Conference Program

Previous studies show that the characteristics of both families’ residential neighborhoods (e.g., Burdick-Will et al., 2024; Candipan, 2020; Scandurra et al., 2020) and schools’ surrounding areas (e.g., Bell, 2009; Bernelius et al., 2021; Hailey, 2025) influence school choice behavior, but few have analyzed these contexts simultaneously. In this article, we integrate research on neighborhood effects, territorial stigmatization, and school choice to advance the argument that the effect of school surroundings on enrollment decisions operates not only in absolute terms but also relative to families’ place of residence. The neighborhoods in which families live, we suggest, may shape how they perceive and act upon the characteristics of schools’ surrounding areas when making school choices. Importantly, we anticipate that these dynamics may vary by social class, given the salience of class in shaping perceptions of urban space and school choice strategies. Does the influence of schools’ surrounding areas on enrollment decisions depend on families’ residential contexts? Do these relative effects vary across social classes?

To address these questions, we assemble a unique dataset that combines geocoded administrative data from the Chilean School Admissions System with several sources of information at the census block level. We examine how violence and deprivation levels around schools and students’ homes jointly influence secondary school choice. We focus on two outcomes that capture the key stages of the school choice process: the likelihood of applying to a school and the ranking of applications.

Results of our regression models indicate that absolute levels of violence and deprivation around schools reduce the likelihood of applying to a school and the probability that it is ranked higher. Families are also more likely to list and rank higher schools located in comparatively wealthier neighborhoods than their place of residence. The results for relative violence levels are mixed. Deprivation matters more in the construction of application lists, whereas violence has stronger effects in ranking decisions. These effects are more pronounced among high-SES students, and this class-based variation reflects not only structural differences in choice set attributes but also differences in preferences. A set of sensitivity analyses indicates that these findings are robust to the use of many alternative measures of school surroundings, choice sets, and model specifications.

Overall, our findings emphasize the interaction between schools’ geographic surroundings and families’ residential neighborhoods in understanding the link between spatial inequality and school choice. We suggest that the residential neighborhood serves as a baseline context from which parents form judgments about other neighborhoods and the schools located within them, ultimately influencing their enrollment decisions. Beyond school choice, the framework developed in this paper may improve how scholars study contextual effects on individual behavior, by considering the joint influence of the urban contexts in which people and institutions are embedded.

This study investigates the role of gentrifying families in Barcelona’s public schools, examining how their school choice practices intersect with broader processes of class reproduction and urban transformation. Drawing on the concept of a gentrifier habitus we argue that middle-class families’ decisions cannot be reduced to pragmatic calculations of school quality. Rather, they engage in complex moral reasoning and risk management, navigating perceptions of safety, school reputation, and social fit while simultaneously constructing narratives about what counts as legitimate participation in school communities. These rationalities of school choice (Bonal et al. 2024) are deeply embedded in culturally and socially informed dispositions that reproduce class advantage.

In gentrifying neighbourhoods, families actively assert elective forms of belonging, assuming the authority to represent the school and to define the norms of inclusion within both the educational community and the wider neighbourhood (Reay et al. 2011). This elective belonging generates a sense of entitlement for gentrifiers while simultaneously masking and reinforcing exclusion and displacement among long-term residents (Lipman, 2011). The paradox is striking: gentrifiers seek integration into local schools and neighbourhoods, yet their claims to representation and influence often undermine the participation and voice of historically established communities (Saporito & Sohoni, 2006).

These dynamics illustrate how gentrification shapes public schooling beyond mere demographic shifts. While the presence of middle-class families may diversify urban schools numerically, the social and cultural influence they exert through elective belonging can entrench inequalities, privileging certain values, expectations, and forms of participation over others (Posey-Maddox et al., 2016). The interaction of risk management, moral reasoning, and classed rationalities in school choice highlights the subtle mechanisms through which urban inequalities are reproduced, even within institutions nominally open to all.

