Simulation offers students insight into European policy-making processes
16.01.2013
As participants in a three-day simulation game, Mainz high school students will be assuming the role of EU representatives. As members of the Council of Ministers and representatives of Serbia and Turkey, they will be negotiating the entry of both countries into the European Union. The approximately 30 students from the Schlossgymnasium and the Frauenlob-Gymnasium high schools will thus gain insight into the entry process and negotiation dynamics of the European Union on a first hand basis.
The project named EU+ is the result of a collaboration between the Chair for International Relations at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU), the Ingelheim Center for Continuing Education (WBZ), the Representation of the State of Rhineland-Palatinate to the Federal Government and the European Union, and various high schools in the city of Mainz. The simulation game has been organized under the aegis of the Jean Monnet Chair held by Professor Dr. Arne Niemann. The Jean Monnet Chair is designed to promote the teaching of and research into the field of European integration. In addition to helping participants understand political procedures, the aim of the event is to introduce high school students to issues related to European politics and to make the general public more aware of the subject of European integration.
"The EU has an impact on our daily lives even if we are often unaware of it. It is all the more important to make sure that high school students already have some grasp of what is happening in the European political sphere. We are thus pleased that the EU+ project, offered as part of the Junior Campus Mainz program, which organizes more than 200 projects across all disciplines, is enabling us to promote the topic of European politics and make the knowledge concrete and understandable for high school students," said Vice President for Learning and Teaching at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Professor Dr. Mechthild Dreyer.