected the role of formal and
informal civic learning in students’ intentions to participate, and this gives us the opportunity
to examine and elaborate on the generalizability of our research findings. In particular, it is
possible that those events affected how students perceive the value of participation in school
Table 1. Overview of student participation variables.

Variable of interest Measurement
Formal learning (achievement Rasch scale reflecting civic knowledge and reasoning
in civics)
Curriculum out of school Participation in an excursion to a parliament, local government or law court (no/yes)
Extracurricular activities (two (1) Helped to prepare a school paper or magazine (no/yes)
variables) (2) Participated in peer support, “buddy” or mentoring programs at school (no/yes)
Student governance At least one of three activities (no/yes):

• Helped to make decisions about how the school is run
• Elected on to a student council (or similar)
• Candidate in a student council or similar election
Voted for class representativesa Two dummy variables (reference category: not available):
(1) Yes
(2) No
Participation in community Sum score of five activities outside of school:

(“service learning”) • Environmental organization
• Human rights organization
• Voluntary group doing something to help the community
• Collecting money for a charity or social cause
• Youth development organization
a
This variable is potentially an element of classroom climate, and due to the larger number of students who said this was
not available, we use two dummy variables.
and the community (“civic efficacy”), which would imply that the predictions made by the
developmental perspective could be affected. It is less clear though how the predictions of
the other theoretical perspectives might be affected.
Data and measures

The present analysis uses the Australian National Assessment Program: Civics and Citizenship
(NAP-CC) data of 10th graders (most of them 15 or 16 years old). These nationally represent-
ative data were collected via paper-and-pencil testing in 2010 and online assessments in
2013 (ACARA 2011, 2014), where both cohorts completed the same questionnaire at school.
In our analysis, we include only students with complete data. The small numbers of students
who said a certain activity was not available at their school is also excluded, except for voting
for class representatives with 16 to 18% of students who said this was not available at their
school (ACARA 2011, 2014). Thus, all analyses are based on the data from 5137 students in
309 schools in 2010, and 4074 questionnaires representing 290 schools in 2013. The following
briefly describes the measures used in the present research (cf. ACARA 2011, 2013, 2014, for
questionnaires and assessment items).
Student participation at school

Building on previous research (Geboers et al. 2013), we differentiate between formal learning
as curriculum in classrooms (“formal curriculum”) versus curriculum out of school as well as
extracurricular activities (“informal curriculum”). However, we separate student governance
from extracurricular activities due to the broad variety of the latter, while the former may
relate more clearly to future political participation (Saha and Print 2010). Table 1 summarizes
10
Table 2. Means (M), standard deviations (SD), and bivariate correlations between student level predictors and outcomes (r).
Cohort 2010 Cohort 2013
M SD r(CIVACT) r(PROMIS) M SD r(CIVACT) r(PROMIS)
F. REICHERT AND M. PRINT
Female 0.51 0.50 0.10 0.28 0.50 0.50 0.05 0.20

Born in Australia 0.89 0.32 −0.05 −0.02ns 0.83 0.37 −0.05 −0.02ns
Achievement in civics 521.48 122.95 0.15 0.36 512.84 116.07 0.15 0.33
Curriculum out of school 0.46 0.50 0.10 0.11 0.42 0.49 0.11 0.11
Extracurricular activities: 0.18 0.38 0.14 0.19 0.16 0.37 0.12 0.19
School paper
Extracurricular activities: Peer 0.46 0.50 0.10 0.15 0.49 0.50 0.14 0.20
support
Student governance 0.42 0.49 0.19 0.21 0.44 0.50 0.21 0.26
Voted for class representatives: 0.60 0.49 0.13 0.16 0.60 0.49 0.12 0.15
Yes
Voted for class representatives: 0.24 0.43 −0.10 −0.18 0.25 0.43 −0.11 −0.15
No
Civic efficacy 50.29 9.91 0.30 0.35 52.05 12.10 0.30 0.35
Participation in community 1.91 1.46 0.26 0.38 2.11 1.51 0.27 0.31
Notes: CIVACT: intention to engage in civic activities in the future (M2010 = 49.83, SD2010 = 9.91; M2013 = 50.63, SD2013 = 10.55).
PROMIS: intention to promote important issues in the future (M2010 = 49.79, SD2010 = 10.10; M2013 = 49.95, SD2013 = 10.18).
Statistically insignificant correlations are denoted by superscript ‘ns’ (p ≥ 0.05, two-tailed).
the indicators of these and all other student participation variables. The descriptive statistics
of all student variables utilized in our study are given in Table 2 (higher scores reflect a higher
ability, agreement, or participation in a certain activity; all binary variables are coded 0/1).
These variables enable us to test the role of different types of school participation at the
same time and to examine the most promising activities for future participation. Conversely
to most research, this approach enables conclusions about the relevance of specific types
of school participation.
Intentions to participate in civic and political life

