Relationality and recognition: can relational practices in alternative education interrupt narratives of educational disengagement?

Alternative education [AE] tends to be positioned as innovative, particularly around its approach to pedagogy and learning environments. However, while there is evidence that AE aspires to and, indeed, achieves a certain degree of innovation, it is an innovation that is curtailed by the dominance of neoliberal models of ‘success’ in education. This paper examines how an AE centre in Ireland works to interrupt and reframe narratives of educational disengagement through emphasising relational practices. The findings suggest that AE is perceived as having a transformational effect on students. Nevertheless, focusing on individual transformation alone may obscure the role played by broader structures and practices in processes of disengagement. The paper’s core argument thus focuses on the ambivalent meanings of success in the context of AE, whereby success is seen in terms of young people learning to be a better fit for neoliberal spaces and structures that themselves remain unchanged.