International Education Day | "Education and happiness" by Paulo Azevedo Dias

International Education Day will be celebrated on 24 January 2024. This year's event, which was proclaimed by the United Nations Assembly, is dedicated to combating hate speech and reminds us of Aristotle's words that "educating the mind without educating the heart is no education at all" and the words of Kant, who saw education as the art of achieving the best possible development of human nature, raising awareness of the reality of oneself and one's fellow human beings. These are reflections that show how much remains to be done to fulfil the ultimate goal of quality education for all, which promotes the integral development, well-being and happiness of each individual.

At the Centre for Philosophical and Humanistic Studies, we explore how education and happiness are related, on a micro (personal) and macro (comparing countries) level. The conclusion may come as a surprise: while the correlations are low in inter-individual studies, the differences between countries are remarkable. These figures emphasise the decisive role of education in the happiness and development of countries, remind us of the more than 250 million children and young people around the world estimated by UNESCO to be out of school and challenge governments and countries to think about why education contributes to the happiness of the citizens of different nations, but has little impact on the happiness of each individual.

Contemporary challenges (social and familial), the 20 per cent of children who suffer from mental health problems, particularly anxiety and depression, cases of bullying and their consequences, the excessive or inappropriate use of digital tools, the decreasing sense of belonging to school and the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic on learning, require capable and informed responses. This was the motto behind the creation of an informal group of experts to support the European Commission's Directorate-General for Education, Youth, Sport and Culture in developing recommendations for states, schools and teachers to promote well-being. The aim is to place well-being at the centre of educational policies and institutions, through both universal and selective, more personalised measures to support children and adolescents with mental health and learning challenges; through measures aimed at teachers, self-care, motivation and involvement in school; and through measures aimed at school management, inspectorates and governments.

As well as being a universal right, education is a privileged context for humanisation, for meeting human beings in peace, for well-being and happiness. To this end, it must be a space open to all, inclusive, centred on the development of cognitive skills, but also on the promotion of personal, social and emotional skills. Promoting these skills is essential, not only for combating hate speech, but especially for realising the potential of each person in their relationship with themselves, with others and with the common good.