Magnifying inequality? Home learning environments and social reproduction during school closures in Ireland
Abstract
COVID-19 school closures have seen the homeplace become a school-place for students and their families in Ireland. This paper presents research on the resources and supports available for students to engage with learning in their home environments. Evidence from a nationally representative survey comprising one third of second-level school leaders, conducted during the first school closures in 2020, shows that attendance and engagement appears to be influenced by the educational level of parents/guardians. The association between parental education and student engagement was stronger for Junior Certificate students but was not statistically evidenced for Leaving Certificate students. Qualitative evidence sheds further light on inequalities which characterised students’ experiences of online and remote learning. Viewing these developments through a social reproduction framework, this study argues that unequal home learning environments may magnify existing inequalities. To prevent a return to the classroom with more classed outcomes, it is imperative that policy, planning and investment strive to mitigate the impact of COVID-19 on educational inequality.
Citation
Mohan , G , Carroll , E , McCoy , S , Mac Domhnaill , C & Mihut , G 2021 , ' Magnifying inequality? Home learning environments and social reproduction during school closures in Ireland ' , Irish Educational Studies , vol. Latest Articles . https://doi.org/10.1080/03323315.2021.1915841
Publication
Irish Educational Studies
Status
Peer reviewed
ISSN
0332-3315Type
Journal article
Rights
Copyright © 2021 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercialNoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way.
Description
This research is supported by the Economic and Social Research Institute’s Electronic Communications Programme, jointly funded by the Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications and the Commission for Communications Regulation in Ireland.Collections
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