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Educational inequalities derived from COVID-19 from a feminist perspective. Analysis of the discourse of madrid education professionals

Abstract:

This paper exposes the educational inequalities perceived in the urban context of Madrid in the face of the social and educational situation resulting from COVID-19, by analyzing the discourses of five education professionals with training in gender studies and feminism. For the purpose of this qualitative study, we carried out interviews semi-structured around blocks of contents using a naturalistic discourse analysis approach and data triangulation. The interviews were later transcribed and analyzed from a feminist lens with the aim of identifying shared ideas between participants. The findings reveal the loneliness experienced by teachers during confinement, the impact of the abandonment of administrative work in educational institutions, a thirty percent hourly increase in the time spent working by education professionals, the physical and mental health issues faced by teachers due to the situation, the impossibility of continuing to meet the social and emotional needs of students in view of the amount of curricular content to be taught, and the lack of attention paid to gender-based violence prevention by educational institutions. The main conclusion drawn from this study is that working time has taken up homes, family spaces and free time and, as a result, there is an increasing need to implement improved coordination techniques, horizontal relationships between teaching teams, and care policies. It is necessary for teachers to be able to assist students emotionally, as well as to modify the curriculum in order to make it more compatible with people's life circumstances.