3. Qualitative study with students
3.1. Key information of an empirical study
3.1.1. Questionnaire
My main research question was about the hindrances and potential for de-veloping tolerance towards religious diversity in the context of school. To ans-wer this central question it was necessary to understand the positions of young people. I first investigated students’ own attitudes towards and their expecta-tions and experiences of religion and religious diversity by the means of a quali-tative research study. Its main aim was to gain a clearer insight into the role of religion in the lives and schooling of young people. I was interested in voca-bulary used and attitudes held by young people when they speak about religion, the role students themselves give to religion in their personal life and in human relations in general, where they meet religious diversity and how they value it. I also paid attention to the question of religious education at school and what expectations they have of the subject.
Partly structured oral interviews with students worked as a pilot phase for the development of the written questionnaire. As described in 1.3.2 written questionnaires were adapted to the language used by young people after oral interviews. A final questionnaire consisting of eight open questions was stan-dardised for all eight countries to make the results comparable. The questions addressed the domains of the individual, societal and educational significance of religion and were accordingly grouped under three themes: personal relevance of religion; religion in society and relations; and religion at school (Appendix 1–2).
The first block of questions dealt with religion at the personal level. Ques-tion one asked about students’ associaQues-tions with the terms ’religion’ and ‘God’.
I tried to establish importance of and attitudes towards religion in their personal lives and wanted to distinguish the associations students have with these words.
Question two asked about the sources of information through which they learned about religion and what kind of information they get through these sources.
The second block of questions focused on the social dimension of religion and on questions of dialogue and conflict. Question three was interested whether young people talk about religion, what they value in such talks and on which occasions they happen. If they do not speak about religion, what are the reasons for this? Question four asked about the experiences students have of religion, both problematic and positive ones, things they value and see as im-portant. Do they see a different worldview as frightening or interesting?
Question five asked about reasons whether or not people of different religious backgrounds can live peacefully together and why.
The last block of questions dealt with religion at school. Question six asked students to imagine that they could decide on policies at school and asked if they would allow religion to appear at school and why. Question seven was interested in topics which students would like to study about religion at school.
The final questions enquired if the teachers could be religious and how the studies about religion should be organised.
The questionnaire was filled by 73 students from three schools. Next I will give information about selected schools and the rationale for choosing these.
3.1.2. Sample and the procedure
As was described in section 2.1.1, Estonia is comprised of two bigger national groups. The religious distribution as well as socio-economic status of people from different parts of Estonia is uneven. To get a variety of opinions I decided to include a school from a rural area and others from towns. The schools in Estonia have adopted very different forms of religious education, as described in section 2.1.2. The qualitative study was carried out in three schools which differ in their geographical, demographical, linguistic8, religious background and also in the organisation of religious education. Only municipal schools, run by local authorities, were chosen. For anonymity reasons capital letters A, B, C are used for schools in this chapter.
School A is a rural school in Southern Estonia, dating back to the 17th century. It is situated in a homogeneously Estonian-speaking area. A Lutheran church plays a remarkable role in the life of local community. The building of the new schoolhouse, that meets the requirements of a basic school, was largely organised and initiated by a local pastor in the 1990s. Due to this initiative and
8 There were 470 Estonian-medium schools, 118 Russian-medium municipal schools in the year of the study (data according to EHIS, available at: https://eh-jas.hm.ee/avalik/
oas/Otsing.uix accessed 10.06.2006).
good relations with the pastor, religious education has been part of the curriculum for 13 years already. Religious education aims at introducing basic bible stories, teaching an understanding of Lutheran cultural background and, in the 8th grade, teaching about different confessions of Christianity and world religions represented in Estonia. Although it is an optional subject, almost all students take it from grade 1 to 8. The students of grade 9 do not have religious education during the final year of their studies but they have studied it before.
The respondents were from grades 8 (10 students) and 9 (15 students); all the students have had religious education experience during their studies at School A. The questionnaire was answered by students on November 20, 2006. The questionnaire was available on the internet (http://www.eformular.com/
olgasch/redco.html). Students were offered a possibility to fill it in on paper, if it was more convenient, but nobody chose this option. Students from the 9th grade gave the longest and most elaborated answers in comparison to all other groups. It is worth mentioning that at the beginning of November respondents had visited Muslims, a Jewish community and school, and a Catholic monastery in Tallinn. Many of their answers were influenced by that experience.
School B is a medium school situated in a predominantly Russian-speaking industrial town in Northern Estonia. The school has a unique history of sharing the same building with a religious orthodox school for several years.
