The Summer Academy offers training in the field of education for human rights and democratic citizenship to teams of school heads, teachers and representatives of local NGOs and parents’ associations.

The Academy 2012 combines a one week face to face training in Poland and a 10 month online follow-up, as well as preparatory tasks. Closely linked to the participants’ own experiences and expectations, the training uses a whole school approach focusing on school governance, teaching methods, classroom climate and partnership with the local community.

It is available for participants from Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova, Ukraine (the Eastern Partnership countries), Denmark, Finland, Germany, Norway, Poland, Russia and Sweden.

Application deadline: 19 February, 2012.


The Summer Academy: Democracy at School is a cooperation between the Polish Ministry of National Education (MEN), Centre for Education Development, Poland (ORE), The European Wergeland Centre (EWC) and Council of Europe (CoE), and is based on the shared values and principles of these institutions.

The Summer Academy puts CoE recommendations and resources into practice, with training sessions based on CoE manuals. Closely linked to the participants’ own experiences and expectations, and using a whole school approach, the training focuses on both school governance, teaching methods and classroom climate, as well as cooperation with the local community.

A part of the training is also to develop an Action Plan to promote and incorporate the principles of democracy and human rights when the participants return to their local community. Furthermore, the Summer Academy aims to initiate and strengthen cooperation between the participating countries by the exchanges of experiences and good practices in the field.

Working languages: ENGLISH, RUSSIAN

Simultaneous translation will be provided.