Educational Exclusion Research Articles

Biographical perspectives on language ideologies in teacher education

Universities represent spaces where language ideologies are taken up, modified, and transformed. The monolingual orientation of most universities contributes to the (re)construction of inequalities between students perceived as “native speakers” and others labelled as “non-natives”. Therefore, language ideologies can be a challenge for linguistically minoritized students if their multilingual practices are not accepted as legitimate. Linking biographical with sociolinguistic and educational theories, this article focuses on the experiences of linguistically minoritized student teachers who aspire to work as German teachers in Austria. The research is based on biographical interviews. Through a comparison of three different cases, in which interviewees describe personal experiences with language hierarchies, the article elaborates on the following: how biographies of linguistically minoritized student teachers are shaped by language ideologies; how the processes of inclusion and exclusion in teacher education are linked to multilingual practices; and how linguistically minoritized student teachers position themselves against and make sense of language ideologies in their educational biographies. In the concluding section, the article makes an argument for the relevance of biographical theory and methodology to research on multilingual practices in educational institutions.

Introduction: Modernity, Schooling and Childhood in India: Trajectories of Exclusion

ABSTRACT This Introduction sets up a binary framing between the ‘marginal child’ and the ‘subaltern student’ to help contextualize this Special Issue’s efforts to frame educational exclusions in India within a longer history of modernity, childhood and the democratization of schooling. Broadly speaking, the ‘marginal child’ refers to discourses that focus on the ‘victimhood’ of particular populations of children while leveraging their hypothetical schooled futures as the ideal solution to their current situation. In contrast, the ‘subaltern student’ embeds a more historicized framing that draws our attention to first-generation students’ cautious hopefulness around formal education as that which coexists with, and is shaped by, their parallel recognition, navigation and experiences of school spaces as sites that devalue their identities as learners. Each figure, one discursive and the other real, aids in disclosing how recent efforts to realize all ‘children’s right to education’ contain distinct techniques of knowledge production, particular understandings of schooling’s spatial and temporal norm, and contrasting ideas around children’s value and futurity, i.e. practices that have significant ethical and political ramifications in shaping contemporary conversations around educational inequities in India.

From inclusive education to global citizenship training. Notes for a reflection

Inclusive, equitable and quality education for all, in addition to being the essence of one of the sustainable development goals promoted by the 2030 agenda, are the indicators of analysis of this study. It aims to elucidate some of the main causes of exclusion in education, in order to understand the real challenge implied by the desire for inclusive education. At the same time, this reflection proposes to assume the training for global citizenship and its direct relationship with the sustainable development of a world, of which we are all part, as an integrating axis and main claim of societies at this time. The proposal finds, in the review of articles, books, conferences and congresses, the support to deliberate around a laudable and necessary challenge. Let this exploration serve, therefore, as a starting point for debate or at least to awaken consciences.

Inclusive education in South Africa: path dependencies and emergences

ABSTRACT Inclusive education is a fundamental right of all students. Despite international policy initiatives, educational exclusion is pervasive, especially in the Global South, and disproportionately affects disabled students. Barriers to inclusive education have been itemised in the literature, but in this conceptual paper that offers a novel perspective on the topic, we argue for a complexity approach to understand its evolution. Using a qualitative deductive content analysis of South African laws, policies, reports and scholarly literature, we explore three path dependencies from colonial/apartheid times that lock the country into historical patterns of categorisation and segregated schooling. These operate alongside the emergence of new and inclusive practices by actors at a system-wide and local level, made possible by inputs into the policy ecology. South Africa represents a complex, contradictory educational environment that confounds the expectation of linear progression towards greater inclusivity. Instead of identifying barriers to inclusive education, we argue for a nuanced understanding of the imbrications of historical investments and drivers of inequality, with policy possibilities and the impetus for transformation among system actors.

