Life at School

The third phase of the EDUMIGROM project comprised the community-based fieldwork, the procession of qualitative data and the structured analysis of the material that has been collected in the qualitative community studies that took place in selected multiethnic communities in the nine participating countries of the EDUMIGROM research project. This phase of the empirical research mapped, by using a wide range of qualitative methods, the personal and institutional factors influencing the living conditions, school life, community network and inter-ethnic relations, school performance, opportunities for further education, and the career choices of minority ethnic youths who attend the schools in the chosen communities and are exposed to the experience (or sometimes danger) of being "othered." As a result of this research phase, nine country Community Studies were produced in June 2010 (eight out of them are available on the project’s website). Upon the completion of the nine Community Studies, the coordinating team at CPS entered the phase of preparing the cross-country comparative analysis of the rich qualitative material. In June 2010, a detailed outline was drafted to point to the core issues to be addressed in the next – comparative – phase. The essays here in Being 'Visibly Different': Experiences of Second-generation Migrant and Roma Youths at School summarize the major themes and findings of the qualitative inquiries that targeted schools and their immediate environments in selected multiethnic communities in nine participating European countries.