By integrating insights from school choice, class reproduction, and urban sociology, this study underscores the paradox of integration and displacement. Inclusion for some—defined through self-authored belonging and assumed representation—coexists with marginalization for others, resulting in differentiated access to educational opportunities and reinforcing broader patterns of urban inequality. Understanding the elective rationalities of gentrifiers is thus essential for both research and policy aiming to address inequities in public schooling under conditions of rapid urban change.

How do parental preferences for compulsory schools vary along ethnic, socioeconomic, demographic, and geographic lines? In particular, is school reputation equally important across groups, or does its salience vary systematically across the population and across different residential contexts? This study examines how key school attributes shape parental preferences in an educational landscape characterised by free school choice. We pay particular attention to the role of school reputation and assess whether its importance differs between groups defined by education, income, ethnic background, and residential context. Furthermore, we examine whether preference structures are homogeneous across areas with different socioeconomic and demographic compositions, or whether similar groups express different priorities depending on local context.

To analyse parental preferences and their variation across background characteristics, we conducted a survey including a choice experiment (Davidson et al. 2022; Thompson 2024) and linked the responses to register-based data on place of residence, income, educational attainment, household composition, and labour market attachment. Parents’ residential locations were identified on a 100 × 100 metre grid, and survey responses were linked to Swedish register data by Statistics Sweden. The survey was distributed to all households in two Swedish municipalities (N = 4,526 households) with a child about to enter compulsory school, nine months before school start and one month prior to the school choice deadline (response rate: 29%, n = 1,293 households). Access to full-population register data enables us to assess response patterns and potential representation bias across social groups. The choice data are analysed using Mixed Logit (MXL) models, allowing for random preference variation and systematic heterogeneity across respondents (Louviere, Flynn, and Carson 2010; McFadden and Train 2000).

The results show strong preferences for proximity, experienced teachers, and municipal rather than private providers. Parents also express systematic preferences regarding the ethnic composition of schools. However, preferences are not evenly distributed across the population. The importance of ethnic composition and school reputation varies significantly with parental education and income. Highly educated and high-income parents place greater emphasis on their child attending the same school as friends, highlighting the role of pre-school peer networks in shaping subsequent school choices. These findings suggest that preference heterogeneity – particularly regarding school reputation and social composition – may contribute to sustaining or reshaping patterns of school segregation in systems with free school choice.

Urban gentrification is a global phenomenon that has physically and socially transformed 21^st century cities. Although in recent years, several studies have addressed the relationship between gentrification and school segregation (e.g., Boterman, 2020), academic outcomes (e.g., Pearman and Steyer, 2023), and family participation (e.g., Posey-Maddox, 2014), the academic literature has tended to focus on Anglo-Saxon and Northern European environments, overlooking the specific characteristics of Southern European settings. Precisely, this presentation analyses school gentrification processes in Barcelona as an exploratory case study.

The presentation is based on the GENTRED project, “The effects of gentrification on educational inequality” (Ref: PID2022-137183NB-I00), led by Dr. Xavier Bonal.

Methodologically, the project is based on a mixed methodology, although this presentation will focus on the qualitative dimension of the analysis and fieldwork. This analysis is interpreted as a critical case study, to test theories and hypotheses in situations where they are more likely to be true (Yin, 2018).

Based on this approach, different sources have been triangulated: documentary analysis (e.g., websites, school educational projects, promotional materials), interviews, and observations at open house events. The sample stratification followed complementary strategies: two Barcelona neighbourhoods have been identified with high rates of urban gentrification (López-Gay et al., 2021); in these neighbourhoods, six schools have been selected with changes in their composition similar to those observed in their neighbourhoods. The fieldwork included 52 interviews, with families (n=17), teachers (n=16), principals (n=15) and key informants from the administration (n=4); in addition, we conducted six observations in open days.

