Approaching Diversity in Education: The Case of Roma Pupils

Abstract

The present study attempts to address the issues related to education of Roma children, drawing its theoretical basis from the intercultural approach, according to which education within the multicultural society should be unified and include all the collective identities represented in the school. Schools should therefore adopt a concept of national identity, which apart from traditional criteria (origin, language, religion, etc.) is also determined by political (participation, equal opportunities, social responsibility) and subjective criteria (self-identification of the person). In such a context and within the perspective of an overall holistic approach at the institutional and socioeconomic level of the problems of the Roma population in Greece, the educational and social position of Gypsy children can be improved.

Roma students and their inclusion in schools

“…Most of the respondents point absenteeism as the major obstacle for inclusion. This finding also coincides with the findings from Calogiannakis et al (2018) who also points that the reason for this is lack of parental support for Roma students, but also the leniency of the schools in case of absences. For the former, we also see that, in general, most of the respondents see weak ties between the Roma students' parents and the schools themselves, although they see the schools as making efforts to attract Roma parents to school and (successfully) integrate students in schools.…”

“…Because of the treatment of Roma by teachers, other students and school institution in general, Roma do not continue with education in school. Parents of these children usually do not support and encourage them to go to school and, in addition, schools appear to be lenient when dealing with absence or occasional school attendance of Roma (Calogiannakis et al, 2018).…”

Inclusion of Roma students in Europe

“…While the share of Roma children attending preschool rarely exceeds 50%, Eurostat estimates that, on average, 95% of children in the EU between 4 and the starting age of primary education attend school. 25 In the United Kingdom, the 2016 Race and Disparity Audit report -one of the rare documents providing disaggregated data on students from diverse ethnic origins in Europe -shows that in England, "at age 5, around a quarter of Gypsy and Roma pupils achieved a good level of development (Figure 2.3), making them around 3 times less likely to do so than average" (Cabinet Office, 2017, p. 19 [39]). Source: (Cabinet Office, 2017, p. 20 [39]).…”

“…Academic underachievement also remains a critical concern both in primary and secondary schools. In the United Kingdom, for example, Gypsy students have the lowest educational performances and attainment among all the country's ethnic minorities and most Roma adolescents leave school at the age of sixteen (Cabinet Office, 2017 [39]). In some contexts, national Roma students also perform worse in comparison with students with an immigrant background (Rozzi, 2017, p. 29[41]).…”

“…In 2011, the Council of Europe and the EU jointly launched the ROMED project that "has been leading an initiative aiming to train mediators in delivering quality mediation between Roma communities and local authorities." 39 With over 1300 mediators trained in 22 countries, this project aims to expand mediation way beyond the school and empower Roma communities through mediation and representation.…”