Session Information
23 SES 12D, Minority Education
Symposium
Contribution
Explicit targeting is an essential characteristic of education policies aiming at Roma inclusion. Political initiatives such as the Decade of Roma Inclusion 2005–2015 and the EU Framework for National Roma Integration Strategies up to 2020 expect member states to develop national policies targeting Romani students and states are expected to periodically report about measures taken and progress made. In addition, financial mechanisms such as the European Union Structural and Investment Funds or the Instrument for Pre-accession Assistance II explicitly support projects aiming at improving education for “marginalized communities”. Organisations applying for such funds are likely to develop a targeted approach focusing on Romani communities. Finally, international organisations disseminate educational models explicitly targeting Romani students such as scholarship programs, school assistant and mediator programs, or education for remembrance projects.
Some scholars have called attention to the ambivalent consequences of explicit targeting arguing that Roma are likely to be portrayed as “problems in need of solutions” (Timmer, 2010) and that targeted policies might create a self-perpetuating cycle policy problems and policy responses attributed to Roma inclusion (e.g. Marushiakova & Popov, 2015; Miškolci et al., 2017; Surdu & Kovats, 2015). Especially NGOs, who in many regions have taken the function of service providers for Romani communities (Trehan, 2001), might be compelled to reproduce deficit statements driven by the need to continuously identify problems in order to raise and spend new funds (e.g. Levinska & Doubek, 2015; Matras et al., 2015).
In the last ten years, a considerable amount of educational research has analysed patterns of ethnic segregation, assessed the extent of educational inequalities between Roma and non-Roma, and evaluated initiatives, projects and funding schemes. However, too little attention has been paid to unintended consequences of targeted education policies and projects. The objective of this symposium is to take a critical look at educational policies and projects that explicitly target Romani students. Particular attention will be paid to ambivalent and unintended consequences that accompany targeted approaches. The methods used by the contributors to the symposium include ethnographic fieldwork, participant observation, interviews, document analysis and contextual comparisons.
Jozef Miškolci examines how pro inclusive educational policy documents and the general public frame Roma students as target of public policies. Nafsika Alexiadou analyses the consequences of explicit targeting evident in the Swedish Strategy for Roma Inclusion. Lídia Balogh & Andras L. Pap present an assessment of policies targeting Romani students in Hungary differentiating between “honours programmes” and “opportunity levelling programmes” as well as between “explicit and exclusive” and “explicit but non-exclusive” approaches. Anna Kirova and Veselina Lambrev look at the role that orientalist discourses play in constructing Roma educational problems in Bulgaria.
References
Levinska, M., & Doubek, D. (2015). “Struggle” for trust – Unintended Consequences of an “Integration Project.” Presented at ECER 2015. Education and Transition, Budapest. Marushiakova, E. & Popov, V. (2015). European Policies for Social Inclusion of Roma: Catch 22? Social Inclusion, 3(5), 19–31. Matras, Y., Leggio, D. V. & Steel, M. (2015). “Roma education” as a lucrative niche. Ideologies and representations. ZEP : Zeitschrift für Internationale Bildungsforschung und Entwicklungspädagogik, 38(1), 11–17. Miškolci, J., Kováčová, L., & Kubánová, M. (2017). Trying to include but supporting exclusion instead? Constructing the Roma in Slovak educational policies. European Education, 49(1), forthcoming. Surdu, M., & Kovats, M. (2015). Roma Identity as an Expert-Political Construction. Social Inclusion, 3(5), 5–18. Timmer, A. D. (2010). Constructing the “Needy Subject”: NGO Discourses of Roma Need. PoLAR: Political and Legal Anthropology Review, 33(2), 264–281.
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