Two outcome variables are specified to examine the role of participation in school and in
the community for students’ future participation. Students’ intentions to engage in civic activ-
ities in the future reflect five rather conventional activities (e.g. find information about can-
didates, join a political party; Cronbach’s α2010 = 0.74, α2013 = 0.77), whereas students’
intentions to promote important issues in the future comprise eight less conventional behaviors
(e.g. take part in a peaceful march, collect signatures for a petition; Cronbach’s α2010 = 0.85,
α2013 = 0.87). These indices allow us to examine whether distinguished types of student
participation are predictive of different forms of political participation.
Control variables
Although we focus on the role of students’ participation in schools, our analyses also control
for additional variables, but we hold their number small to avoid an inflation of variables
and collinearity. At the individual level, we control for gender, country of birth, and civic efficacy
(five items measured agreement with statements such as: “if students act together at school
they can make real change happen,” “citizens can have strong influence on government
policies in Australia;” Cronbach’s α2010 = 0.77, α2013 = 0.82). We consider the latter index as a
control and potential mediator of student participation, because students’ beliefs in the
effect of civic action could be influenced by student participation and translate the latter
into (future) political participation. This prediction of a mediated relationship stems directly
from the developmental perspective.
At the school level, we account for school sector (Catholic school, independent school;
reference category: government school) and geographic location of the school (regional,
remote; reference category: metropolitan). These are important formal school characteristics
in the Australian context and possibly indicators of school landscape.
Analytical strategy
The primary aim of this study is the examination of the role of different school participation
activities if we control for participation in other activities. This requires multivariate regression
analyses which are conducted in Mplus (Muthén and Muthén 2015) using hierarchical linear
models. This enables us to address all research questions, as it allows us to account for indi-
vidual level predictors and characteristics of the schools. Utilizing a multiple group design,
we can also test whether student participation has the same effect in both cohorts or if dif-
ferential correlation patterns appear in 2010 versus 2013. This is done by examining Wald
z-tests for each parameter comparison and the modification indices. The reported results
are based on the most constrained models that still fit the data very well (p < 0.05).
The three theoretical perspectives are addressed in three steps: First, we estimate the
direct effects of student participation on the two behavioral outcomes in a two-level model
with only student level variables. This informs us about the relative importance of different
student activities at school, and helps us to address the participation perspective. In this
analysis, our primary interest is in the prediction of students’ expected participation in the
future by their prior participation. Therefore, all variables are centered at the respective
school means (Enders 2013).
In a second step, we extend the first model to conduct mediation analyses with students’
civic efficacy as potential mediator. Specifically, we analyze whether students’ school par-
ticipation positively relates to civic efficacy, and whether efficacy, in turn, is a positive pre-
dictor of future participation that translates the impact of school participation on future
participation. If the developmental perspective holds, we should identify such mediated
effects, and this in particular with respect to participation in organized activities, such as
community organizations or school governance.
Third, we examine the role of the composition of students at a school – that is, the school
average of the student variables; for instance, whether the school average of students who
participate in school governance activities is correlated with students’ intentions to future
participation. This approach tackles the structural perspective, which turns our focus to the
contextual (school) level. Therefore, we now grand mean-center all student as well as the
school composition variables (Enders 2013). If the structural perspective holds, we should
see a variety of composition effects, especially for organized forms of student
participation.
Results
In both cohorts, all student activities and civic achievement are significantly correlated with
future intentions to participate (Table 2, p < 0.05), suggesting that participation in any of
the measured activities is associated with stronger intentions to get involved in civic and
political activities. Although participation clearly matters, these correlations do not inform
us about the relative importance of student participation and which theoretical perspective
may be most suitable.
For this purpose, we first inspect the multilevel null model without any predictors (data
not shown). This reveals the existence of rather small amounts of variance between schools
regarding both outcome variables (RQ2). Thus student variables explain most of the variation
in students’ intentions to participate in the future (similar to Isac et al. 2014; Kahne and Sporte
2008; Mirazchiyski, Caro, and Sandoval-Hernández 2014; Quintelier 2010), and we could
proceed with simple student-level regressions. Specifically, schools account for 4.3% of the
variation in students’ intentions to promote important issues, and less with respect to future
civic action (2.5%) in 2013. The intra-class correlations are slightly higher for the 2010 cohort,
in which schools explain 4.1% of the variation in students’ expected civic action and 7.4%
of the differences in their intentions to promote important issues.
Table 3. Multivariate multilevel model (student level predictors).

