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the coherence between their values and religious education, and how they explain 1 possible discrepancies between the values and this practice. In line with the results
of our research in the participating schools, we contributed to the reflection on
the coherence between values and religious education by analyzing the teachers’
design of one such practice of encounter. Our results help us understand why and how teachers deal with their values in religious education in a context of plurality.
4. Conceptual framework
The main concept we address is school identity. Considering the specific plural context of cooperation schools, we study two aspects of school identity. First, we focus on addressing religious diversity in education as an expression of school identity. Since principals of cooperation schools in our first research phase formulated the concepts of encounter and equality as key values of their school identity, we study these values concerning religious diversity in school. The second aspect of school identity is its expression in the practice of religious education. We investigate both the approach to religious diversity and the concept of religious education as identity markers of the school. We describe our theoretical concepts in the following sections.
School identity (4.1)
Values concerning religious diversity (4.2) Religious education (4.3)
Encounter (4.2.1) Equality (4.2.2)
4.1. School identity
Only a definition of school identity that transcends the distinction between nongovernment and public education is helpful for our research. The focus should not be on schools that are based on a particular religious or pedagogical perspective. Only a transcendent definition can help us explore the identity of cooperation schools that share common values. We have opted for a definition of school identity that is “applicable to schools in general” (Faber 2012, 44). For this reason, we use the definition proposed by De Wolff: “what makes a school this particular school, or, what are the typical or characteristic features of this school, what the members of the school have in common . . . and what can be characterized by a certain degree of durability or continuity throughout time” (2000, 53). De Wolff (2000) describes a multidimensional concept of school
GENERAL INTRODUCTION
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