Community Outreach and Systems Change Research for Access to Education for Socio-Economically Marginalised Groups in Ireland and Europe

Professor Paul Downes, Director, Educational Disadvantage Centre gave an invited online Lecture, Community Outreach and Systems Change Research for Access to Education for Socio-Economically Marginalised Groups in Ireland and Europe, for the Centre for Engaged Research Lecture Series, DCU on June 22, 2022. Dr. Siobhan O’Reilly, Senior Associate Research with the Educational Disadvantage Centre and former CEO of Familibase Ballyfermot was the Respondent.

Building on his recent book, https://www.routledge.com/Reconstructing-Agency-in-Developmental-and-Educational-Psychology-Inclusive/Downes/p/book/9781032089751, Professor Downes highlighted how concepts such as marginalisation, exclusion, inclusion, community, voice and hierarchies presupposes a spatial understanding, that space is a system of relations and that physical and relational space is not simply reducible to place. He argued that space is a key concept for engaged research to bridge the Research-Practice-Policy divide and a spatial systems focus can address a key gap in Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems framework in psychology with regard to system blockage and power relations.

Building on the Educational Disadvantage Centre’s previous community and child centred consultations for reports in Ballyfermot, Blanchardstown and the South West Inner City in the mid2000s and its 12 country study on access to education in Europe https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-94-017-8795-6, Paul highlighted a range of key issues for space and system blockage as illustrative examples of engaged research.

Highlighting the importance of Assertive Outreach as Assumed Connection in Relational Space and the need for Overcoming Diametric Spatial Splits between Health and Education, Professor Downes emphasised the need for system scrutiny and transparency for policy makers through a focus on structural indicators. This structural indicators lens was argued to be by Analogy with the UN Right to Highest Attainable Standard of Health and as Critique of Outcome Indicators for Complex Systems, building on the following published work:

• Downes, P. (2018). An Emerging Paradigm of Structural Indicators to Examine System Supports for Children’s and Adolescents’ Education and Wellbeing. Child Indicators Research,  11,  1445–1464.
• Downes, P., Nairz-Wirth, E., Rusinaite, V.  (2017). Structural Indicators for Inclusive Systems in and around Schools. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union

Dr. Siobhan O’Reilly’s response as discussant argued that the effectiveness of a systems of care approach to interventions and change has been demonstrated particularly where this focuses on and can accommodate values, actions at an individual/familial/community and wider systemic level and a real commitment to the flexibility required for real change at all required levels. There appears to be a challenge for researchers in demonstrating the importance of all of these elements and in telling the story of how they all contribute and connect.

An example of this is FamiliBase in Ballyfermot. She proposed that the research community needs to find effective ways to best support participation from under-represented groups and create opportunities for real co-creation of knowledge through a range of accessible research methodologies. How committed are researchers and funders to a real ‘co-creation’ with communities challenged to access and effectively participate in traditional systems? To what degree can ‘belonging’ occur within access if the system does not change part of itself?

Developing an agenda for future research, Dr. O’Reilly recommended as follows:

• To address complex and intertwined issues holistically—multidisciplinary research informed by an understanding of how structures and systems work across domains to produce and compound exclusion and inequality
• Research that can include an exploration of the structural and cultural impediments that limit full access and inclusion
• Research that is aligned not just with funding priorities at a national and EU level but with the needs/experiences of the communities experiencing challenges with access and inclusion. Community-based collaborations to help inform the research agenda while the research helps community partners and policymakers with strategies and policy, hopefully increasing mutual effectiveness at many levels.

The session is available on:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HycWKk3Ks38