Future civic action Promote important issues
Female −0.32 3.13***
Born in Australia −1.05** −0.66*
Achievement in civicsa 0.01*** 0.02*** 0.03***
Curriculum out of school 0.49* 0.33
Extracurricular activities: School paper 0.78** 1.16***
Extracurricular activities: Peer support 0.58* 0.59**
Student governance 1.27*** 1.03***
Voted for class representatives: Yes 1.10** −0.11
Voted for class representatives: No 0.17 −0.44
Civic efficacy 0.21*** 0.19***
Participation in community 1.17*** 1.53***
Meanb 49.79*** 50.53*** 49.38*** 49.69***
School varianceb 4.83 3.74 8.59 6.72
Residual varianceb 80.55 94.98 65.24 79.81
Total of explained variance (R2)b 0.12 0.13 0.23 0.24
Unstandardized coefficients; χ2(21) = 16.12 (p = 0.641).
a
Effects on promote important issues in 2010 (left) and 2013 (right) differ significantly (p < 0.05).
b
Unfixed means and variance components for 2010 (left) and 2013 (right).
*p < 0.05; **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001.
Effects of student variables

Next we include student level predictors in our analysis (RQ1). The multivariate regression
in Table 3 shows that formal learning in school as measured by achievement in civics is
positively associated with students’ willingness to civic action and to promote important
issues. Formal learning is the only variable that has different effects in both cohorts (RQ3):
Although formal learning always goes along with stronger intentions to participate in the
future, students’ expected promotion of important issues is much weaker correlated with
formal learning in 2013. Had we constrained this coefficient to equally affect the promotion
of important issues, the model would have been significantly worse (p = 0.023).
Positive effects that are consistent across both types of future participation appear
throughout for most other student participation variables, including civic efficacy. That is,
participation in these activities goes along with a stronger willingness to engage in civic
action and to promote important issues in the future. There are only few exceptions: First,
not having voted for classroom representatives despite the availability of this activity in
school is unrelated to future participation. Second, additional Wald z-tests were conducted
to compare whether the predictors in Table 3 have significantly different effects on future
civic action versus intentions to promote important issues (p < 0.05; data not shown). These
suggested that formal learning and participation in the community are more positively
associated with the promotion of important issues, whereas voting for classroom represent-
atives has a stronger impact on future civic action. The latter reveals that for promoting
important issues in the future, it does not make any difference whether students say that
they may not vote, do not vote if they may vote, or actually vote for class representatives.
While this can easily be inferred from Table 3, it is interesting to note that according to those
z-tests, the effects of curriculum out of school do not vary significantly between the two
outcomes, which suggests that curriculum out of school activities are rather irrelevant in
the prediction of future participation. For the remaining predictors, the relationships are
likely to be of the same strength for both outcome variables.
Civic efficacy as a mediating mechanism

Although we find some activities to be more important than others in preparing students
for active citizenship as a democratic adult, it may be that student participation (additionally)
promotes students’ sense of collective efficacy, as suggested by the developmental perspec-
tive. Therefore, we test whether civic efficacy operates as a mediating mechanism (data not
shown).2 Indeed, all student activities but curriculum out of school and not having voted for
classroom representatives are significantly and positively related to civic efficacy (p < 0.05),
which is an important condition for statistical mediation. The second condition, according
to which the mediating variable must have a significant effect on the dependent variables,
is also fulfilled (Table 3); and, third, we find mediated effects for the significant predictors of
civic efficacy.
Therefore, three conclusions can be drawn: First, the effect of having voted for classroom
representatives on the promotion of important issues is fully mediated, as it did not have a
direct effect on this outcome variable. Specifically, voting for classroom representatives is
associated with higher civic efficacy, and thus related to higher intentions of promoting
important issues in an indirect way. Second, for all school participation variables with direct
effects on future participation (except curriculum out of school), the direct effect may under-
estimate the impact of the predictor variables. The reason is that part of their actual effect
on expected participation is mediated by students’ civic efficacy, as these variables are there-
fore also positively associated with our participation variables in an indirect way. Third, cur-
riculum out of school is unrelated to the promotion of important issues once we account
for other variables. Given the mentioned results, one might say that curriculum out of school
activities are least relevant for future participation.
In conclusion, by increasing civic efficacy through student participation and civic knowl-
edge, expected participation could be promoted both in direct and indirect ways. While this
may be in line with the developmental perspective, the prevailing direct effects might speak
for the applicability of the simpler participation perspective.
The role of the school context