Educational Transitions in War and Refugee Contexts: Youth Biographies in Afghanistan and Austria

This article addresses educational transitions under conditions of multiple insecurities. By analyzing empirical data of two research projects with youths in Afghanistan and refugee students in Austria, we show how young peoplemake sense of the social and educational inequalities they encounter on their educational pathways within different national, socio‐political, and institutional contexts. We present in‐depth analyses of two cases to elaborate how young people in different parts of the world conceive of their futures when basic security needs are not met, and how they make sense of the social and educational inequalities they face during their transition processes. After living through repeatedly fractured perspectives, young people have to make sense of their biographical experiences and continuously (re)design their plans while facing uncertain futures. In the Afghan Youth Project, we reconstructed a collective—and morally charged—biographical orientation of future plans. This orientation can also be understood as a critical response to persistent fragility and inequality and suggests an imagined generational hold and sense of belonging. In the Austrian project Translating Wor(l)ds, we reconstructed continuing experiences of educational exclusion, marginalization, and devaluation in different migration societies throughout refugee routes. Educational transitions, which can be challenging for all young people, take on special relevance under these conditions. Combining biographical and socio‐psychological research perspectives allows us to reconstruct educational processes as cumulative, non‐linear processes and to reveal the ambiguities, contradictions, and ruptures woven into them, as well as the subjects’ constructions of sense and agency.

Mahaul and Mazboori: educational aspirations and realities of Dalit youth in Delhi

This paper examines the predicament of the Dalit youth in their pursuit of higher education through a qualitative study in a low-income locality of Delhi. In absence of control over material resources historically, education offered promise in liberating socially excluded groups for its instrumental link with modern occupational structure. The policy of universal public education backed up with affirmative action in India has formally aided its access across sections. Even as the participation of the hitherto marginalized groups has been increasing manifold, privatization and marketisation in the education sector under the neo-liberal regime have transformed the educational landscape. Dalit youth is largely segregated into low-quality distance and social sciences education. The paper discusses various constraining and motivating factors embedded within and outside the neighbourhood and educational institutions which shape their educational interests, choices, and decisions. It elaborates on how cumulative socio-cultural, spatial, and historical disadvantages continue to shape the process of educational exclusion, even when these groups live in a metropolitan city amidst educational institutions. However, we also stress that the state policies, informed mentors, shared aspirations, and diversity in socio-cultural interactions hold the potential to alter and widen educational aspirations, access, and outcomes.

Intercultural philosophy and internationalisation of higher education: epistemologies of the South, geopolitics of knowledge and epistemological polylogue

ABSTRACT The enduring colonial-like relations among Northern and Southern spaces continue to influence knowledge production and dissemination. Critical scholarship on epistemic diversity in higher education has argued that knowledge circulation is often unilateral considering how global partnerships among universities and higher education models are still unidirectional. While Northern ways of knowing dominate what is taught and researched in higher education institutions, indigenous knowledges are not always represented in their local universities due to skewed geopolitics of knowledges. That is why emerging forms of resistance such as the calls for decolonising the curriculum have emphasised the need to deconstruct the ideological systems of exclusion in contemporary higher education. This article discusses how the internationalisation of higher education may be running the risk of reproducing epistemic injustice and uneven geopolitics of knowledge. With the West-led internationalisation discourse and the ascendancy of neoliberal tendencies, universities in the Global South might be experiencing deeper epistemic dependency. To undermine the dominance of western epistemologies, less popular ways of knowing are expected to assume a central position in the global geopolitics of knowledge. This article makes a case for embracing intercultural philosophy as an emancipating framework that offers the possibility of reconciling the world’s epistemologies by promoting inter-epistemic dialogue. The nuance of intercultural philosophy and its analysis of the epistemic relationships at play granted by epistemological polylogue can encourage pluri-epistemologies in higher education.

Identity Politics and Syrian Refugees in Lebanon: Implications for Higher Education

Identities and identity politics play a significant role in the lives of Syrian refugees in Lebanon. Using empirical qualitative research with focus groups as the primary research method, this article is a critical investigation into the ways in which Syrian refugees in Lebanon are simultaneously politicized through their everyday lived experiences yet depoliticized through humanitarian policy and practice. In particular, the article explores how the politicization/depoliticization dichotomy impacts Syrian refugees’ access to and experiences within higher education opportunities made available for them in Lebanon. The article argues that humanitarianism’s inattentiveness to intersectional identities and social hierarchies of power has often resulted in physical and psychological educational exclusions and reinforced existing inequalities and fissures/divisions between different groups of refugees. In this way, higher education for refugees has often fallen short of its potential to transform lives.

