Extracurricular Education

Prof. Dr. Peter Rieker
 

Education beyond the school system is highly important for the process of growing up and for the development of children and youths. This fact has also been widely discussed in educational sciences for some time now. Offers of extracurricular education can be found in different fields of youth welfare, yet diverse activities in families and peer groups are also relevant as contexts of informal processes of education. At the University of Zurich’s Institute of Education, offers and interventions of youth welfare, corresponding educational and learning processes, their surrounding conditions as well as processes concerned with learning and development in regard to family and peer group are taken into account. Where research is concerned, special attention is directed to children and youths who face special strains, show conspicuousness, and indicate problematic developments; in this context, conditions and progressions of these developments as well as their treatment within the limits of family, peer group, and youth welfare are focused here. It is also important to document performances and development needs of professional offers and to evaluate these on the basis of systematic analyses.