Extending the multivariate student level model to include contextual variables, we first
examine contextual effects for each school composition variable separately (RQ2), always
controlling for school location, school sector and student level variables (data not shown).
These analyses reveal two significant composition effects (p < 0.05): Only the school average
performance in students’ formal civics learning and the percentage of students who help to
prepare a school paper at their school are suitable to explain future participation. However,
further model comparisons suggest that it is appropriate to constrain most variables, such
that only students’ formal learning and the school average performance in civics have dif-
ferent effects in 2010 versus 2013 (p = 0.018). Hence, the final model (Table 4) does not
account for the school composition in relation to the percentage of students who help to
prepare a school paper (p > 0.05).
This final model yields that a schools’ performance in civics, measured as the average
achievement of its students, is a significant predictor of students’ intention to promote impor-
tant issues, and only in the 2013 cohort. As we grand mean-centered the predictor variables,
the interpretation is not straightforward and needs to be read in conjunction with the student
Table 4. Multivariate multilevel model (student and school level predictors).

Future civic action Promote important issues
Female −0.21 3.20***
Born in Australia −1.19*** −0.66*
Achievement in civicsa 0.01*** 0.02*** 0.03***
Curriculum out of school 0.62** 0.24
Extracurricular activities: School paper 0.88** 1.30***
Extracurricular activities: Peer support 0.51* 0.43*
Student governance 1.20*** 1.05***
Voted for class representatives: Yes 0.82** −0.04
Voted for class representatives: No 0.11 −0.42
Civic efficacy 0.21*** 0.20***
Participation in community 1.20*** 1.53***
School sector: Catholic −1.15*** −1.03***
School sector: Private −1.58*** −1.21***
School location: Regional −0.48 −0.38
School location: Remote 1.95** 0.47
School average: Achievement in civicsa – −0.00 −0.01***
Interceptb 50.50*** 51.19*** 50.08*** 50.29***
School varianceb 1.56 0.29 1.39 0.75
Residual varianceb 80.79 95.18 65.37 80.10
Total of explained variance (R2)b 0.16 0.17 0.32 0.33
Unstandardized coefficients; χ2(31) = 25.84 (p = 0.729).
a
Effects on promote important issues in 2010 (left) and 2013 (right) differ significantly (p < 0.05).
b
Unfixed intercepts and variance components for 2010 (left) and 2013 (right).
*p < 0.05; **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001.
level predictor of formal learning, indicating a leveling effect: The negative effect reflects
the expected difference in the willingness to promote important issues between students
who have the same individual level of achievement in civics but attend schools that differ
in their average performance in civics (i.e. the school mean of students’ formal learning).
Consequently, being knowledgeable is advantageous for expecting to promote important
issues in the future if the school average performance in civics is held constant; but being
surrounded by knowledgeable peers and integrated in a high-performing social context
has a negative effect on this behavioral outcome when comparing two equally knowledge-
able students from two different schools.
Furthermore, once other predictors are taken into account as is done in this model, stu-
dents in government schools are more likely to intend to participate in civic action and to
promote important issues in the future than students in Catholic or independent schools.
We also find that students who attend remote schools are more willing to engage in civic
action, compared with students in metropolitan areas. The final model also confirms previous
results in that the effects of the student level variables hold even when we compare across
the entire student sample, instead of within-school comparisons (owing to grand mean-
centering instead of school mean-centering).
In addition, we again tested whether the regression weights of the predictors vary signif-
icantly between future civic action and the promotion of important issues. While we find
the same results as before for the student level variables, remote schools are significantly
associated with future civic engagement, but unrelated with the intention to promote impor-
tant issues. In conclusion, and as suggested by the small amounts of variance that are due
to the schools, it seems that school context matters a little, but students’ participation and
civic efficacy are far more important.
Discussion
In Australian secondary schools, students experience diverse forms of civic participation
(Print 2007; Saha and Print 2010). Many also learn about civic and political issues, acquire
political reasoning skills and visit political sites as part of the formal curriculum (Print 2007,
2009). Hence, schools are unquestionably important agents in the political socialization of
adolescents, and our results indeed show that student participation is associated with ele-
ments of active citizenship.
Whereas most research tends to look at a limited number of student activities at school
or aggregates various activities, our study aimed to compare the effects of participation in
a range of learning opportunities at school (RQ1). The analysis revealed that, given schools
offer a variety of these opportunities, participation in student governance and extracurricular
activities are quite likely to go in hand with increases in students’ willingness to engage in
civic action and to promote important issues in the future. Moreover, the acquisition of civic
knowledge and skills was positively associated with both kinds of expected participation.
Other activities at school may be less relevant, and primarily associated with future civic
engagement. In this regard, our findings support previous research which yielded a high
significance of student governance activities (Geboers et al. 2013; Saha and Print 2010) and
of formal learning in school, but a lower priority of curricular activities conducted out of
school for building behavioral outcomes (Geboers et al. 2013). That is, curriculum out of
school is often designed as to acquire civic knowledge, and its effects on future political
participation may remain limited. Furthermore, the positive effects of community partici-
pation suggest that joint programs of schools and communities provide additional chances
to increase adolescents’ willingness to participate in the future.
Three perspectives on participation