Biomotor profile of children at risk of educational and social exclusion in north-eastern Romania

Identification of the somatic and motor profile of students at risk of social and educational exclusion can be a factor of diagnosis but also of prognosis in terms of planning the content of various sports activities in order to integrate them. In this context, 189 students from North-Eastern Romania were included in the research. Gender distribution indicates that there are 104 boys and 85 girls. Participants are enrolled at the “Cezar Botez” Middle School in Fâstâci (57 students) and the Middle School no. 1 - Racova, Gârceni (132 students). The current research aims to outline the somatic and motor profile of boys in the North-East region by area of residence, the somatic and motor profile of girls in the North-East region by area of residence, the somatic and motor profile of boys in the North-East region by age and the somatic and motor profile of girls in the North-East region by age. The results obtained in somatic tests (height, weight, arm span, body mass index for teenagers) for the North-East region of the country were analysed as well as the results recorded in motor tests (4 x 10 m Shuttle Run, Standing Long Jump, T-Test). This research is part of the project “Sustainable social and educational integration through sports activities” (PNP001).

BIOMOTOR PROFILE OF CHILDREN AT RISK OF EDUCATIONAL AND SOCIAL EXCLUSION IN NORTH-EASTERN ROMANIA

Abstract. Identification of the somatic and motor profile of students at risk of social and educational exclusion can be a factor of diagnosis but also of prognosis in terms of planning the content of various sports activities in order to integrate them. In this context, 189 students from North-Eastern Romania were included in the research. Gender distribution indicates that there are 104 boys and 85 girls. Participants are enrolled at the “Cezar Botez” Middle School in Fâstâci (57 students) and the Middle School no. 1 - Racova, Gârceni (132 students). The current research aims to outline the somatic and motor profile of boys in the North-East region by area of residence, the somatic and motor profile of girls in the North-East region by area of residence, the somatic and motor profile of boys in the North-East region by age and the somatic and motor profile of girls in the North-East region by age. The results obtained in somatic tests (height, weight, arm span, body mass index for teenagers) for the North-East region of the country were analysed as well as the results recorded in motor tests (4 x 10 m Shuttle Run, Standing Long Jump, T-Test). This research is part of the project “Sustainable social and educational integration through sports activities” (PNP001).

Rethinking Educational Modernity: The Educational State of Exception

This article proposes that the concept of “educational state of exception” (based on Giorgio Agamben’s idea of the “state of exception”) can productively explain a history of school administration, teachers, and class organization observed by the author at a school in a leper village. The educational state of exception found at the leper school has three primary aspects: (1) The educational state of exception is a method that operates outside of the normal order; it is neutral, possessing both just and unjust properties (from the just side, it can offer education to those who otherwise would not receive it; from the unjust side it can turn into a kind of exclusion, excluding an exceptional group from public education); (2) the educational state of exception wavers between the normal and the abnormal; and (3) the educational state of exception can be a tool of modern educational governance; it suspends the rules of the normal order while guaranteeing the most rudimentary rights to an exceptional group. The history of education in the leper village illustrates the meaning of this specialized term. It also shows us that we need to pay attention to the educational state of exception and utilize its positive functions but avoid its negative consequences; it leads us to use extreme educational exclusion as a lens through which to consider the real meaning of educational equality.

