Fragmented Geographies of Education: Institutions, Policies, and the Neighborhood
AbstractEducational settings, both in and out of the school environment, not only affect one’s educational opportunities, but may also result in structural disadvantages and barriers. In this chapter, we explore political programs and initiatives aimed at improving educational opportunities and related settings on a local scale in Freiburg, Germany. Drawing upon educational statistics and biographical interviews conducted with adolescent students who are confronted with severe educational barriers, we sketch out a local pattern of fragmented geographies. Moreover, we critically assess how the local initiative “Lernen Erleben in Freiburg” (LEIF) implemented the national program “Lernen vor Ort” (Local Learning). With this example, we show that educational programs and initiatives—framed according to the New Public Management paradigm and neoliberal logics of competition, rankings, and best practices—have a limited potential to transform educational landscapes and work against educational inequalities and prevailing fragmented geographies of education.