Although the three perspectives on the impact of student school participation on future
political participation are not entirely exclusive, in our analysis we could tentatively address
these perspectives. In the participation perspective, participation at a previous time is the
precursor of participation in similar activities in the future: The mere participation in activities
at school may become a habit which familiarizes young people with democratic processes
of decision-making and thereby increases the likelihood that students will be active partic-
ipants in their communities and political life (Hahn 1998; Niemi and Junn 1998; Print,
Ørnstrøm, and Skovgaard Nielsen 2002). Though participation in student governance was
positively related to students’ intentions to engage in civic action and to promote important
issues, in our study voting for class representatives was irrelevant for promoting important
issues. This outcome fits well with the participation and developmental perspective, as voting
for classroom representatives and future civic action tap into similar types of activities, and
the former has indeed little overlap with the promotion of important issues, as measured in
our study. More generally, our analyses indeed provide evidence in favor of the participation
perspective, given the various positive relationships between almost any kind of student
participation and both forms of future political engagement.
From our study, however, it is not possible to say clearly to what extent this supports the
participation perspective in comparison to the developmental perspective. The former
assumes that specific types of student participation result in future participation in similar
activities. This may to some extent be due to the development of behavior-related skills,
which in turn increase the likelihood of participation in activities that require similar skills.
From our study, we can only speculate that student participation in a range of diverse infor-
mal civic learning activities might develop participation-related skills more broadly, which
then might benefit future participation in general. Unfortunately, we had no measures of
behavior-related skills owing to the infeasibility of their measurement (ACARA 2014).
At first sight, it may be surprising that formal learning showed stronger positive associ-
ations with students’ intentions to promote important issues than with their expected future
civic action. One might have expected that formal learning would perhaps relate more
strongly to more conventional activities. However, from psychological theory we know that
behaviorally relevant knowledge is a better predictor of behavior (Fabrigar et al. 2006; Lupia
2016). The NAP-CC assessment indeed differs from common public opinion surveys, such
as the Australian Election Study (McAllister 2011), as it covers a broader range of civic knowl-
edge that goes beyond mere knowledge about political institutions. Our finding suggests
that civic knowledge and reasoning skills are important not only for more traditional forms
of participation, but even more so to build issue-based political action. This is potentially
because of the higher level of elaboration that is required to make a decision for or against
the promotion of important issues (Barden and Tormala 2014).
In the developmental perspective, participation in organized activities at school and in
community organizations becomes part of the self-concept development of students con-
tributing to a sense of agency and relatedness, which stimulates future participation in
organized activities. As we had no measure on volunteering intentions, this may be a caveat
in examining the developmental perspective which would expect a link between participa-
tion in community organizations and volunteering in later life. Hence, effects on the activities
that our study utilized as outcome variables could be less powerful.
The clearly positive effect of students’ civic efficacy, measured as the value of participation
in school and politics, might be interpreted as supporting evidence for the developmental
perspective though: Students who feel that participation at school and beyond can make a
difference may develop a sense of empowerment and duty actually to participate in the
determination of their environment(s) (Saha and Print 2010; Schulz, Ainley, and Fraillon
2013). We found evidence for this thesis, as various student activities went along with higher
civic efficacy, which in turn was associated with increases in students’ intentions to participate
in politics in later life. However, only the effect of voting for classroom representatives was
fully mediated with respect to students’ intentions to promote important issues. All other
school participation variables (except curriculum out of school and not voting for classroom
representatives) still had direct effects when controlling for civic efficacy. Therefore, the
participation perspective, which assumes a more direct link between specific types of current
and future behavior, might be more suitable to explain future participation. However, evi-
dence was in favor of both the participation and the developmental perspective, suggesting
that school participation matters for building active citizenship and democracy, so that
educators can play an important role in what types of active citizens develop at school by
favoring and endorsing certain forms of participation against others.
Evidence for the structural perspective was limited though. Many forms of student partic-
ipation require some kind of collaboration, negotiation and engagement with others, which
can build social ties and networks. Yet our analyses suggest that it is primarily the direct
experience of participation which is associated with political participation, and less so the
inclusion in a social context where participation is the norm. This is evident by the absence
of school composition effects, in addition to zero- and non-positive effects of metropolitan
and non-government schools. Hence, only to a small degree may participation in schools
contribute to students’ social capital, which in turn and consistent with the structural per-
spective would be beneficial in terms of future engagement in civic and political life (Putnam
2000; but see the discussion later).
Little evidence for the structural perspective also comes from a study of 31 countries:
Although Isac et al. (2014) found the percentages of students reporting participation at
school to matter, the average effect of school composition was very small. Others have
suggested that country differences matter when explaining future political participation by
students’ participation in school, and that the latter may be less powerful predictors in estab-
lished democracies (Mirazchiyski, Caro, and Sandoval-Hernández 2014), such as Australia.
One reason could be differences in political socialization and lower levels of intended political
participation among students in new democracies (Mirazchiyski, Caro, and Sandoval-
Hernández 2014), as political socialization for active citizenship at home may be less com-
mon, or powerful, than in established democracies where considerable opportunities to
participate have existed for long.
The role of school and societal context

