Opinions of foreign students education in Turkey on the rights, duties and responsibilities

Migration takes place worldwide for political, social, and economic reasons. However, these migrations increase the ethnic diversity in societies. This diversity makes it difficult for people in the society to live together. This situation necessitates raising effective and democratic citizens who can live together as a society and cope with social and global problems. In order to ensure the sustainability of societies in a healthy way, all individuals should benefit from citizenship education. All individuals, regardless of race, religion, language, or gender, should acquire the necessary awareness of good and effective citizenship. Like many countries, the Republic of Turkey is also one of the countries that receive immigration. In our country, citizenship education is offered with social studies courses at the primary and secondary school levels. With this course, it is aimed to provide students with the knowledge, skills and values that a good and effective citizen should have. In this sense, this study aims to reveal the views of international students on the development of citizenship perceptions in the social studies course. The research was designed in the phenomenology model, which is one of the qualitative research methods. The research study group consists of 30 international students studying at the 8th grade in secondary schools affiliated to Kastamonu Provincial Directorate of National Education in the spring semester of the 2020-2021 academic year. A semi-structured interview form was used as a data collection tool in the research. The data were analyzed through descriptive analysis. According to the results obtained in the research, the majority of international students explained the concept of citizenship by associating it with values. Students state that they have not encountered any obstacles regarding the violation of their rights in the Republic of Turkey. It is found that the students have a positive perception of being good and effective citizens, and they acquire this understanding related to this issue through the social studies course. It is also revealed that they have a positive approach towards both our country and its people. Students find Turkey more developed than their own country in terms of personal right and freedom. They also emphasize that education right of female students is actualized more freely in our country. KEYWORDS: Social Studies Education, Citizenship Education, International Student