Political Awareness and Classroom Engagement among Secondary Students in Chandrapur Municipality: Exploring the Influence of Nepal’s Gen-Z Movement

This study explores the impact of the Gen-Z movement on political awareness and student involvement in the classroom at the secondary level. With a qualitative approach, data were obtained from five secondary schools in Chandrapur Municipality, and about 40 students from grades 11 and 12 were selected as key respondents through interviews, classroom observations, and recordings of discussions. The data collected were thematically analysed by coding and by identifying various themes. The results show that the students have a developing but mostly superficial political awareness, this being mainly due to digital media, and that their engagement is mostly passive. At the same time, they exhibit strong civic values and a latent political consciousness. The study also finds that the Gen-Z movement has increased classroom participation by promoting discussion and critical thinking. It concludes that it is important to strengthen civic education if political awareness is to be turned into active engagement. The study is especially important for examining the political understanding of teenagers, since most of the research currently focuses on adult and college and university level students, and it also relates to the medium through which their ideology is formed, as well as being equally relevant for understanding classroom behaviour via which they often express their ideology.