In this connection, we would like to recall that our analysis revealed only marginal differences
in students’ expected civic and political participation that are due to differences between
schools (RQ2). This has been found in other geographical contexts (Isac et al. 2014; Kahne
and Sporte 2008; Mirazchiyski, Caro, and Sandoval-Hernández 2014; Quintelier 2010) and
supports the general contention that within-school variations may be greater than between-
school differences. Thus, the question is what and how civic and citizenship education at
schools can contribute to promote active citizenship. Our results suggest that student par-
ticipation at school may promote active citizenship (Geboers et al. 2013). However, it remains
unclear how a school subject and school curriculum on civic and citizenship education would
be most suitable to promote active citizens, while there is no doubt that it could facilitate
informed citizens.
Among the formal characteristics of schools, we found that students who attend govern-
ment schools reported higher willingness to future participation, compared with other stu-
dents. Although the purposes and quality of student councils and participation in general
may vary between schools (McFarland and Starmanns 2009), our analysis provides no indi-
cation that Australian government schools inhibit the development of active citizens. This
may surprise at first, in particular as government schools are more likely to provide less
advantageous social networks, if any. Yet it merely suggests that although students at inde-
pendent and Catholic schools usually perform better in formal learning, this may not convey
to future civic and political participation, accounting for other student and school correlates.
We can speculate that the perception of injustice might be more prominent among students
at government schools, ceteris paribus. In terms of social psychological theory, these students
might feel relative deprivation and could therefore choose to participate in activities that
could advance the position of their disadvantaged in-group (for a meta-analysis on the
effects of relative deprivation, see Smith et al. 2012).
Turning the focus on the societal context, we found differential effects only for formal
civic learning (RQ3). Specifically, students’ civic knowledge was more strongly and positively
correlated with their intention to promote important issues in the future if they belonged
to the 2013 cohort. At the same time, the role of a school context coined by peers who are
more knowledgeable and have better analytical skills in the political domain was negative
in 2013, thus leveling the overall effect of formal learning. While this indicates that formal
learning outcomes of individual students are more important for future participation in the
younger cohort, it would be too farfetched to claim that the role of school context is getting
less important. Though we could speculate that expectations to participate in the future
might become more self-determined by relying on personal knowledge and skills, while
decisions to participate may become less influenced by schoolmates’ arguments. Also,
research has shown that peer influence is strongest in early adolescence and declines there-
after, and it is less pronounced for prosocial compared with antisocial behavior (Brown
et al. 2010). As younger cohorts tend to reach biological maturity more quickly, this could
suggest that the decline of peer support also starts earlier or is more pronounced among
younger cohorts. Future research should monitor this development and examine whether
this hypothesis applies, and more contextual data from families and peers out of school
would be needed better to understand whether leveling effects can be observed and how
these contexts concur.
As for the moment, it is implausible to attribute the negligible differences to the events
that occurred between 2010 and 2013, even though the younger cohort of secondary school
students must have been more aware of politics. This is due to the political turmoil in the
Australian government and the constant media scrutiny about what was going on, as well
as the development of the first national Australian Curriculum. Further research is needed,
and the continued flip-flopping in Australian government as well as the nascent implemen-
tation of the civics and citizenship curriculum may provide opportunities to follow up on
this, before speculating about potential effects.
Limitations and future research

