International human rights education: an evaluation of treaty compliance in British Columbia's Kindergarten to Grade 12 Social Studies school curriculum

• Main Author: Friedmann, Lesley Barbara
• Other Authors: McDonough, Graham Patrick
• Language: English; en
• Published: 2016
• Subjects: human rights education; curriculum; Social Studies curriculum; global citizenship; peaceful coexistence; transformative action; treaty compliance; dissemination of human rights
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/1828/7290

In this thesis I probe into British Columbia’s (BC) Kindergarten to Grade 12 Social Studies curriculum to determine how adequately it adheres to Canada’s international treaty obligations. I give particular attention to the duties regarding dissemination of information about, through, and for human rights principles and norms that are contained within the United Nations (UN) 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child (Convention) and the UN 2011 Declaration of Human Rights Education and Training (DHRET). To accomplish this, I first develop a compliance assessment tool that is based on international human rights legal standards. This tool is then used in a normative inquiry into BC’s current Social Studies curriculum to assess the extent to which its educational aim, and its conception of the learner, learning process, learning environment, teacher’s role, and evaluation satisfies the international human rights education law requirements that are articulated in the treaties that Canada has ratified. The knowledge that is generated from this investigation is of value to BC’s Ministry of Education and members of the public who are involved in BC’s curriculum development and revision, because it creates a benchmark from which to “take more active measures to systematically disseminate and promote” (UN, 2012, paragraph 25) knowledge about international human rights in BC’s schools. === Graduate