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Issues in Educational Research, 2019, Vol 29(2), 519-536.
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Educational inequalities, teacher authority and student autonomy in multi-ethnic Basque secondary education

Elizabeth Pérez-Izaguirre
University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU), Spain

This paper focuses on educational inequalities in multi-ethnic Basque secondary education. More precisely, the study takes an ethnographic standpoint and aims to explore the academic performance disparities between autochthonous and immigrant students in Basque education in relation to teacher authority. Methods include participant observation and interviews conducted in a Basque school attended by a high proportion of immigrant students. The data indicates that teachers showed three kinds of authority styles, including authoritative and affectionate, which elicited different degrees of student autonomy. The authority style that did not elicit an effective student response involved the use of both authoritative and affectionate strategies; this inconsistent style was only observed when teachers interacted with immigrant students around Basque language learning. This paper argues that teachers' authority styles have implications for the academic inequalities present between autochthonous and immigrant students.
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Authors: Dr Elizabeth Pérez-Izaguirre is an Adjunct Professor of the Department of Didactics and School Organization (DOE) at the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU), Donostia/San Sebastián, Spain. Her research focuses on the education system using ethnographic methods to analyse interactions between students and teachers in multi-ethnic environments. Email: elizabeth.perez@ehu.eus

Please cite as: Pérez-Izaguirre, E. (2019). Educational inequalities, teacher authority and student autonomy in multi-ethnic Basque secondary education. Issues in Educational Research, 29(2), 519-536. http://www.iier.org.au/iier29/perez-izaguirre.pdf


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