Schools as Learning Communities

How can schools in deprived neighbourhoods with 90% migrant or minority population achieve the same academic results as elite schools? How can the most pressing problems in education, such as school failure and early school-leaving, be overcome, and what can be learnt from schools that are already achieving it?

This book presents the main pillars and contributions of Schools as Learning Communities, an international network of schools that is demonstrating that it is possible to provide excellent education for all children that allows them to achieve success regardless of their socioeconomic, ethnic, geographic or minority background, reversing the reproduction of social and educational inequalities.

A scientific basis and a participative model of school are two cornerstones of this approach to education that has already expanded across countries and continents and across educational levels from early childhood education to adult education. Schools as Learning Communities engage the entire educational community, including not only teachers, students, family and community members, but also policy-makers, public administrators, researchers and economic actors to implement Successful Educational Actions that are based on scientific evidence of the most fundamental theoretical contributions in education as well as on the most recent research findings.

Due to its transformative approach, this book is addressed to all the people who consider education a resource for overcoming social injustices, from teachers and educators to family members, policy-makers and researchers, and it can be particularly useful as a bibliographic source in courses on education, sociology of education, social and educational policy, and educational research.

Marta Soler-Gallart. Professor of Sociology at the University of Barcelona, Harvard Doctor, and Director of CREA Research. In 2019 she was elected President of the European Sociological Association. She has been in the coordination of the EU funded INCLUD-ED research on successful educational actions.

Roseli Rodrigues de Mello. Professor of Pedagogy at the Federal University of São Carlos, Director of NIASE Research. She transferred to Brazil the transformation of schools into learning communities and she has published extensively on the topic at international level.