Identifying an educational response to the prevent policy: student perspectives on learning about terrorism, extremism and radicalisation

School responses to the Prevent agenda have tended to focus primarily on ‘safeguarding’ approaches, which essentially perceive some young people as being ‘at risk’ and potentially as presenting a risk to others. In this article we consider evidence from secondary school students who experienced a curriculum project on terrorism, extremism and radicalisation. We argue that a curriculum response which addresses the acquisition of knowledge can build students’ critical capacity for engagement with radicalisation through enhanced political literacy and media literacy. We further argue this represents a genuinely educational response to Prevent, as opposed to a more restrictive securitised approach.

This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in British Journal of Educational Studies on 17/12/2017, available online: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/00071005.2017.1415295