Educational Factors Affecting Diversity in Marginalised Rural Communities: Familial Socialisation and Male Second Level Students Perception of Biology.

This study is set in the North NorthWest region of Ireland which, under the European NUTS classification framework, is considered to be a transition region (where GDP per capita falls between 75 and 90 percent of the EU average) (EuroStat, 2021). This region has experienced significant population growth moving from 650,000 in 2020 to 903,000 in 2022. Since 2017, the same region has experienced an increase in the prevalence of poverty and social exclusion rising from 2.9% in 2017 to 4.9% in 2020, above the rest of the country (EuroStat, 2023).Young people from such marginalised rural settings across Europe experience significant disadvantage compared to their urban counterparts when it comes to opportunities to enter the workforce (Flynn et, al., 2022; Erdogan et al., 2021; Mujinovi et al., 2021) ultimately reinforcing existing perspectives on the relevance of education. In Ireland, measures to address the impact of poverty and social exclusion are responding to the European Smart Specialisation Platform, which aims to boost employment across Europe in areas that require a diverse set of skills, that move the population beyond the dominance of agriculture. In the North Northwest, this means being part of a strategic move towards a knowledge economy where the second level subject of science has a key role to play. The relationship between education and diversity for prosperity in marginalised rural communities couldnt be clearer. As part of a broader project to explore how science education, an ever-increasing requirement for progression to employment in the Irish economy, could be enhanced in marginalised second level schools, the project team uncovered a disproportionate participation rate across gender in upper secondary school science education at a national level. It was found that males were participating at a ratio of approximately 1:2 ( male: female), half the numbers of their female peers (SEC, 2020). While work has been done to promote opportunities in Science in the 12-18 year age group, it is evident that many male students from rural areas, such as the North NorthWest region, continue to struggle to see the study of science subjects such as Biology as being relevant to their lives. Hence, considering their future entry to the workforce in growth areas under the S3 framework, disengagement with Science as a subject leads to immediate disadvantage and an increased risk of poverty and social deprivation in a region that is already disadvantaged. Considering the idea of Science Capital, or a students view of the relevance of science to their identity and life aspirations (Archer et al., 2015), lived experience such as community school engagement and socialisation within the familial setting, can play a role in limiting the aspirations that any student might hold (Bourdieu, 2018). Thus, important considerations regarding the teaching of science in regions such as the North NorthWest of Ireland emerge. Bourdieu (2018) suggests that the totality of the environment which somebody inhabits directly influences the development of an individual and their orientation to the world around them. In the case of prospective upper second level male biology students in the North NorthWest region, this may hold true as there appears to be a tension between the students perception of the relevance of science to their career trajectory, and the future career opportunities under a national alignment with the EU Smart Specialisation Platform. The work reported on here seeks to unpick the influence of familial socialisation in relation to the perception of science, as part of a broader social ecosystem, as it relates to future opportunities for male secondary school students within a marginalised European transition region - the North NorthWest of Ireland.