The analysis describes the specific characteristics of urban gentrification in the city, especially transnational migrations and intensive touristification (Arbaci, 2019; Cocola-Gant and Lopez-Gay, 2020; Janoschka et al., 2014). These characteristics are shared with other urban areas in the Mediterranean.

The analysis highlights that the specific characteristics of urban gentrification in the city strongly condition the dynamics of school gentrification. Furthermore, the article inductively identifies seven mechanisms that explain how school gentrification occurs:

(1) the second-order competition strategies of schools in the process of gentrification;

(2) school legitimation through a pro-diversity discourse;

(3) the pedagogical legitimation of school change;

(4) the work of delimitation and symbolic signaling;

(5) social homophily as a mediator of school decisions and relationships;

(6) pro-equity axiological dispositions; and

(7) the moral rationalization and reconfiguration of the social identity of gentrifiers.

We suggest that school gentrification has a primarily material basis, while cautioning to conceive school gentrification as a mere passive by-product of urban gentrification and segregation. On the contrary: school gentrification is actively (re)produced through the actions of various actors (schools, families and administrations), with an important degree of agency and reflexivity – especially on the part of those with greater cultural capital.

The presentation concludes with a series of recommendations for public, urban, and educational policies to mitigate the adverse effects of school gentrification. Those recommendations are particularly applicable to similar urban contexts, i.e., Southern European cities affected by transnational migrations and intense touristification.

Several cities have been intensively interested by processes of gentrification, often triggered or accelerated by important urban changes. The consequences of these transformations have gone also far beyond the housing and the neighbourhood dimensions, affecting also schools. The city of Milan have been interested in the last decade by several relevant urban transformations and important and scattered processes of gentrification, that have developed in a quasi-market educational system, characterized by an extensive freedom of choice, a high presence of private and subsidized school and a strong competition.

This study explores the effects on the composition of local schools of urban and social transformations at neighbourhood scale, focusing on the case of Milan. The analysis takes into consideration neighbourhoods characterised by an increase in the share of residents with university degrees and employed as managers and professionals. The selection builds on socio-economic and demographic data at neighbourhood level. The five selected neighbourhoods are at different stages of the process of change that has been set in motion by different drivers such as housing estate projects, urban renovation or mega-events. The contribution then follows by analyzing trends in local school enrolment highlighting whether and to what extent the change in the socio-economic profile of the neighbourhood have led also to a change in the schools’ composition. Results show a variety of outcomes as specific local educational landscape can affect the choice patterns of parents, the relationship among schools and with the surrounding territories. Overall the study highlights on one hand the need for further research on the relationship between urban trasformations and the reproduction of educational inequalities, and on the other hand it signals the need for a policy agenda that takes into account these intertwined consequences of urban changes at neighrbouhdoor and school level.

With the advent of globalisation, many European cities are undergoing accelerated social and urban change, with urban gentrification emerging as a key process. In education, while early research showed that middle-class families historically tended to opt out of local schools in gentrifying areas, more recent studies reveal a shift in these patterns. In gentrified environments, some middle-class families are becoming increasingly inclined to enrol their children in local schools, driven by progressive narratives (Posey-Maddox et al., 2014; Freidus, 2019). However, less is known about how their arrival is experienced by school actors and how it translates into different logics of action (Van Zanten, 2009).

This paper aims to address this gap with a focus on Barcelona, a city encompassing areas with a strong presence of urban gentrification (López-Gay et al., 2021), where the controlled choice system enables strategic behaviour within and beyond school choice. Adopting a qualitative approach, the study explores how gentrification processes affect school perceptions and logics of action. More specifically, it draws on a comparative case study of six public primary schools that have recently undergone substantial transformations linked to sharp urban changes. School rationalities are examined through the cross-analysis of semi-structured interviews with teachers and school leaders, as well as observations during schools’ open days.

