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I urval från Stockholms universitets publikationsdatabas

• Governance dynamics and local autonomy in large-scale governmental funding: The case of Sweden’s campaign to improve equity

  2024. Carlos Rojas, Wieland Wermke. Policy Futures in Education

  Artikel

  This article analyses the Swedish case of the government’s funding for equity, which annually provides over 600 million euros to improve equity. Being one of the largest funding schemes ever for work towards educational equity it also provides full autonomy for local education authorities (LEAs) to use the money at their discretion. By studying local decisions through interviews and analysing applications and plans in nine cases, we deepen our understanding of governance relations between state, LEAs and schools. Our findings show that funding is used mostly for general purposes, rather than for specific measures to improve equity. Dynamics of governance that mitigate improvements in equity are also found. LEAs take advantage of their position as receivers and distributors of the funding to local schools, deciding what equity is and how to invest in improving it, rather than passing funds to their school units and let them decide on its use.

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• Racialization of Educational Support: Preliminary findings from ongoing research in lower secondary schools

  2024. Carlos Rojas.

  Konferens

  By studying activities of educational support, the research to be presented has revealed power relations at play in these. During three semesters, policy and practice regarding educational support on micro and macro levels have been analyzed, with specific interest in the role of discourses and subjective positionings (Foucault 1972/2002). One of the findings is a racialization of the provision of educational support. 

  A certain degree of racialization (Miles 1989) of educational support is inevitable. Understanding educational support as pedagogical or didactical efforts supplementing mainstream teaching, there is for instance a group of students in need of such based on them having migrated, until they learn the Swedish language. Nevertheless, this research reveals differences in provision of educational support in the form of e.g. special education or assessments that are difficult to explain pedagogically.

  We find hints on educational support failing in terms of equity in educational statistics, as well as quantitative and qualitative research that for decades have revealed how children of migrated families in Sweden are worse off in school on accumulated group level (Behtoui et al 2019). One example is in the passing rates from lower to upper secondary. While being a crucial step in regards to future life opportunities (The Public Health Agency 2022), no one has yet hit the spot on how to improve the situation.

  The presentation at the Nordic Conference on Racism and Education will discuss preliminary results regarding the racializing power dynamics revealed when researching provision of educational support in two lower secondary schools where ~30-40% of the students have migrant background. Adopting an ethnographic approach, daily life with class sessions and staff meetings have been observed and over 80 interviews been made with students, teachers and parents.

   

  References

  Behtoui, A., Hertzberg, F., Jonsson, R., Rosales, R. L., & Neergaard, A. (2019). Sweden: The otherization” of the Descendants of Immigrants (Vol. 2, pp. 999–1034). Palgrave Macmillan. 

  Foucault, M. (2002). The archaeology of knowledge and the discourse on language. Routledge.

  Miles, R. (1989). Racism. Routledge.

  The Public Health Agency. (2022). Folkhälsans utveckling – årsrapport 2022. The Public Health Agency.

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• Educational support in disadvantaged neighborhoods

  2023. Carlos Rojas. Everyday consequences of urban segregation in disadvantaged Nordic schools

  Konferens

  The research contributes to the field of school development and specifically inclusion and equity in the field of education, intending to reveal structural and social processes that condition the provision of educational support in schools located in disadvantaged neighborhoods. 

  Increasing rates of school failure that moreover are concentrated among already disadvantaged groups, is distancing the Swedish school system from its utopian ambitions on universality and equity. When introduced in policies through both text and discourse half a century ago, the school for all was supposed to compensate for pupils varying starting positions and provide equal opportunities regardless of social backgrounds, families or life circumstances. It seems to have fallen short. Researchers from different disciplines have shed light on how political restructuration of the school system in the spirit of neo-liberalism and marketization since then have increased segregation and polarization in the field of education socially, economically and in the end academically. As of today, schools with long lasting failure rates are often located in structurally disadvantaged neighborhoods that house more families with lower socioeconomic status and more migrants relatively to the city or municipality as a whole. Moreover, there is a tendency in public and political debate as well as within the schools, to place the responsibility for school failures on individual, social or structural circumstances attributed to the neighborhoods, rather than attributing the responsibility to the school and its organization. 

  This research project widens the scope and intends to provide new knowledge on how a greater array of structural and social processes impact and condition policies and practices of educational support on macro, meso and micro levels. Focus is on policies and practices of educational support, understood as a key to improved school success. The study adopts the approach of critical policy sociology (Ozga 2021) and starts digging in national and local policy texts, through the discourses of heads of schools and principals in nine municipalities to end up in the power dynamics and positionings in two classrooms in lower secondary schools. 

