Defining Secondary Education Curriculum Goals with an Emphasis on Citizenship Education

The main goal of the current phenomenological study was formulating secondary education curriculum goals with an emphasis on citizenship education. The survey participants were all education specialists of secondary education in Isfahan and Qom. Sampling was purposive and involved participants until data saturation was fulfilled. At the end، the sample included 7 participants. The data was collected through an in-depth semi-structured interview and was recorded using an MP3 set. Data was analyzed applying Colaizzi''s approach involving seven stages. After extracting conceptual codes and elimin ating common codes، the findings resulted in «goals» characterized as two main themes of «democratic citizenship» and «multi-layer relationship in citizenship concept” with five sub-themes encom passing 102 conceptual codes. The results of the present research rev eal that، unfortunately، the citizenship education approach in seco ndary education is reactive and، in practice، insufficient attention has been paid to all components of the students’ citizenship education. In addition، in the view of education officials and curriculum designers (and hence the curriculum itself) no logical balance exists between citizenship rights and responsibilities.