FLAGSHIP PROGRAMMES
Conspiracy theories have long been a part of societal discourse. Recent crises such as the Covid-19 pandemic, Russia’s war against Ukraine or a rising support for right-wing extremist parties in several European countries have increased public and academic attention to this topic.
These developments affect schools and teachers, since young people are just as vulnerable to being exposed to conspiracy theories and extremist beliefs. While the social environment plays a large role in how people come into contact with conspiracy narratives or extremist beliefs, the effects of the media consumption of young people should not be
underestimated.
The Erasmus+ project Recognising Extremism and Conspiracy Theories (REACT) was created to support teachers in recognizing and dealing with conspiracy theories and extremist beliefs. To address this challenge a consortium consisting of one research partner and one school partner from four European countries, Austria, Bulgaria, Denmark and Germany, was created.
The project has two central objectives:
1. The development of a survey to identify the presence of extremist beliefs and conspiracy theories, and
2. the development of a curriculum and teaching/learning materials
This manual presents the first of the project objectives and serves as a guide to understand and implement the survey. This tool is supposed to help teachers evaluate what conspiracy theories students believe in and what topics to tackle in the classroom. This manual is structured into five parts: After a brief introduction of the topic as well as of the project (1.),
the REACT-survey is presented (2.) and some advice regarding the implementation is given (3.). Finally, some results from implementing the survey at the partner schools are presented (4.) and an outlook towards the development of didactic materials is included in this manual.
Political scientist Lara Möller presents selected problems and solutions in Austria on the topic of early drop-outs from vocational schools by students with a history of migration or Roma. Klaus Linde-Leimer, health psychologist and academic integrative trainer, presents the project ‘Roma Empowerment. Education in training, counselling and self-organised learning’. Leonie Brixa and Karlheinz Boss, both of whom work at KUS - Kultur- und Sportverein der Wiener Berufsschulen, among other organisations, will report on their work experience and work with apprentices based on their own activities.