Roma and non-Roma Parents' Views About Their Children's Learning Difficulties (original) (raw)
Related papers
Roma and non-Roma Views About Their Children’s Learning Difficulties
Educational Research: Theory and Practice, 2018
Roma have been described as the most hated minority in Europe. Particularly in Southeastern Europe (SEE), this bias is reflected in how Roma children are treated and segregated in schools. Anecdotal evidence shows that Roma parents may give permission for their children to be included in segregated programs in order to benefit from payments, food and other compensations. This pattern may explain the overrepresentation of Roma children in segregated settings for children with disabilities in the region. In this analysis of parent survey data from ten SEE countries, with oversampling of the Roma minority, we found that Roma parents were no more likely to report that their children had learning difficulties than non-Roma parents. Instead, books in the home was the strongest single predictor of whether parents in either group reported that their children had learning problems.
Social Change Review, 2011
In social and educational practices, a number of ‘negative’ descriptive categories such as minority or disability determines inequalities and deepens the vulnerability of such groups. We focus on the Roma students enrolled in Special Education and analyse the mechanisms of (re)producing stereotypes and discrimination. We interpret qualitative research data, conducted in a technical high-school from Cluj-Napoca. Our study concludes that Roma schoolchildren enrolled in special education, whether or not really disabled are discriminated against (on behalf of an educational practice that reinforces the stigma of an inferior ethnic group, socio-culturally marginalized) and thus, their opportunities are severely limited, since their very youthful years, spent in school education.
Roma Parents' Perceptions on Education
Journal of Advances in Education Research, 2019
Politicians and academics from various European countries dealing with the issues of the Roma strongly believe that education can help Roma individuals and groups social integration and improve their living conditions. Therefore, a series of policies measures and programs have been set up to target the educational integration of pupils of Roma origins. What is missing from these actions are the views of Roma themselves. This exactly is the aim of our paper: to give a voice to those parents of Roma origins, whose children go to school or ought to go to school. Our study is based on a qualitative research where participants are individuals of Roma origins living in the suburbs of Thessaloniki (Greece). According to our finding, it seems that Roma parents' that contributed to our research approaches and attitudes broke down some basic and well-established myths about education.
Community influence as an explanatory factor why Roma children get little schooling
Public Choice
Parents who experience poverty and who want to provide their children with an escape route can be expected to encourage and support their progeny’s education. The evidence that Roma parents behave differently is unsettling. In this paper we test empirically an explanation for that behavior. The explanation is based on a theory (Stark et al. 2018) that can be “borrowed” to rationalize the enforcement of norms of little formal education in underprivileged communities. An analysis of survey data collected in Roma communities in four Central and Eastern European countries lends support to the explanation. The analysis reveals a strong negative correlation between the influence of the Roma community on an individual member’s life and the importance accorded by the individual to formal schooling for children. The correlation is robust to controlling for standard determinants of attitudes towards schooling, such as poverty, unemployment, labor market discrimination, and parents’ educationa...
ROMA CHILDREN IN THE CONTEMPORARY ROMANIAN EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM
2014
This paper explores the values and attitudes of Roma parents and Gadjo teachers regarding childhood education in a Romanian village. The aim of this research is twofold: 1) to demonstrate that differences between parents and teachers in expectations and practices of child socialization contribute to the failure of Roma children in achieving the same level of academic success as their Gadjo peers, and 2) to explore some of the institutional and structural barriers to Roma children’s educational success. Data gathered through participant observation and informal interviews are interpreted through theories of social inequalities and structural violence, and offer solutions for improving academic outcomes for the Roma children in rural Romania.
Roma children in community-based Europe. Exploring the shape of cultural boundaries.
This paper seeks to explore the influence that the idea of culture has upon the building of social representations about Roma children in community-based Europe. The recent waves of discrimination against Roma (children) in most countries demonstrate that community-based Europe has problems in managing cultural diversity. Moreover, Roma children seem to tackle ethnic profiling and racial stereotyping, which puts barriers in acquiring equal education and is aggravating inter-ethnic tensions. We ask ourselves to what extent phenotypic or cultural characteristics play on the construction of social representations about Roma children. Having Goffman"s reflexions about a stigmatized human being as support for our analysis, we examine the impact of stigmatisation upon Roma children"s social and personal identity. We assume that ethnic stigmatization has implications on equal access to education for Roma children. Furthermore, the processes of differentiation "inscribe" this social category in a trajectory of school failure, which affects its place in mainstream society.
Schooling For Roma Children: Challenges and Practices
Deleted Journal, 2023
Throughout the 21st century, the equality and inclusion of vulnerable groups has been a constant theme in international debates and on the official agendas of international organisations. In the area of education, the participation of children belonging to these groups is a challenge in all countries, whether or not they have high enrolment rates for the general population. In Greece, the Roma community is considered the most socially vulnerable group. Roma children face significant challenges in terms of education and wider social integration. Schooling programmes for Roma children have been planned in Greece since the end of the last century. However, despite positive ex-post evaluations of these programmes, the expected results have not been achieved. The evaluation of these programmes identifies four distinct stages in the schooling process: (a) Families' decisions regarding the value of their children's school attendance; (b) Cultivating a culture of reducing bureaucratic-administrative issues related to enrolment; (c) Establishing support structures for Roma pupils during their stay in school; and (d) Implementing actions to promote the effective development of knowledge, skills, and competencies of Roma pupils in the school environment. National-level studies have shown that the attendance of Roma children is a complex social phenomenon that extends beyond the educational process. This paper presents a research study conducted in Greece, in comparison with the European level. At the initial research, the University of Patras conducted field research as part of the 'Integration of Roma Children in School' programme, which was funded by the Ministry of Education and the EU. For further analysis of the original data, a qualitative approach of text analysis was employed, utilizing specialized reports from international (European) organizations and national reports from the Ministry of Education in the context of relevant programmes and actions.