The European dimension of Education. The Role of the Community Action Programmes in Developing the European Citizenship and a Common Identity

Building the European identity and strengthening the concept of European citizenship is a task that can be achieved through various ways. One of the most powerful tools is represented by the system of education. Since the inception of the Community action programmes in this field, pupils, students and teachers take part actively in a new form of socialisation at the European level. Realised in the theoretical framework of the social constructivism, this paper shows that a feeling of common belonging to the European construction can be nurtured by building transnational and multinational networks, by initiating partnerships between various European academic institutions and by encouraging and facilitating students? and teachers? mobilities across the continent. The repeated interaction between participants gradually leads to a process of mutual learning and consequently to a sense of sharing the same European values. This development is unique in respect to the process of socialization that took place twenty or thirty years ago. Although no immediate, visible results can be expected until the educational programmes run for a substantial period of time, an important change of perception (towards feeling more Europeans) has already been noticed in the case of the participants within the educational Socrates framework programme