Carcerality and Education: Toward a Relational Theory of Risk in Educational Institutions

In this paper, we explore the logics underlying the policies and practices within K-12 schools, colleges, and universities that expose students to carceral systems, such as the police and prisons. Educational institutions at all levels have had the latitude to develop the capacity to discipline, surveil, and control students, which reproduce carceral logics within as well as create pathways to carceral systems. However, our scholarly understanding of such phenomena is bifurcated and uneven. While there is an extensive line of research on exclusionary discipline in the K-12 sector, similar scholarship is emergent at the postsecondary level. The goals of this paper are twofold. First, we review the ways in which carcerality informs the development of discipline, punishment, and control structures throughout the K-16 pipeline. Second, we introduce a relational theory of risk as a unified conceptual approach to examine carceral policies and practices in both the K-12 and the higher education sectors. From a relational risk perspective, we argue that carceral practices can be understood as a relationship between educational institutions and students who are perceived to be threats to institutional interests. Engaging with the organizational imperatives that lead to carceral practices, researchers and practitioners can better attend to dismantling racial exclusion in education.

Greek Roma’s educational success: the contribution of community factors

ABSTRACT Children from Roma communities are consistently among the lowest academic achievers in many European countries and this holds true in Greece. In Greek schools, Roma students experience high dropout rates and low performance compared to their non-Roma peers. Moreover, in Greece, as elsewhere, Roma experience wide-spread discrimination. Drawing on a set of in-depth interviews with 20 Greek Roma who have entered higher education, this paper examines how these participants account for their educational success. In particular, this article analyses the influence of ‘community factors’ on the participants’ academic progression. This article highlights aspects of the Greek case of Roma’s educational success that may contribute towards addressing aspects related to Roma’s educational exclusion and promoting educational progression in the European context more widely.

Digital Gaps Influencing the Online Learning of Rural Students in Secondary Education: A Systematic Review

The digital gaps that were amplified due to the COVID-19 pandemic deepened more in vulnerable areas in different parts of the world. The present work aims to analyze the study of digital gaps that influence online learning of students from rural areas in secondary education, based on a systematic review of the literature. It was developed using the PRISMA methodology, the scientific information was retrieved from the Web of Science and ERIC databases in a period of three months. In the searches it was taken as inclusion criteria; open access, year of publication 2017 - 2021, English and Spanish language, rural secondary education level and exclusion; articles whose studies were carried out in higher education, in specific areas, related to research policies, evaluation, studies before 2017 and articles from systematic reviews. The results and findings emphasize that digital literacy levels are scarce and limited in terms of the skills developed by students and teachers to achieve digital competencies, in addition to restricted access due to technological, economic, and coverage gaps of families. The conclusions are aimed at strengthening urgent educational policies in addition to the integration of the school curriculum.

Zones of educational exclusion of out-of-school youth

This study provides new evidence on bottlenecks of progression across six zones of exclusion from primary to secondary education for out-of-school youth of five poorer countries (Guatemala, Honduras, Panama, Paraguay and Senegal) using the recent out-of-school assessment from PISA-D. We also investigate whether these barriers have gendered dimensions and which policies can boost progression. We find that barriers have differential impacts across exclusion zones, with low parental education and involvement in education and local language being leading determinants, and some of these barriers having a larger impact on girls. We also find that policies linking financial support to attendance, raising teaching quality and tackling discrimination push up youth cohorts to top zones of exclusion, thereby allowing them to gain more education.

Primary School Teachers’ Perception of Low Functioning Students: Validation of the EPREPADI-1 Scale

This research contributes to the knowledge and understanding of some aspects of the professional practice of primary education teachers in the Region of Murcia (Spain), and its possible effect on the creation of situations of educational exclusion. For this purpose, an instrument called EPREPADI-1 (Scale of Perception of Primary Education Teachers on their Training and Professional Practice in relation to Pupils with Disabilities) has been developed. The design and structure of the instrument includes important aspects that seek to highlight teachers’ views and knowledge of educational legislation (international, national and regional), their views on nomenclatures (such as those of persons with disabilities and inclusive education), as well as their assessment of the use of language of denial in relation to pupils with lower functional performance. Furthermore, after the statistical tests carried out for the validation of the scale (Kendall’s W test and Cronbach’s Alpha), values were obtained that give the instrument excellent validity and reliability (both for the group of experts and also for the pilot group), which is why its use and application is recommended.

