Periodic Reporting for period 1 - SHINE (The impact of the socio-economic crisis on student well-being and happiness in Greece and Cyprus)
Période du rapport: 2019-09-02 au 2021-12-01
The MSCA research project SHINE, which was carried out at the European University of Cyprus, used a comparative approach to explore the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on students’ well-being and happiness in Cyprus and Greece, in order to understand patterns of inequality that affect happiness attainment in children. Specifically, it gave secondary school students the opportunity to report their experiences and share insights into the impact of the pandemic on their society, on their educational experience and especially on their everyday lives, and to share thoughts on the role they believe education can play in tackling this impact. Through this, it raised important questions about the possible role of education for the promotion of students’ well-being in contexts of emergency such as the pandemic and aimed to lay a foundation for tracing new ways of exploring the practices and discourses through which well-being and happiness are constituted.
In periods of great transition, the role of education could not be more pivotal. Education systems have to develop robust and urgent responses to prepare students to think more critically and creatively about the future. Schools can be sites for and participants in substantive social change, public spaces where projects are undertaken in response to the needs and the desires of the community, places where young people grow to become more adaptable to change and learn to be proactive, developing skills that will help them face challenges and build emotional happiness. They can become places that give students the support they need to blossom in life.
In the conclusions of the project, it is argued that the COVID-19 pandemic and the prevention measures imposed have brought about disruptive and unexpected changes in adolescents’ daily lives and habits. They have also led to the redefinition and reframing of their social identities, their relationships with their friends and family, and their habits and routines. During the lockdown, adolescents were forced to isolate in their homes, away from their schools, sometimes for many months. Their personal and social rhythms changed in an attempt to adapt to and cope with these disruptive changes. Adolescents and their family members suddenly lost the place and time landmarks usually marking their daily routines. Their houses became offices for their parents and classrooms for themselves. The boundaries of school, work, rest, and leisure spaces became very faint. Communication with those outside their households became entirely virtual.
Throughout the COVID-19 crisis, while also dealing with social exclusion, adolescents faced an unequal distribution of economic, social and cultural resources connected to schooling. Adolescents from families in the upper and upper-middle socio-economic classes had different educational experiences during this pandemic compared with students from middle-, working- and lower-class families. This related to the divergent modes of teaching, the unequal number of hours of schooling per day, access to computers, access to an internet connection and the variety and quality of the extracurricular activities available. Adolescents’ socio-economic background and personal history shaped the way the effects of this crisis affected their school achievement; they also shaped their responses to the contemporary setting of the pandemic, which was frequently ingrained with misery, fear, tension, and an increasing sense of insecurity.
In periods of great transition, the role of education could not be more pivotal. Education systems have to develop robust and urgent responses to prepare students to think more critically and creatively about the future. Schools can be sites for and participants in substantive social change, public spaces where projects are undertaken in response to the needs and the desires of the community, places where young people grow to become more adaptable to change and learn to be proactive, developing skills that will help them face challenges and build emotional happiness. They can become places that give students the support they need to blossom in life.
In the conclusions of the project, it is argued that the COVID-19 pandemic and the prevention measures imposed have brought about disruptive and unexpected changes in adolescents’ daily lives and habits. They have also led to the redefinition and reframing of their social identities, their relationships with their friends and family, and their habits and routines. During the lockdown, adolescents were forced to isolate in their homes, away from their schools, sometimes for many months. Their personal and social rhythms changed in an attempt to adapt to and cope with these disruptive changes. Adolescents and their family members suddenly lost the place and time landmarks usually marking their daily routines. Their houses became offices for their parents and classrooms for themselves. The boundaries of school, work, rest, and leisure spaces became very faint. Communication with those outside their households became entirely virtual.
Throughout the COVID-19 crisis, while also dealing with social exclusion, adolescents faced an unequal distribution of economic, social and cultural resources connected to schooling. Adolescents from families in the upper and upper-middle socio-economic classes had different educational experiences during this pandemic compared with students from middle-, working- and lower-class families. This related to the divergent modes of teaching, the unequal number of hours of schooling per day, access to computers, access to an internet connection and the variety and quality of the extracurricular activities available. Adolescents’ socio-economic background and personal history shaped the way the effects of this crisis affected their school achievement; they also shaped their responses to the contemporary setting of the pandemic, which was frequently ingrained with misery, fear, tension, and an increasing sense of insecurity.
The objectives of the project were achieved through allocating the work to seven work packages (WPs). WP1 Project Management was dedicated to the management of the project and entailed meetings, communication and progress-monitoring activities, as well as the contingency plan. WP2 Training Activities / Career Development was chosen to enhance skills in all the areas needed for successful project implementation. The fellow attended intensive training workshops and multi-day conferences, as well as workshops for researchers and educators; she completed online a course at the University of Oxford on Academic Language, a course at Yale University on The Science of Well-being, numerous courses on Quantitative Research Methodology, and she is now attending a post-graduate course on Therapeutic Photography at Robert Gordon’s University Aberdeen. She also provided mentoring for early career researchers. She was appointed reviewer of the following journals: International Journal for Educational Research, Power and Education, Journal for Critical Education Policy Studies, International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy. WP3 Comparative Analysis served to identify and review relevant literature documenting research activity in the area of the project, and to set out the theoretical approach of the study. Moreover, it served to develop a framework for comparative analysis. WP4 and WP5 Focus Group Interviews in Greece and Cyprus focused on the main fieldwork (sampling, data collection and data analysis). WP6 National Representative Online Survey focused on the online survey (sampling, preparation of questionnaires, etc.) of students which took place in both countries. WP7 Dissemination and Public Engagement aimed at increasing the visibility of the project and at providing the people most affected by and most interested in the findings of this research with a summary of the key findings. During the grant, the fellow delivered 10 conferences presentations (with 2 more planned for the following months), 3 webinars for public engagement, 2 conference publications, 3 book chapters, and 1 journal publication (forthcoming), and has an additional 2 conference publications and 1 journal manuscript underway. She also took part in numerous webinars, seminars, EU participatory workshops, EU summits, etc. Since the start of the project, the empirical phase, the time plan and most of the activities had to undergo significant changes due to the pandemic and the restrictions on school operations imposed by the governments of Cyprus and Greece. As a result, WP4 and WP5 had to be postponed. WP6 and WP7 were therefore similarly postponed.
SHINE progressed beyond the state of the art by providing in-depth research on students’ well-being and happiness in Greece and Cyprus and new ways for exploring the practices and discourses through which well-being is constituted. The state of the art was advanced by the comparative approach, which paved the way for tracing the causes behind the different ways Greece and Cyprus coped with the COVID-19 pandemic. It also seized the opportunity to explore policy developments in this field, situate them within the European context, and strengthen the body of relevant literature. SHINE advanced the state of the art by asking crucial questions about the role of education. It has pushed the frontiers of research on students’ well-being forward in numerous ways. The educational posts on the website and social media page, as well as the workshops at schools, have enhanced public engagement. This MSCA allowed the fellow to develop dexterity with many different research methodologies and promote best practices in the study of students’ well-being and students’ habits during the COVID-19 pandemic. Impacts anticipated from the MSCA will be increased and improved: a final overarching impact will be the enhancement of public perception of the role of schools in enhancing students’ well-being.