Student Interpretations of Student Roles: What About Sustainability?

The goal of this article is to investigate the relationship between the contemporary humanistic ideology and the student roles as perceived by young people themselves. First, the traditional humanist ideas of education as a relational term and its contemporary features are analysed. Theoretically, a good education today offers young persons positive experiences for developing and is dialogical in nature. After this discussion, the interpretations of young people from different school types and age groups on their perceived role at school and their relations attributed to that role are described. These young people see their role in a very traditional way, meaning that the most important goal is to behave in manner that best insures their receiving good grades. This paper shows that there is no congruence between the currently desired image of education and the described role of student