Schools as Learning Communities

Abstract

Schools succeeding against the odds can make a difference. However, this complex challenge has barely been achieved individually. Knowing that it takes a village to raise a child, schools as learning communities join everybody to develop a common understanding of the school ethos that promotes quality education for all. This article focuses on how this process turned despair into hope in an elementary school in one of the most marginalized areas in Spain. Building upon critical pedagogy and dialogic learning, I analyzed some turning points of this transformation. Particularly, the power of qualitative research under the communicative methodology approach seems to be crucial for (a) opening the classrooms and school to the community and (b) including people's voices into the research. Eight years later, evidence shows profound changes in people's lives. This case exemplifies the Freirean concept of the “untested feasibility,” which enables us to generate real transformations.