School Choice as Citizenship. Communication between Municipalities, Schools, and Parents in School Choice Processes

The Swedish school choice process can be seen as an opportunity for individuals to exercise their citizenship, but the conditions for doing so are influenced by individual resources and competences, as well as by how national reforms are implemented at the municipal and school levels.

In order to gain a deeper understanding of the complexity of the school choice system and its accessibility, actors at all these levels should be studied.The aim of the project is to examine school choice within compulsory education in Sweden as a way of exercising social citizenship, by studying the literacy practices of and communication between a) municipalities, b) local schools and c) parents, focusing on the information provided by schools and municipalities and how it is received by parents.

What is communicated by municipalities and schools to help parents make informed choices? How do individuals value and use this information in their school choice decisions?

How do municipal, school and parental literacy practices shape social citizenship?The study uses a mixed-methods approach, with qualitative and quantitative analyses of texts: web pages and information material from municipalities and schools, and ethnographic material: interviews with parents and observations of information events.

It is multidisciplinary, using perspectives and concepts from ethnology, linguistics and political science, with social citizenship and New Literacy Studies (NLS) as a common theoretical framework.