This paper presents a qualitative study conducted to develop proposals to improve education in the city of Palma.
The study compiles and analyses the opinions of experts in planning and implementing measures and programmes aimed to improve academic success, as well as the opinions of educational agents, educational experts and community leaders in order to formulate educational and social intervention proposals within the framework of a comprehensive territorial approach that enables educational, social and urban development to be articulated.
The study does not aim to provide elements for a simple sectoralisation of the educational interventions in the municipality of Palma, since sectoral interventions in themselves cannot solve educational inequalities. Territorialisation and positive discrimination policies in problematic districts may often encourage the segregation of their inhabitants and discrimination against them (Bacconnier, Marguerite and Geoffroy, 2008).
Thus, the study we put forward seeks to push beyond the concepts of the UK’s Educational Priority Areas (EPA) and France’s Zones d’Éducation Prioritaire (ZEP). The work is partially based on the perspective of the so-called "Integrated Actions" that have arisen in response to the fact that certain urban districts share the city’s social, education and economic development problems. At a methodological level, the integrated actions have three fundamental points:
1. Diagnosis of problematic issues that arise in sensitive or problematic districts.
2. Determination of objectives for rehabilitating districts in need.
3. Determination of appropriate approaches for rehabilitating districts: education, socio-cultural activities, social work, job promotion, economic development, etc..
This paper thus analyses the city of Palma’s educational circumstances from a global, comprehensive perspective, in which the interventions’ true objective is to improve the social and educational situations of individuals and families in need through better social relations and a higher quality formal and extracurricular educational offering in which improving the district as an integral part of the city is just another element in achieving this goal (Laurent, 2007).
Accordingly, the study aims to: (a) analyse the needs and issues of primary school students, paying special attention to those with social and academic difficulties, (B) propose several formal and informal educational interventions to improve education in the municipality of Palma on the basis of a comprehensive territorial approach.
The research team consists of an interdisciplinary team from the University of the Balearic Islands and the University of Barcelona.
