Evaluation Of Diversity In Compulsory Secondary Education Schools: The School Counselor’s Point Of View

Author(s):

Joaquín-Lorenzo Burguera(presenting / submitting)Mirian Miranda-Morais José-Miguel Arias

Conference:

ECER 2016

Network:

04. Inclusive Education

Format:

Poster

Session Information

04 SES 04.5 PS, General Poster Session

General Poster Session

Time:

2016-08-24

12:00-13:30

Room:

NM-Concourse Area

Chair:

Contribution

One of the main challenges facing our national education system is to provide quality education and adjusted to the functional diversity of all students. All this makes it very interesting to know how schools develop actions to contribute to the implementation of the principles of inclusion and equity.

We understand these principles as an attitude that must be present in the political dimension and in educational practice, if the aim is to ensure that all people receive a quality education, conceived as a right, without discrimination for ability, race or any other difference (Pujolás, 2004; Stainback y Stainback, 1999).

Given the recent change in legislation the Spanish Education System it is very important to know how schools are organized to meet the educational needs of all students.

In this paper we present the process and the results of the study on the state of the art of diversity in public schools providing Compulsory Secondary Education in Asturias (Spain). The study was based on information provided by school counselors.

The objectives of this work are:

To know the school counselors opinion about the educational policy, school resources, school organization, and teaching practices to give responses to the students diversity in the secondary schools in Asturias (Spain).
Analyze factors that promote or hinder the development of inclusive education in secondary schools.

We have adopted the concept of inclusive education (Ainscow, Booth, Dyson, Farrell, Frankham, Gallannaugh et al. 2006; Ainscow, Hopkins, Southworth y West, 2001; Echeita, 2013), as well as legislative rules and the recommendations of international organizations such as United Nations Educational, Scientific and cultural Organization (UNESCO) and the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

We consider the context of the inclusive education approach, which states that equal opportunities are guaranteed to the extent that education is equal for all students. The Inclusive Education emphasizes that education must be comprehensive and should be guided to achieve the maximum social and personal development of the students.

Stainback and Stainback (1999) Indicate that this is a process involving to take decisions regarding the following dimensions: educational curriculum, teaching practices and active participation of the entire educational community. The goal is that schools will be a place where students can develop to the maximum their capacity, interests and motivations.

The goal of an inclusive school is to develop a culture which will promote belonging and cohesion, and at the end, a school where everyone feels they are treated as valued individuals.

The analyses made by Echeita (2013) about development of the approaches and actions on this topic, emphasize the recognition of inclusive education as a social value that refers to an inalienable right of the persons.

In order to carry out this study we have taken as reference the review carried out by Booth & Ainscow (2002), Index for inclusion and other research papers on perception of teachers, school counselors, school management teams about of the measures to give response to the diversity at the schools (Álvarez, Rodríguez, García, Gil, López, Romero et al., 2002; Domínguez & López, 2010; Ferrandis, Grau & Forte, 2010; Moliner, Sales, Traver & Fernández, 2008).

Method

Taking into account the theoretical and conceptual framework adopted (inclusive education in compulsory secondary education schools), a design ex post facto was design to develop this research. A questionnaire shaped by a Likert scale and open questions has been developed for data collection from stakeholders. It has chosen to know the counselors point of view because we consider they are experts in this matter. To compute questionnaire internal consistency we used the Cronbach’s alpha statistic and a value of 0.91 has been obtained, which is a good value if we take into account the Nunnelly scale as a reference to analyze the result achieved. Statistical analysis were performed using the IBM-SPSS program (v. 21). From the conceptual adopted basis, the literature reviewed, the Spanish and Asturian current legislation about diversity and the counsellors functions a questionnaire was developed to collect the opinions and assessments of school counselors (Miranda, Burguera & Arias, 2014). The questionnaire has the following structure: 1. Six questions about their personal and professional information: sex, age, educational background and professional experience at the school. 2. Two questions regarding the type or nature of the school and its geographical location. 3. The Likert scale is composed by 55 items in order to collect information about eight dimensions: context, organisation, coordination, measures to pay attention to diversity, resources, leadership, training and attitude. To validate the instrument we select a group of experts. This group of experts was composed by 10 school counselors who are currently taking part in a secondary school counselling working group in Avilés area. The application of the questionnaires would not have been possible without the express support of the academic authorities of the Regional Government of the Principality of Asturias (Spain). The questionnaire was sent it by e-mail via to all school counselors which are working in public secondary schools in Asturias. Fifty-one school counselors from public secondary schools have participated in this work, representing a 63.75% of the population.

