Advancing Equality Within The Austrian School System

The innovative teaching program for the Austrian education sector.

”The consequence of the single story is that it robs people of dignity. It makes our recognition of our equal humanity difficult and it emphasizes that we are different rather than how we are similar.”
– Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Who we are

Working towards creating an inclusive, non-discriminatory education system in Austria is a central concern for people of African origin, which is why this issue has been dealt with constantly for decades[1][2][3][4].

In 2019 Advancing Equality Within The Austrian School System AEWTASS was established. The main focus is to create equitable opportunities and optimize the representation of people of African heritage and the Diaspora within the Austrian civil society.

Educational institutions have a.o. the mandate to help raise critical, self-reflective individuals, capable of shaping social life based on democratic values, human dignity and recognition of the equality of all people. However, current research findings prove that the images of Africa that can be found predominantly within the Austrian school system- based on current research findings[5] [6][7][8] stand in stark contradiction to this.

Historically speaking, African states are often portrayed in the context of poverty, violence and disease. The central problem of this one-sided Eurocentric presentation of African countries as presented in Austrian teaching and learning materials, is that the actualities and peculiarities of the socio-political and economic dynamics of the continent are ignored and the complex situations prevailing on this continent are not taken into account. Furthermore, the existing power relations between the “Global South” and the “Global North” are also neglected.

It is therefore not surprising that the socio-political and social-economic conditions of Black people living in Austria can be impacted negatively.

In order to change this status quo, the project AEWTASS offers sustainable solutions for the Austrian education sector, to address and solve this problem, on a multi-perspective level.

Range of services:

[1] https://cba.fro.at/9168

[2]https://www.derstandard.at/story/1308186198822/jahresbericht-ueber-schwarze-menschen-afrikanische-schuelerinnen-hinken-hinterher

[3] https://www.diepresse.com/670607/bericht-kritisiert-einseitiges-afrika-bild-in-schule

[4] https://www.diepresse.com/1564579/neger-am-testblatt-suche-nach-schule-lauft

[5] https://unipub.uni-graz.at/obvugrhs/content/titleinfo/3574301

[6] https://othes.univie.ac.at/46612/

[7]https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/16673703.pdf

[8]http://www.globaleslernen.at/fileadmin/user_upload/PDF/Diplomarbeiten/DA_Koch_Judith.pdf

 

MISSION

Team AEWTASS contributes to changing the representation of the African continent and the diaspora in the Austrian education system by creating teaching material that provides a new perspective for learning about these topics.

 

VISION

AEWTASS is an innovative and diverse, practice-oriented educational program with the aim to create a fairer and non-discriminatory representation of people of African heritage and the African continent within the Austrian education system.

Our partners