Based on school actors’ narratives, three drivers of educational change are identified, which vary across cases in both nature and influence. First, educational policies, operating both as constraints and catalysts for changes in school composition. Second, surrounding urban transformations, generally shaping opportunity structures for school change. Third, schools themselves, promoting various internal and external strategies aimed at triggering specific educational changes.

In this regard, the paper identifies three main perceptions through which school actors interpret the arrival of ‘gentrified’ families. First, these families are seen as the “desired” profile by schools experiencing low or declining middle-class enrolment despite their growing local presence. Second, schools that have strategically pushed for and increased middle-class enrolment often frame new families as “saviours” of the school. Finally, schools that receive this profile more passively tend to perceive them as “intruders”, particularly when friction arises around intense forms of parental participation.

These perceptions connect with particular logics of action, which are strongly shaped by the nature and intensity of schools’ attraction of this new population. One logic, “resistance” -often coupled with sense of loss and nostalgia-, occurs when schools perceive declining middle-class appeal and are compelled, primarily by policy mandates, to include more disadvantaged students. Another, “accommodation”, emerges in those schools that, primarily due to urban shifts, experience increased enrolment and participation from new middle-class families. A third, “conversion”, arises when schools actively implement consistent strategies to promote themselves, attracting the attention of more affluent families and embracing transformation as a successful result of school renewal efforts.

In conclusion, public schools perceive change in varied ways and develop diverse logics of action within gentrifying contexts. These findings reflect schools’ agency and their capacity to interpret and respond to structural constraints, while also shaping educational dynamics.

Recent school admission policies in Catalonia, particularly those based on reserved quotas for vulnerable students, have contributed to a significant reduction in school segregation. However, these measures have shown more limited effects in schools with a high concentration of socially vulnerable students. In this context, a group school enrolment policy has emerged as an innovative instrument aimed at reversing this trend. The policy allows groups of non-vulnerable families, mostly from middle-class backgrounds, to enrol together in entry grades of early childhood and secondary education in schools serving highly disadvantaged populations. The policy assumes that school choice may acquire a collective dimension and that some segments of the middle classes may be willing to choose socially diverse schools when this decision is made in group and under specific institutional conditions.

Building on this context, this paper analyses how middle-class families who access socially disadvantaged schools become involved in and position themselves within school communities. More specifically, it examines the motivations underpinning these decisions, the social and emotional mechanisms shaping both school choice and school experience, and the organisational dynamics that emerge in schools following the arrival of these groups. More broadly, the paper contributes to debates on the role of middle-class families in desegregation policies and on the tensions that may arise between redistributive aims and processes of recognition and representation within school communities.

While school choice has often been understood as an individualised strategy through which middle-class families mobilise resources to maximise educational advantage (Ball, 2003; Van Zanten, 2003), a growing body of research suggests that, under certain conditions, school choice may also incorporate moral, political, and normative considerations linked to equity, diversity, and commitment to public education (Wilson, 2021; Posey-Maddox et al., 2014; Freidus, 2019). From this perspective, school choice is approached here as a situated social practice in which educational rationalities, moral commitments, emotional responses, and dynamics of social distinction are articulated simultaneously.

Methodologically, the paper draws on a qualitative research design combining in-depth interviews with families, school leaders, and policy actors, together with observation in school and community spaces linked to the implementation of the policy. This approach makes it possible to analyse both the meanings families attach to their decisions and the institutional responses developed by schools.

Findings show that participation in group school enrolments is shaped by a combination of normative commitments, emotional uncertainty, and collective dynamics. While many families frame their decision in terms of support for public education and social mixing, collective enrolment also helps reduce perceived risk and facilitates the mobilisation of social capital. At the same time, these processes may generate ambivalent effects within schools, including forms of social closure, differentiated patterns of participation, and organisational adaptations oriented toward retaining and attracting these families. Overall, the paper argues that group-based school enrolments may open innovative pathways toward school desegregation, but they also raise important questions about symbolic power, representation, and inequality within diverse school communities.