Session Information
99 ERC SES 04 I, Communities, Families, and Schooling in Educational Research
Paper Session
Contribution
This paper will draw upon the first two years of my doctoral studies in order to address an overarching question: how can caring communities be co-created in our schools?
In the context of global conflicts, polarisation of political beliefs, rising inequalities and the climate crisis, learning to live together well and collaborate are arguably the ethical imperatives of our times (Booth, 2018; Samanani, 2022; IEA, 2022). School environments hold the potential to be sites of relational learning, in which both staff and students can learn experientially about coexistence, and how we might collaborate to address common issues. Dewey conceptualises the school environment as a ‘miniature community’: a participatory space, in which we can learn through processes of co-construction and reflecting upon our interactions (1941). As well as a co-learning space, the school community also holds the potential to be an invaluable source of social, emotional and wellbeing support (The Children’s Society, 2023).
Yet the extent to which our education systems are preparing young people to grapple, collaboratively, with the challenges we are facing, and enabling schools to support the social and emotional needs of those within their care, can be called into question by urgent calls to transform education globally in light of the climate crisis, and situated reports of alienation and unhappiness in English state secondary schools (e.g. Higham, 2021; Tannock, 2021; UNESCO, 2021; The Children's Society, 2023; McPherson et al., 2023; Haraway, 1988). In the face of these international and national challenges, this paper draws upon the concepts of care, agency and community to theoretically and empirically consider the role of school communities today.
This paper explores the potential for participation, support and connection at school through the lens of care: a broad and expansive concept that connects how we relate to each other and the world around us (Dobson and Higham, paper in progress). The theoretical framework for this paper also draws upon the literature review from the first year of my doctoral study, in which I brought together literature on care and agency to theorise an agential ethic of care, elevating our capacity to act together in care in education (references include: Tronto, 1993; Owis, 2022; Noddings, 1984; Higham and De Vynck, 2019).
In order to address the central question of how we might co-create caring communities in our schools, this paper will present initial findings from my Economic and Social Research Council-funded doctoral research, which explores: how care and community are lived and experienced in state secondary schools in England at present; barriers to and opportunities for co-creating caring communities in our schools; and emergent possibilities from care and community-centred collaborative research in schools. This field work will provide a situated example of knowing with staff and students in the English context – yet the findings hold international implications, in light of the global challenges we face (Haraway, 1988).
Method
This paper will invite discussion around initial findings from my doctoral field work, for which I am employing a range of methods. For this field work, I began by facilitating staff and student focus groups about care in one English state secondary school community, leading into a participatory action research project, designed to collaboratively address a particular care need or opportunity identified by co-researchers in the school. To design this field work, I am drawing upon a range of participatory methodological literature (e.g. Fine and Torre 2021; Brown, 2022; Riley, 2017). I plan to also use collaborative methodologies to engage staff and students in other selected school contexts in mixed discussions about care and collaboration, in order to build upon and further explore initial emerging themes. This paper will also draw upon focus group and observational data to explore the experience of participating in a care-and-community-centred participatory research project in a school.
Expected Outcomes
Emerging themes from initial focus groups indicate broader structural, relational and individual factors that can affect the extent to which students and staff feel cared for, able to care, and able to participate in their school community. They also indicate the complex balancing act of care needs and priorities, which Tronto argues elevates the need for dialogue about care (1993). Subsequent field work and analysis prior to the ECR conference will build upon and clarify the emerging themes for the paper presentation. Emergent possibilities from this collaborative research will, in combination with the theoretical framework outlined above, feed into the paper’s exploration of co-creating caring communities in our schools. Overall, this research aims, through collaborative methodologies, to help school leaders and policymakers to understand, and act on, what helps staff and students to feel cared for, able to care, able to participate, and able to collaborate within their school community. By re-framing caring as potentially collaborative and agential, this paper seeks to respond to urgent questions of how we can learn to live together well, and how we might support, and engage, members of our school communities - while also making a contribution to theories of care in education. Staff and student perspectives on care and community in their schools, amplified through this research, will hold implications for researchers, policymakers and practitioners, indicating the relevance of and potential for reclaiming ‘schools as caring communities’ in the present-day context (e.g. Baker et al., 1997).
References
Baker, Jean A., Robert Bridger, Tara Terry, and Anne Winsor (1997). ‘Schools as Caring Communities: A Relational Approach to School Reform’. School Psychology Review 26 (4) 586–602. Booth, A.J. (2018). 'How Should We Live Together? Choosing the Struggle for Inclusive Values'. Revista Ibero-Americana de Estudos em Educação, Esp. 13 (2), pp.1388–1406. Brown, Nicole (2022). ‘Scope and Continuum of Participatory Research’. International Journal of Research & Method in Education 45, (2) pp.200–211. Dewey, J. (1941). Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education. New York: The Macmillan Company. Fine, Michelle, and Torre, María Elena (2021). Essentials of Critical Participatory Action Research. Washington: American Psychological Association. Haraway, Donna (1988). ‘Situated Knowledges: The Science Question in Feminism and the Privilege of Partial Perspective’. Feminist Studies 14 (3) pp.575–99. Higham, R. (2021) ‘Reframing Ethical Leadership in Response to Civilizational Threats’, in T. Greany and P. Earley (eds) School Leadership and Education System Reform. London, UK: Bloomsbury. Available at: https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/school-leadership-and-education-system-reform-9781350173514. Higham, R. and De Vynck, H. (2019). 'Creating an ‘Ethic of Care’ in a Vertical Tutor Group'. In N. Mercer, R. Wegerif, and L. Major (Eds.), The Routledge International Handbook of Research on Dialogic Education. New York: Routledge, 2020.: Routledge, pp.622–633. IEA (2022). 'International ‘Collaboration Gap’ Threatens to Undermine Climate Progress and Delay Net Zero by Decades'. International Energy Agency. Available at: https://www.iea.org/news/international- collaboration-gap-threatens-to-undermine-climate-progress-and-delay-net-zero-by-decades [Accessed: 3 May 2023]. McPherson, C. et al. (2023). Schools for All? Young Lives, Young Futures: King’s College London. Available at: https://www.edge.co.uk/research/projects/research-reports/schools-for-all/. [Accessed 7 June 2023]. Noddings, N. (1984). Caring, a Feminine Approach to Ethics & Moral Education. Berkeley: University of California Press. Owis, B. (2022). Queering and Trans-gressing Care: Towards a Queer Ethic of Care in QTBIPOC Education. Doctoral Thesis. Vancouver: University of British Columbia. Riley, Kathryn (2017). Place, Belonging and School Leadership: Researching to Make the Difference. London: Bloomsbury. Samanani, F. (2022). How To Live With Each Other : An Anthropologist’s Notes on Sharing a Divided World. London: Profile Books. Tannock, S. (2021) Educating for Radical Social Transformation in the Climate Crisis. Cham, Switzerland: Springer International Publishing. The Children’s Society (2023). The Good Childhood Report 2023. London: The Children’s Society. Tronto, J.C. (1993). Moral Boundaries: A Political Argument for an Ethic of Care. New York: Routledge. UNESCO (2021) Reimagining Our Futures Together: A New Social Contract for Education. Paris, France: Unesco Digital Library. Available at: https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000379707 [Accessed:15 May 2023].
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