Most of the students in the orthodox school were from religious families; some children had been accepted from ordinary schools, where they were not succeeding (having learning or behaviour problems). Religious education took the form of confessional studies, including basic Orthodox teachings and parti-cipation in the liturgy. The school has now been closed for economic reasons;
the students continued their studies at School 2, where religious education is not taught.
All 20 respondents were from grade 9, a few of them used to be students in the Orthodox school for several years, but most of them had no previous per-sonal experience with religious education. The students answered the questions on December 6, 2006 during their final lesson. The answers were rather short in most cases with some exceptions that were personal and exhaustive.
School C is a relatively new school, dating back to 1991. It is located in a suburb of a Western Estonian town. The students mainly belong to working and middle class families. As it was established during the period of religious revival, religious education was introduced into the new school. The first headmaster appointed a teacher of religious education and set up a compulsory course of religious education in the 10th grade dealing with world religions.
Although the school has no connection with any church, the teachers of reli-gious education have been Baptists, but the content of the relireli-gious education has been inter-religious.
The respondents from the 9th grade (17 students) had never studied religious education; grade 10 (11 students) had studied religious education for almost three months at the time the questionnaire was administered. The questionnaire was delivered on November 24, 2006. Here the answers differed greatly,
especially regarding attitudes towards religious education, according to the grades the students were in.
I give students’ answers using a code, which includes an identifier of gender, worldview and experience of religious education. The questionnaires are decoded in the text below according to the code key introduced in Table 2. For example ‘f-nr-02-A+’ labels a girl from the School A, grade 8 with no religious affiliation, who studies religious education. As it is impossible to know if a student took part in religious school in School B, the question mark is used.
Table 2. Codes for quotations
Gender Worldview Number –
school&grade School&Religious education
f/m at/ch/pr/nr/or/ur 01–73 A+/B?/C-/C+
f= female
The profile of the sample by gender and immigration background is similar to that of the whole population. There were 39 boys and 34 girls in the sample.
The mother tongue profile is also similar to that of the overall population.
Students with immigration background are all from School B, most of them (17 from 20) have roots outside Estonia (with one or more parents born outside Estonia). 6 respondents (8%) do not have Estonian citizenship, only 2 (3%) are born elsewhere themselves.
The specified worldview corresponds for the most part to the data of the Census from year 2000 (Table 3). Worldview was difficult to define for Estonian students – 42 out of 73 could not define their worldview. As according to the poll of 2000 the younger generation in Estonia relates to religion less than the older generation does, the worldview of 15–19 years old are presented in the table. It is worthwhile pointing out that Russian-speaking students were more eager to identify with a specific tradition – 11 out of 20 students regarded themselves as Orthodox. The higher percentage identifying with the Orthodox tradition compared with the rest of the age group could be due to the peculia-rities of the school with its former connections to the Orthodox Church and also to the higher percentage of Orthodox in the towns (Hansen, 2002, 121).
Table 3. The structure of sample and of the population: worldview Religion
Sample age 14–17
N 73 %
Total in Estonia age 15–19
N 103 772 %
Atheist 6 8 5 978 6
Christian 5 7 1 742 2
Lutheran 2 3 5 278 5
Orthodox 11 15 8 756 8
Religion 6 8 223 0,2
Destiny 1 1
Nothing
concrete 42 58
No
affiliation 37 505 36
Not defined 44 291 43
Source: Statistics Estonia, http://pub.stat.ee (accessed 10.06.2007)
3.1.3. Quantity and quality of data
Before conducting the study permission by parents and students was asked for.
All the students in selected schools and classes were asked to answer the questionnaire. Later the answers of those, who were outside the age group (17 years old), were dropped. In School C, grade 10, part of the class filled in the form while others were busy with the lesson. In School A, in grade 8, a teacher was present at the beginning of interview, but left after ten minutes. In School B the teacher was always at hand, but stayed far enough away not to see the answers given. In other classes no teacher was in attendance at any time during the interview. In all classes throughout the writing time I was present to answer possible questions from the students as they filled in the questionnaires. The length of the answers was rather short and depended partly on the school. In School B the average length was 119 words, in School A 174 and in School C 126 words. The longest answers in the School A group could be the result of the use of computers. No answers were given for six questions from School B and six questions from School C. Sometimes one-word answers were given for the questions that demanded longer answers: 14 questions in School B, five in School A and two in School C. The most difficult (not answered or answered just “Do not have”) was the 4th question regarding personal experiences of religion.