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.

Keywords:

• COVID-19
• home learning environments
• second level
• student engagement
• parental education

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to acknowledge the contribution of the survey participants who gave their time to inform this work and the support of the National Association of Principals and Deputy Principals in Ireland.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Each school’s catchment area was marked as a circular buffer, with buffer distance determined by the extent to which the surrounding area was urban, ranging from 8km for schools located in highly urban areas to 24 km for rural schools. These distances were assigned based on data from the National Household Travel Survey 2017 and Growing Up in Ireland, described in Mohan et al. (2020), Appendix.

2 School leaders were asked to rate ‘student attendance’ and ‘student engagement’ during the school closures compared to in-school learning. Response options included ‘much better’, ‘better’, ‘similar’, ‘worse’, ‘much worse’ – where ‘much worse’ and ‘worse’ was coded 1 for the outcome variable ‘worse’ student attendance/engagement, zero otherwise. The wording of question relating to student engagement of exam year students (Junior and Leaving Certificate) was slightly different. The question posed ran as, what effect has the COVID-19 shutdown had on Junior/Leaving Certificate students in your school? With response options: ‘Very positive’, ‘positive’, ‘neither negative nor positive’, ‘negative’, ‘very negative’ – where worse engagement by exam years =1 if ‘very negative’ or ‘negative’, zero otherwise.

3 Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools – a national programme aimed at addressing the educational needs of students from disadvantaged communities in Ireland.

Additional information

Funding

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.

Notes on contributors

Gretta Mohan

Dr Gretta Mohan is a Research Officer at the Economic and Social Research Institute in Ireland and Assistant Professor at Trinity College Dublin. Her research interests include the economic and social impacts of electronic communications and digital technologies, including educational outcomes to inform public policy making.

Eamonn Carroll

Dr Eamonn Carroll is a Research Assistant at the Economic and Social Research Institute in Ireland. His research interests include educational inequality, bio-ecological approaches to educational research and inclusive education.

Selina McCoy

Prof Selina McCoy is an Associate Research Professor at the Economic and Social Research Institute in Ireland and Professor at Trinity College Dublin. Her research has focused on educational inequality, inclusion and digital technologies in teaching and learning.

Ciarán Mac Domhnaill

Ciarán Mac Domhnaill is a PhD student in the School of Economics and Finance, University of St Andrews. Environment, health, education, and energy economics are among his research interests.

Georgiana Mihut

Dr Georgiana Mihut is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Economic and Social Research Institute, Ireland. Her research interests include higher education, inequality, and inclusion.