While schools are supposed to provide educational support when a pupil is at risk of school failure, this is not always the case. Teachers and other school personnel are governed by macro policy such as legislation that often makes provision mandatory, but they are also governed by the nitty-gritty of everyday life at schools – situations that occur, organizational challenges, social contexts surrounding the school, parental involvement, varieties in pupils’ personalities, performance and backgrounds, etc. This study set out to study provision of educational support, holding the dynamics involving them as the main focus of interest. For this purpose, an ethnographic approach was adopted, carrying out fieldwork over three academic semesters, including 104 interviews and observations in classrooms, meetings and daily life during 44 days in two Swedish lower secondary schools.

Problematizations are understandings of problems, rather than problems themselves. Foucault explained the concept as ‘the totality of discursive or non-discursive practices that introduces something into the play of true and false and constitutes it as an object for thought’ (Foucault, 1988: 257). Foucault's concept of discourse, as well as truth and power are key to the analysis of the findings. Having identified accountability-structures as fundamental for the processes and dynamics, the understanding of the current as an age of accountability (Hopmann, 2008) serves to deepen our understanding of the identified.

Findings from this study point at four main problematizations being formed in schools: around attitude, absence, migration and neurodevelopmental disability (NDD). These add up to an overarching problematization of school failures rendering inadequate responses and a rejection of responsibility from the teachers, instead attributing the main responsibility for school failures on pupils and their families. Findings also identify intersections with dynamics related to accountability as key in the power relations. A preliminary conclusion is that the findings point at these power relations ultimately corrupting the strive for equity within the Swedish education system on both micro and macro levels.

At ECER, published as well as still unpublished findings will be presented and discussed. The wide array of dynamics involved in the problematizations invite researchers and practitioners to adopt a critical stance towards problems wee see in the education systems we are seeking to improve. Are they problematizations, rather than problems, serving interests of dominating groups, rather than improving schools? And if they are, how do we get hold of what is really causing school failure, in order to really improve schools?

An ethnographic approach has been used in the study, carrying out field work during three semesters in two lower secondary schools where there are 50% above average share of students with low socio-economic status. The empirical data consists of classroom and meeting observations, field notes and interviews with pupils, parents, teachers and other school personnel. The empirical data was analysed using a thematic analysis (Braun, Clarke & Hayfield, 2022), taking reflexive stance and treating the data as more than topical. This is seeking to find the meaning or central point, rather than literally sorting, coding and striving for a reliability-approach of more positivist or neo-positivist kind. A theme is not merely a topic, but what we could understand as a central organising concept, suiting the purpose of understanding existing problematizations in the schools.

This study, carried out during three semesters in two lower secondary schools, shows how problematizations intersecting with tensions within the accountability structure push teachers and school personnel towads defaulting from the universality and unconditionality of provision of educational support. While the Education Act stipulates provision of educational support to all pupils in need of it, or at risk of school failure, personnel at the schools form problematizations around problems, enabling them to default from the legislation's mandates. Ultimately, mitigating equity in the education system.

Braun, V., Clarke, V., & Hayfield, N. (2022). ‘A starting point for your journey, not a map’: Nikki Hayfield in conversation with Virginia Braun and Victoria Clarke about thematic analysis. Foucault, M. (1988). Politics, Philosophy, Culture (L. Kritzman, Ed.). Routledge. Hopmann, S. T. (2008). No child, no school, no state left behind: Schooling in the age of accountability 1. Journal of Curriculum Studies, 40(4), 417–456.