  The symposium at NERA will discuss results from the first and second study of the research project, in which nine municipalities with schools in disadvantaged neighborhoods are subject to research. First through a content analysis of plans and policies for educational support and second in an interview study with principals and heads of school. Special attention is given to the use of a unique Swedish governmental subsidy in the order of 600 million euro that every municipality receive automatically based on their children’s registered SES, with a minimum of direction and control mechanisms, more than the request of improving their capacity to provide “equity in school” (likvärdig skola).

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• Migration som orsak till samhällets problem: - hur påverkar narrativet kommunal verksamhet?

  2023. Carlos Rojas. Socialvetenskaplig tidskrift 30 (2), 563-581

  Artikel

  Even though Sweden has well over half a century’s experience with migration, recently strengthened master narratives of migration and migrants as social problems are generating an impact on policies and practices at the local level. Previous research has identified how narratives of migration and migrants impact policy making and interventions related to migration, integration and accommodation of migrants. This study widens the scope as it identifies how narratives of migration and migrants impact policies and practices in general.

  Adopting a theoretical framework based on racialisation, decision making and narrative theory, 17 interviews with local government administrators and police officers from a district in Stockholm are analysed. The results show how narratives of migration and migrants are embedded in the causal argumentation of present problems in the district. When practically every problem is argued to have migration as a root cause, policy and practices for solving them tend to target migrants. The article describes how this takes place and the final discussion addresses several risks that follow.

  First, the quality and efficiency of policy and interventions is at risk when the causality behind a problem is simplified and inaccurate. Second, targeting migrants when addressing the districts’ problems also risk omitting those natives impacted by a problem from benefiting from the solution or relief provided by the local government. Third, there is a risk that the local government strengthens the master narrative of migration and migrants as causing society’s problems.

  Given the results, an ending theoretical contribution is provided, arguing that a local government is a racialising bureaucracy. Not only is it racialised in its structure, as previous theory has stated, it also actively contributes to the reproduction and development of racialised structures in society at large.

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• Barn och ungdomar i stadens olikheter: Om segregation, gränser och möjliggörande interventioner i det uppdelade urbana rummet

  2021. Nihad Bunar.

  Bok

  Barn och ungdomar i stadens olikheter handlar om barn och unga från ett antal bostadsområden i Stockholmsregionen och villkoren för deras uppväxt, utbildning, fritid och hälsa. En viktig bok för blivande och verksamma lärare, rektorer och politiker i strukurellt missgynnade områden som arbetar för att barn och ungdomar ska få samma möjligheter och livschanser. 

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• Social hållbarhet i Fokus Skärholmen: Nycklar för det lokala behovet

  2017. Carlos Rojas.

  Rapport

  Fokus Skärholmen är ett stadsutvecklingsprojekt som berörSkärholmens stadsdelar och involverar flera av Stockholms stadsförvaltningar och allmännyttiga bolag såväl som privata bolag.

  Inom ramen för Fokus Skärholmen är social hållbarhet prioriteratoch arbetet med att konkretisera detta pågår. Sedan tidigare harstadsbyggnadsprinciper med bäring på social hållbarhet tagits fram,och den här rapporten utgör underlag för arbetet med socialhållbarhet utifrån det lokala perspektivet.

  Denna rapport innehåller sju nycklar för arbetet med socialhållbarhet utifrån det lokala perspektivet och en redogörelse för vadsom ligger till grund för dessa. Nycklarna och riktlinjerna för dessahar tagits fram utifrån tidigare rapporter och underlag frånHållbarhetskommissionen, Lokalt utvecklingsprogram förSkärholmen 2017-2022 och utifrån en kunskapsinhämtande processspecifik för detta arbete.

  Den kunskapsinhämtande processen som ligger till grund förrapporten har bestått av en fördjupningsstudie där 186 personer iSkärholmens stadsdelsområde har intervjuats och workshopar däraktörer med en roll inom Fokus Skärholmen analyserat insikternafrån fördjupningsstudien och situationen i stadsdelarna i stort.Kunskapen som dessa moment genererat redovisas i bilaga 1 och 2.

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• Var går gränsen?: Om flyktingmottagande, öppna hjärtan och systemkollaps

  2017. Carlos Rojas.

  Bok

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