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Geographies of Education: Context and Case

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Establishing Geographies of Children and Young People

Part of the book series: Geographies of Children and Young People ((GCYP,volume 1))

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Abstract

This chapter explores a selection of themes across a broad range of geographies of education research. In particular we incorporate discussion on school choice, educational aspiration and transition, race, ethnicity, and migration. In doing so the chapter explores an emerging geography of educational inequality while being sensitive to the considerable ties of the sub-discipline to cultural, economic, political, and social geography. The chapter points toward key themes emerging from the geographies of education literature, before exploring the case and context of geographies of education research in Canada and Ireland (reflecting each author’s experience and positionality). Throughout, we explore how a variety of social justice issues transect educational experience. In particular we focus on migrant, newcomer, and refugee young people, with the migration experience both framing and impacting multiple educational tropes (e.g., school choice decision-making, inclusion, aspiration). Inherent throughout the chapter is the issue of scale, and the case studies discussed exemplify how such educational inequalities operate in nuanced, contextual, and subaltern ways, exploring the role of the state and the local in maintaining a geography of opportunity that ultimately privileges some and by extension marginalizes others.

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Reilly, K., Basu, R., Ledwith, V. (2019). Geographies of Education: Context and Case. In: Skelton, T., Aitken, S. (eds) Establishing Geographies of Children and Young People. Geographies of Children and Young People, vol 1. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-4585-88-0_10-1

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