Assessment of Democracy Education and School Parliaments Project in a primary school in the context of creating democratic political culture: A case study

This research is a case (sample incident) study that is planned with respect to ?integrated single case pattern? aimed at investigating the application process of the project and its functions in the context of democratic political culture in detail in a primary school in which ?Democracy Education and School Parliaments Project? (DEOMP) has been applied. The school detected for research is a primary school that can be characterized as a typical common school where DESPP (DEOMP) is applied, that is close to Adana Seyhan center county, that is easy to reach and where families of median income is placed. In the collecting of research data, a three staged pattern was followed. In the first stage, school and class observations were performed in order to investigate how DESPP is implemented in school X. In the second stage, by interviewing with three directors, seven teachers and fifteen students from primary school X, their opinions about the applied Democracy Education and School Parliament Project in their school, the function of democratic political culture on development of dimensions of Tolerance, Confidence to Individuals, Empathy, Compromise, Conservancy of Rights and Freedom, Respect to Human Honor and Respect to Diversities and their opinions about the problems faced during the application process of the project and their suggestions about increasing the efficiency of the project about construction of democratic political culture in the school were observed. In the third and the last stage, in order to determine the perceptions of directors/teachers and students about DESPP?s contribution level to the construction of democratic political culture in the school, a scale and a questionnaire from quantitative data collecting methods was used as tool of data collecting. 3 directors, 34 teachers and 276 students who are from this X primary school were attended to this stage of research.At the end of the research, it was seen that the perception of adults about Democracy Education and School Parliaments Project and construction of democratic and political culture overall the school is statistically significantly more positive than the students. While the male teachers and male students perceive the democratic political culture construction level of the project in the school higher, there was no significant differences in the teachers perceptions about the contribution level of the project on the democratic political culture construction in their school due to their professional seniority, their branches and their schools where they had graduated. 7th and 8th grade students from 13-14 age group were the students that perceive the contributions of class representative and school parliament studies on construction of democratic and political culture in the school most positive. Research showed that teachers perceive their directors and students perceive their teachers inadequately in the view of information and guidance about the DESPP. However, it was seen that the perceptions of students about the manner, behavior and applications of teachers and directors who were assigned in the application process were more positive. The participants who think that the physical possibilities of the school is enough were agreed with DESPP is applied in a democratic process without any pressure in their school, the tasked teachers and students on the poll desk council is objective and they treat equally without discriminate one student from one another.The directors and teachers who perceive the Democracy Education and School Parliaments Project generally functional about developing democratic political culture in the school highlighted pluralistic attendance and suggested that by studying more planned and programmed, information studies should be performed, the project should be believed and with allowing adequate time, place support should be done and parliaments shall be activated. Students suggestions about the project to be more effective were to enrich election activities, to make the elections once a month, to use voting cards as in real life, to select more elder and pattern pupils, voting of the teachers, selection of representatives by teachers and directors with the help of students opinions and to nominate at least one student from every class. The results of this research collected from school and class observations showed that the implementation process of the project in the school is generally compatible with the DESPP regulation, it is seen that both voters and candidates are generally excited and elections pass in a positive ambience.Keywords: Democracy Education, Democratic Education, Democratic Social Culture, School Parliaments Project.