We also need to address a few limitations of our analysis. First, we relied on cross-sectional
data, owing to the lack of high-quality longitudinal data. Hence, we cannot prove that the
predictors in our analyses actually cause future participation, though we may claim tentative
causality. Longitudinal data certainly would be of great advantage for examining the pre-
dictions made by all three perspectives, and in particular for testing mediated relationships.
Second, since adolescents’ opportunities to participate in politics are limited, we could only
refer to what they expect to do in the future. Although the link between behavioral intentions
and actual participation is strong (Ajzen 2012) and current participation increases the like-
lihood of future civic participation, there is no direct causation. Again, longitudinal studies
are required to examine respective relationships by covering substantial time periods to
identify long-term effects of student participation in school and the influence of the societal
context. These would be particularly useful if they examined the link between civic learning
in school and adult civic behavior beyond electoral participation. For this, smaller samples
of youth could be followed over time using qualitative and observational designs to gain
more information about the types and meanings of participation as students develop over
time. Thereby, behavior-related skills could be measured more objectively (though any kind
of scoring and observation has its own limitations), which is currently not feasible in large-
scale assessments (ACARA 2014). This would also address the challenge that arises from the
effect that social desirability can have on self-reported participation.
It is furthermore noteworthy that our analysis was restricted to the prediction of normative
participation in the future, third. Other research has shown that civic knowledge and par-
ticipation at school can reduce students’ intention to participate in illegal protest (Ainley
and Schulz 2011), yet this cannot be answered for Australians with data from the NAP-CC.
Fourth, we did not find much evidence in favor of the structural perspective. On a cautionary
note, it is possible that community organizations and the networks and ties that are devel-
oped there might be more important in the promotion of political participation of youths.
The positive influence of community participation at least indicates that, though we unfor-
tunately had no measures to examine this assumption. In the structural perspective, neigh-
borhood ties and parental involvement in school development are crucial in building
adolescents’ social capital. Future studies could gather data about the involvement of differ-
ent agents in schools – parents, teachers, community organizations etc., at least by means
of a report by the school principal. Arguably, it would be much better if more information
about students’ families, school neighborhoods and teacher practices were available.
This brings us to another limitation, which relates to the difficulty of assessing the quality
and consistency of how civic education is implemented in schools. Although teacher-ques-
tionnaires would also rely on self-reported information, these would be a valuable comple-
ment to the NAP-CC. Finally, the small to medium amounts of explained variance (R2), in
particular regarding future civic action, suggest that other variables not considered in our
study are also relevant predictors of future political participation. The present analysis did
not intend to provide an account of all possible predictors of expected participation, but to
examine the role of students’ participation in school.
Conclusion
Our study provides a rare examination at a national level of the effects of student participa-
tion in school on intended civic and political participation in the future, as we (1) included
a variety of activities students may engage in at school and in their communities (without
mixing different types of school participation as an aggregate index), (2) employed a model
that accounts for characteristics of the school, and (3) conducted all analyses for two cohorts
of secondary school students. The analyses presented here yielded stable results at both the
student and the school level as well as across cohorts. This suggests that we may generalize
the results of our study, which makes them valuable for school policy and practice.
We demonstrated that student participation at school and in the community have positive
effects on their willingness to engage in civic action and to promote important issues for
democracy in the future. Characteristics of the school, given comparable opportunities to
participate at school, do not make a huge difference when it comes to secondary school
students’ intentions to future participation, despite existing but small differences (Isac et al.
2014; Kahne and Sporte 2008; Lopes, Benton, and Cleaver 2009; Mirazchiyski, Caro, and
Sandoval-Hernández 2014; Quintelier 2010). Instead, individual participation at school and
in the community have a major share in the explanation of intended future participation,
although the explanatory power of these variables is much stronger for students’ willingness
to promote important issues compared to future civic engagement. We suspect that this is
caused by the nature of the activities that each of the outcome measures comprised of,
because future civic engagement included some adult activities in which students cannot
yet participate due to their age. In addition, research suggests that young people are less
willing to engage in conventional participation but prefer informal and everyday activities
or alternative forms of participation (Harris, Wyn, and Younes 2010). Similarly, de Groot,
Goodson, and Veugelers (2014) emphasized not only the importance of students’ efficacy,