Expected Outcomes

According to the aim set we have defined which actions provide a fitting response to the needs of all students of compulsory secondary education. The results confirm that the school counselors perceive that the principle of diversity is present and is included in documents and in making decisions processes at the schools. School counselors also say that although there are consolidated measures to pay attention to the diversity in schools, and they perceive some limitations in the legislation to address diversity. The results of the study show that there are several aspects that facilitate and promote to pay attention to diversity in schools such as: collaboration and participation of families in school life, the commitment of teachers, teacher staff stability, positive leadership on the school management and necessary resources. But there are also other factors that hinder diversity such are: low level of teacher training on topics related with student diversity and classroom management, schools with large numbers of students and teachers and shortage of time and lack of space for coordination between teachers. In conclusion, school counselors they consider that while the professors' attitude respect to the diversity is positive, it is necessary overcome resistances respect to the methodological changes and also to improve initial and continuing teachers training. However we consider appropriate for the future of the study, the need for include another involved actors in the educational community such are students, teachers and families. We consider that their opinions are Important to have more insight about context and how they are developing the measures to diversity in schools. This requires to promote changes in the educational system in order to design schools that guarantee equal opportunity for all people. The educational inclusion is necessarily a process of transformation and participation of the whole educational community (Ainscow, 2004).

References

Ainscow, M., Booth, T., Dyson, A., Farrell, P., Frankham, J., Gallannaugh, F., Howes, A. and Smith, R. (2006). Improving schools, developing inclusion. London: Routledge . Ainscow, M., Hopkins, D., Southworth, G., Wets, M. (2001). Hacia escuelas eficaces para todos. Manual para la formación de equipos docentes. Madrid: Narcea. Ainscow, M. (2004). Desarrollo de escuelas inclusivas. Ideas, propuestas y experiencias para mejorar las instituciones escolares. Madrid: Narcea. Álvarez, V., Rodríguez, A., García, E., Gil, J., López, I., Romero, S., et al. (2002). La atención a la diversidad en los centros de enseñanza secundaria: Estudio Descriptivo en la provincia de Sevilla. Revista de Investigación Educativa, 20(1), 225-245. Booth, T. & Ainscow. M. (2002). Index for inclusion (2nd ED). Developing leaning and participation in schools (2ªed). Manchester: CSIE [trad. Guía para la evaluación y mejora de la educación inclusiva. Madrid: Consorcio Universitario para la Educación Inclusiva. consorcio.educacion.inclusiva@uam.es.] Domínguez, J. y López, A. (2010). Funcionamiento de la atención a la diversidad en la enseñanza primaria según la percepción de los orientadores. Revista de Investigación en Educación, (7), 50-60. Echeita, G. (2013). Inclusión y Exclusión Educativa. De Nuevo, "Voz y Quebranto". REICE. Revista Iberoamericana sobre Calidad, Eficacia y Cambio en Educación, 11(2), 99-118. Recuperado de: http://www.rinace.net/reice/numeros/arts/vol11num2/art5.pdf Ferrandis, Mª. V., Grau, C. y Fortes, Mª. C. (2010). El profesorado y la Atención a la diversidad en la ESO. Revista Educación Inclusiva, 3(2), 11-28. Miranda, M., Burguera, J. L., y Arias, J. M. (2014). La percepción del orientador/a sobre la diversidad en Secundaria. International Journal of Developmental and Educational Psychology, 1(3), 193-202. Moliner, O., Sales, A., Traver, J. A. y Ferrández, R. (2008). La atención a la diversidad en los centros de Educación Secundaria Obligatoria: análisis de las variables facilitadoras y limitadoras de las prácticas docentes. Educación y Diversidad, 2, 99-127. Pujolàs, P. (2004). Aprender juntos alumnos diferentes. Los equipos de aprendizaje cooperativo en el aula. Barcelona: OCTAEDRO. Stainback, S. y Stainback, W. (1999). Aulas inclusivas. Madrid: Narcea.

Author Information

Joaquín-Lorenzo Burguera (presenting / submitting)

University of Oviedo

Department of Educational Sciences

Oviedo

Mirian Miranda-Morais

Teachers' Training and Resource Center - Aviles-Occidente (Spain)

José-Miguel Arias

University of Oviedo, Spain

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