Roma women’s higher education participation: whose responsibility?

ABSTRACT

There are striking gaps between Roma and non-Roma higher education (HE) participation rates, with less than 1% of Roma possessing a tertiary-level qualification [United Nations Development Programme, World Bank and European Commission. 2011a. “The Situation of Roma in 11 EU Member States.” Accessed 3 April 2015. http://issuu.com/undp_in_europe_cis/docs/_roma_at_a_glance_web/1#download]. As the Decade of Roma Inclusion (2005–2015) closes, this renders the present a salient moment to reflect on Roma students’ HE experiences. Widening educational access for marginalised groups raises specific questions about where responsibility for doing so lies – with tensions between individualised articulations of raising aspiration and notions of collective responsibility framed in a social justice agenda. Drawing on interviews with five Roma women students, this paper unpacks the contradictions between desiring access to HE for individual self-betterment and concurrent pulls towards educating for the wider benefit of ‘improving’ Roma communities. Using Ahmed’s [2012. On Being Included: Racism and Diversity in Institutional Life. Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press] work on institutional belonging, we explore the specifically gendered nature of these narratives in how ‘doubly’ marginalised bodies are positioned as outsiders, in receipt of an educational gift.

KEYWORDS:

• Difference and diversity
• higher education
• equality
• migration
• femininities
• education policy

Acknowledgements

Particular thanks to the interview and focus group participants who gave up their time to speak to us about their experience. We would also like to acknowledge the help and support of all colleagues at the Roma Education Fund, including Judit Szira and Dr Stela Garaz, who provided not only access to key stakeholders, knowledge networks but also helped to ensure that we asked the right questions. Thanks also to the other project partners Dr Mayte PadillaCarmona, Alejandro Soria, Professor Nafsika Alexiadou, Anders Norberg and Professor Louise Morley.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Dr Tamsin Hinton-Smith is a Senior Lecturer in Higher Education and Co-Director of the Centre for Gender Studies at the University of Sussex. Her disciplinary background is in sociology, and research interests around inclusions and exclusions in international higher education; feminist research and theory; and intersections of gendered expectations at work and home.

Dr Emily Danvers is a Lecturer in Higher Education and the co-director of the Centre for Higher Education and Equity Research at the University of Sussex. Her research interests include critical thinking, student learning and identities, equity and inclusion, higher education internationalisation and feminist theory.

Tanja Jovanovic is a doctoral student in the Centre for Higher Education and Equity Research at the University of Sussex. Her research draws on post-colonial feminist theories to explore the experiences of Roma people in accessing higher education in Serbia, using qualitative interviews and documentary analysis.

ORCID

Emily Danvers http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0170-5331

Additional information

Funding

A Project funded by Horizon 2020: The EU Programme for Research and innovation Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) Research and Innovation Staff Exchange (RISE). [Grant agreement number 643739]