but also the significance “to help (young) citizens imagine different ways in which they can
have an impact, especially when they are still under 18” (163).
Clearly, schools are places where youth can trial different forms of democratic participa-
tion, and are therefore suited to help them become active, democratic citizens. Although
the specific ways in which schools provide and students make use of the learning opportu-
nities that we have discussed here vary between schools and individuals, our results provide
clear evidence for the relevance of these experiences for future participation. They suggest
that active and (at least partially) self-regulated learning experiences, in addition to formal
civics learning at school, can help nurture active, informed citizens for democracies.
Our analysis also provides several avenues for the conception of future research. Most
important are the need for an extension of the NAP-CC to enable researchers to link student
responses and civic learning outcomes to the school and community environments as well
as the actual learning, both quantitatively and qualitatively, that happens in schools. While
we know that there is a positive effect of school experiences in civics on later civic engage-
ment we do not know how well that effect is sustained over time and across social contexts.
We therefore need robust longitudinal studies that can confirm the relationship between
school experiences and longer-term political and civic engagement. This request is chal-
lenging (Manning and Edwards 2014), because unexpected and confounding factors cannot
easily be controlled for in longitudinal field studies. However, this challenge needs to be
tackled, and a multicohort sequence design such as it is utilized in the German National
Educational Panel Study (von Maurice, Blossfeld, and Roßbach 2016) could be a reasonable
middle ground that would address potential uncertainties in longitudinal research.
Challenging but badly needed is also the development of measures of applied and behav-
ior-related skills in large-scale studies and out of the laboratory. Another important area for
research is the impact of the diverse forms of the informal curriculum in schools on nurturing
active, informed citizens. The potential impact of school elections on students is logical (Saha
and Print 2010), but the many diverse activities within the informal curriculum remain
under-researched and their impact potentially under-valued over time, particularly if there
is a cumulative effect with the formal curriculum. Finally, any data collection should be
theory-driven, not only from a conceptual point of view but also considering the mechanisms
behind the correlates. That would enable scholars to go beyond shallow claims and expedite
the gain of empirical knowledge that should guide educational policy.
Notes
1.
We note that “active citizenship” is not conceptualized as a dichotomy. Although this analysis
focuses only on behavior, we would like to emphasize that a comprehensive understanding
of active citizenship comprises skills development, motivated behavior and attitudes and
values (Hoskins and Mascherini 2009; Kennedy 2006). Dichotomies often fail to capture the
whole picture, and this applies to active citizenship. Most prominently has this been argued
by Amnå and Ekman (2014), who speak of “standby citizens”; and there is recent evidence on
the inappropriateness of any binary thinking of active citizenship in the Australian context
(Reichert 2016b, 2016c, 2017).
2.
Because the mediator was an intermediate dependent variable in this scenario, it was used in
its raw metric for mediation analyses to avoid model identification issues.
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by a postdoctoral fellowship by the Fritz Thyssen Foundation, a visiting
fellowship at The University of Sydney, and an Australian Research Council grant [DP 120103057].
Parts of this research were conducted while the first author was affiliated with the Leibniz Institute for
Educational Trajectories in Bamberg, Germany. The data used in this publication are sourced from the
Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) and are available from ACARA
in accordance with its Data Access Protocols. The authors would also like to thank three anonymous
reviewers for their thoughtful comments on an earlier version of this manuscript.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
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Civic participation of high school students: the effect of civic

ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

CONTACT Frank Reichert reichert@hku.hk

Formal civic learning and political participation

Informal civic learning and political participation

How participation in school matters: three perspectives

Informal civic learning matters: empirical evidence

Limited impact of civic learning in schools?

Research questions and hypotheses

of other extracurricular activities, while participation in student governments arguably is more

Table 1. Overview of student participation variables.

Student governance At least one of three activities (no/yes):

Participation in community Sum score of five activities outside of school:

Data and measures

Student participation at school

Female 0.51 0.50 0.10 0.28 0.50 0.50 0.05 0.20

Intentions to participate in civic and political life

Table 3. Multivariate multilevel model (student level predictors).

Effects of student variables

Civic efficacy as a mediating mechanism

The role of the school context

Table 4. Multivariate multilevel model (student and school level predictors).

Three perspectives on participation

The role of school and societal context

Limitations and future research

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