Free Primary Education, Gender and Intersectionality

Free Primary Education (FPE) program was introduced in Kenya in 2003 by the National Rainbow Coalition (NARC) Government to abolish primary school fees. Recent evidence indicates that a substantial number of children, especially girls are still out of school and that initial gains from the program have been eroded by wastage issues within the system. Specifically, girls from poor, rural and marginalized backgrounds are most affected. The study employed the critical social theory, from a gender perspective, to interrogate the concept of gender and intersectionality in education provision. The challenges that girls face due to social circumstances they find themselves in because they have a disability or where they come from either rural, urban slum, or marginalized region intersect with gender to exacerbate their exclusion in education. This study analyzes the 2019 basic education statistical data from Kenya and supplements it with evidence from qualitative data from four case schools representing rural, slum, pastoralist and disability categories of marginalization in the Kenyan context to highlight the multiple marginalizations that girls from these backgrounds face of girls. In confirming that gender intersectionality is a reality in gender neutral policies like the FPE, the study reports that girls from poor and marginalized communities have lower educational participation outcomes compared to their affluent counterparts due to social, cultural and economic factors. It suggests strategies of enhancing their status to enable them benefit from FPE and related interventions.

Quality Pedagogical Practice in Early Childhood Education Institutions Relating to Children at Risk of Social Exclusion

Quality early childhood education and care has been the focus of interest of researchers for over half a century. Approaches to the quality monitoring and quality assurance of early childhood education and care, as well as its conceptualisation and operationalisation, have changed and developed over the decades in line with contemporary understandings of child development and learning, and in accordance with changes in the purpose and functions of early childhood education and care. The results of many relevant studies confirm that quality early childhood education and care is crucial for short-term and long-term positive outcomes in different development and learning areas, especially in the case of disadvantaged children, including children at risk of social exclusion. The aim of this paper is to present the concept of quality in early childhood education and care from various research perspectives, with special emphasis on a review of the literature on the quality of pedagogical practice aimed at children at risk of social exclusion. The paper presents the theoretical model of responding to the needs of children at risk of social exclusion in Croatian early childhood education and care. Special attention is given to the quality of pedagogical practice regarding children at risk of social exclusion, as a prerequisite for planning targeted measures and interventions directed at this group of children and their families within the Croatian early childhood education and care system. It was concluded that the key factors for quality pedagogical practice are an interdisciplinary approach of highly qualified professionals and the participation of all key stakeholders within the child’s immediate environment, as well as connection between relevant policies and practice, which are crucial for early childhood education and care quality.

Introduction to the Special Issue: exclusion, expulsion and suspension of students with disabilities: advancing knowledge, preventing educational exclusion

The papers in this special issue are at the vanguard of advancing knowledge about school suspensions and exclusions and in establishing a critical evidence base which educational policy and school‐based initiatives can access in efforts to re‐enact meaningful inclusion for some of our most vulnerable students. Hosting and showcasing emerging knowledge in this space is an important role for JORSEN as a journal which promotes educational inclusion. This short editorial offers an overview of the papers included in this special issue and suggests common issues in the important emerging field of research into the educational exclusion and suspension of students with disabilities.

Normalizing race in (gifted) education: genomics and spaces of White exceptionalism

ABSTRACT This paper utilizes the concept of ‘discriminate biopower’ to explore how advancements in social and behavioral genomics might inform the racially exclusionary nature of one of the most inequitable and academically coveted environments in American public education: gifted education. In its birth, gifted education became a mechanism for regulating the politics of race and equity in the American education system. Underpinning gifted education’s contested history is the conflation of Whiteness with exceptionalism and the proliferation of false genetic ideologies about biological differences between races. Genetics and education are re-intersecting today as social and behavioral genomics examine whether, how, and why genetic differences between individuals relate to differences in characteristics such as educational attainment or intelligence. This paper identifies three mechanisms through which social and behavioral genomics might be recruited for biopolitical governance strategies that maintain or exacerbate the racially exclusionary nature of gifted education: distractionism, determinism, and sociopolitical invisibility. Although these mechanisms are not predestined, researchers will need to employ proactive and socially responsible collaboration and communication to prevent genomics from normalizing racial exclusion in education.