The INCLUDed project, "Culturally Inclusive Schools: Celebrating Diversity, Teaching Common Values, and Fostering Intercultural Competence among Youth," addresses the critical issue of cultural diversity in European lower-secondary schools. As European societies become more diverse, schools face the challenge of providing high-quality education that ensures young people acquire the knowledge, skills, and attitudes necessary to understand and respect people perceived to be different from themselves – a concept known as intercultural competence (IC). To achieve this, schools need to organize a wide range of high-quality learning and teaching experiences that promote IC, but often lack guidance on the most effective strategies. The INCLUDed project identifies challenges in research, educational policy, and practice regarding the conceptualization and measurement of intercultural competence and culturally inclusive educational approaches. Notably, there is a lack of empirical evidence needed to inform educational policy and practice on the best practices in this field.
Fostering intercultural competence in young people is essential for creating inclusive, respectful, and cohesive societies. In an increasingly diverse world, the ability to understand and appreciate cultural differences helps reduce social tensions and promotes mutual respect. By equipping students with these skills, we can ensure they are better prepared to contribute positively to society, promoting peace, tolerance, and the protection of human rights while countering extreme worldviews, intolerance, and discrimination. Educational systems, schools, and teachers play a pivotal role in this process. It is essential that they are aware of and prepared to implement a range of educational approaches that are effective in fostering intercultural competence, such as transcultural approaches that emphasize common values and human rights, and multicultural approaches that build upon cultural differences to engage students with various cultural perspectives.
This MSCA project had two overarching aims. The first aim focused on the research proposal of the project and strived to develop a systematic framework to conceptualize and measure different dimensions of intercultural competence and culturally inclusive educational approaches. This aim was centered around the development and validation of measurement instruments for intercultural competence (IC) and classroom cultural diversity climate (CCDC) in nationally representative samples of young people in Italy, and to examine the links between the two. This aim was further translated into three hierarchically interdependent specific objectives (SO):
SO1: To develop, adapt, and validate a multifaceted measurement instrument for IC.
SO2: To develop, adapt, and validate a multifaceted measurement instrument for CCDC.
SO3: To evaluate the relationship between different CCDC approaches and the IC of youth.
The second overarching aim was to enhance the potential and future career prospects of the MSCA fellow. This included a wide range of training and professional development activities aimed at increasing the fellow's career prospects, contributing to the creation of stable international research networks, and developing further research projects within the broad field of civic and citizenship education, where the research in this project is situated
Regarding the research aim and corresponding specific objectives, significant progress has been made in developing validated instruments for IC and CCDC, as well as generating empirical evidence on promising culturally inclusive educational approaches for IC development. These approaches include teaching and learning strategies that emphasize similarities and common values, as well as strategies that build upon the cultural diversity students bring to the classroom.
Concerning the personal growth aim, the researcher has achieved substantial personal development, positioning herself as an expert in the field of citizenship education and laying the groundwork for future large-scale projects in the area.
