Vital interests: cultivating global competence in the international studies classroom

Are students being prepared for the challenges they will face in a globalising world? We investigated whether middle school students were interested in global issues, had knowledge of global issues and possessed the skills needed for competence as a citizen in a globalising world in the context of participating in a five-week, web-based international negotiation simulation conducted by the GlobalEd Project. A repeated measures ANOVA on a pre- and post-test scores and a chi square analysis on qualitative data indicated significant pre- to post-increases in knowledge and skills from this educational programme. Potential implications of these findings with regard to global education are discussed.