Step 7
Turn civic information into monitoring questions
Understand
A proper monitoring question should be formulated following the naive approach of children, who ask why things are happening, combined with the methodical approach of retired people when watching over the progress of building sites.
Combining these two attitudes, we can verify how a public administration’s action affects the community’s well-being, whether it is actually achieving (or not) its basic aims and whether it really considers vulnerable groups. Any questions can be asked if they concern the common good.
Experience
Once you look at the information you have collected, multiple questions can arise, and each is important if related to the common good. However, it is essential to guide the young people to move from a list of individual questions to a list shared by everyone in the group, to give a collective meaning to this process.
Try to guide the young people to move ‘from information to questions,’ always taking into account the information found (and what is missing) and the desires and curiosities of the participants, to favour their engagement.To better familiarise them with the concept of monitoring questions, you can have young people practise an activity that explores different ways of asking a question, especially when talking to public authorities.
