On the market: Privatization and 'new' populations at a metropolitan school fair

Myers, Paul

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/109484 Copy

Description

Title

On the market: Privatization and 'new' populations at a metropolitan school fair

Author(s)

Myers, Paul

Issue Date

2020-12-01

Director of Research (if dissertation) or Advisor (if thesis)

Jankowski, Natasha Fellowship

Doctoral Committee Chair(s)

Trent, William T.

Committee Member(s)

• Welton, Anjale
• Thorstensson Davila, Liv Fellowship

Department of Study

Educ Policy, Orgzn & Leadrshp

Discipline

Educational Policy Studies

Degree Granting Institution

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Degree Name

Ph.D.

Degree Level

Dissertation

Keyword(s)

• School choice
• market signaling
• Sweden
• visible minorities.

Abstract

In consideration of Stockholm, Sweden’s mature school choice policies, I ask (1) How are ethnically diverse students offered a sense of representation in Stockholm’s competitive high school market and (2) How do schools within Stockholm’s competitive school market craft their identity? Data collection consisted of gathering viewbooks and taking field notes at Stockholm’s Gymnasiemässan, a high school fair, which hosts rising students and places municipal schools in direct competition with their privately managed, public-funded counterparts, free schools. Using Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) and ethnographical methods, along with market signaling as an analytical frame, I found that when comparing the viewbooks of schools that were present during all three years of observation that there was a significant difference in the representation of visible minorities students in viewbooks between free schools and municipal schools, with municipal schools having a greater presence of visible minorities, though these differences were not significant across all schools for all years. Additionally and of equal importance, I found that (1) though the numbers of visible minorities did not seem to increase dramatically over time, security theater and surveillance seemed to rise in response to national narratives regarding recently arrived unaccompanied minors, (2) student representatives of schools were relatively diverse, however, adult representatives were overwhelmingly white Swedish adults, (3) Gymnasiemässan is considered the “Black Friday” for schools in Stockholm, with an intentionally chaotic and mesmerizing character, and Consequently, the branding of the schools, as opposed to some metric of quality, is the principle function of schools at the event and presumably within macrocosmic space of Stockholm.

Graduation Semester

2020-12

Type of Resource

Thesis

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http://hdl.handle.net/2142/109484

Copyright and License Information

Copyright 2020 Paul Myers

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