Rebecca Loader
Biographic Data
| ID | 5144262 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Rebecca Loader |
| GIVEN NAMES | Rebecca |
| FAMILY NAME | Loader |
| SIGNATURE | LOADER R |
| AFFILIATIONS | Queen's University Belfast |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-2899-1590 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 10 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 23 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 10 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2015 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
The educational response to ethnic and cultural diversity in transitional Northern Ireland
Ethnic diversity has increased substantially in Northern Ireland’s schools over the past two decades, with statistics showing that the number of minority ethnic pupils doubled between 2013 and 2023. In this article, we examine how two features of education in Northern Ireland, the school system and the curriculum, have responded to this greater ethnic and cultural diversity. Adopting the lens of critical multicultural education to review relevant…
Equality of Condition? Exploring Minority Ethnic Group Experiences of Education in Northern Ireland
The period since the signing of the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement in 1998 has seen an exponential rise in inward migration to Northern Ireland, with around 8% of the school-age population now comprising children and young people from minority ethnic groups. In this paper, we examine the experiences of families from minority backgrounds, including recent migrants and those from generations previously settled in Northern Ireland, as they navigate s…
Adolescents’ and teachers’ experience of shared education
This article explores adolescents' and teachers' interpretations of shared education through interviews with participating teachers and pupils in one school partnership in Northern Ireland.As an initiative explicitly designed to bring pupils from Catholic and majority Protestant schools together, shared education offers potential for building intergroup relations in Northern Ireland where, despite a peace agreement in 1998, life continues to be c…
Shared education
Adopting a social cohesion framework, we consider how the shared education model in Northern Ireland reflects distributive, ideational and relational dimensions of social cohesion, and the processes through which its implementation may be contributing to a more socially cohesive society. We use this case study to reflect on the current conceptualisation of social cohesion in the literature and to argue for dynamic and interdependent connections b…
Shared spaces, separate places
Education in Northern Ireland continues to be organised along denominational lines, with more than 90% of pupils attending separate Catholic or de facto Protestant schools. Since 2007, an initiative known as ‘shared education’ has operated in the region to provide opportunities for pupils from separate schools to meet and learn together on a regular basis. This involves the formation of collaborative partnerships between Catholic and Protestant s…
Is academic selection in Northern Ireland a barrier to social cohesion
Northern Ireland has a deeply divided education system with demarcation most notable along ethno/religious and social class lines. The former is largely attributable to the historical organisation of the schools estate based on religion, and the latter is associated with a system of academic selection that filters children into grammar and non-selective post-primary schools according to their performance in tests taken during the final year of pr…
The role of school-based contact in reducing social distance
Education plays an important role in bridging divisions and promoting positive intergroup relations. A number of initiatives aimed at improving relations in conflict-affected societies have been based on the contact hypothesis. However, very little attention has been devoted to the potential of such interventions to reduce social distance between groups. Moreover, the voices of the young people involved in such programmes have rarely been taken i…
By law, custom or local atmosphere’
Allport’s intergroup contact theory outlines four conditions for effective contact: equal status between participants within the contact situation, cooperation, common goals and institutional support. While the literature indicates that institutional support may be a particularly important condition for effective contact, its role and impact remain under‐researched, particularly in studies of contact within real‐world contexts. This article seeks…
Balancing Cultural Diversity and Social Cohesion in Education
This article considers how the education systems of divided societies have been shaped in response to the experience of ethnic and religious conflict. The analysis identifies two competing priorities in such contexts – the development of social cohesion and the protection of cultural, ethnic and religious identities – and explores how these may be reconciled through a model of ‘shared education’. Drawing on research evidence and recent experience…
Plugging the gap’
Although there is no consensus among educationalists as to the role schools play as drivers of hostilities in divided societies, there is broad agreement that they can facilitate more positive intergroup relations. In Northern Ireland the promotion of school based intergroup contact has been offered as a means through which this can happen. Until 2007, the approach was twofold, reflected on the one hand in short‐term contact opportunities for pup…
Plugging the gap’
Although there is no consensus among educationalists as to the role schools play as drivers of hostilities in divided societies, there is broad agreement that they can facilitate more positive intergroup relations. In Northern Ireland the promotion of school based intergroup contact has been offered as a means through which this can happen. Until 2007, the approach was twofold, reflected on the one hand in short‐term contact opportunities for pup…
Shared education
Adopting a social cohesion framework, we consider how the shared education model in Northern Ireland reflects distributive, ideational and relational dimensions of social cohesion, and the processes through which its implementation may be contributing to a more socially cohesive society. We use this case study to reflect on the current conceptualisation of social cohesion in the literature and to argue for dynamic and interdependent connections b…
Balancing Cultural Diversity and Social Cohesion in Education
This article considers how the education systems of divided societies have been shaped in response to the experience of ethnic and religious conflict. The analysis identifies two competing priorities in such contexts – the development of social cohesion and the protection of cultural, ethnic and religious identities – and explores how these may be reconciled through a model of ‘shared education’. Drawing on research evidence and recent experience…
Shared spaces, separate places
Education in Northern Ireland continues to be organised along denominational lines, with more than 90% of pupils attending separate Catholic or de facto Protestant schools. Since 2007, an initiative known as ‘shared education’ has operated in the region to provide opportunities for pupils from separate schools to meet and learn together on a regular basis. This involves the formation of collaborative partnerships between Catholic and Protestant s…
Is academic selection in Northern Ireland a barrier to social cohesion
Northern Ireland has a deeply divided education system with demarcation most notable along ethno/religious and social class lines. The former is largely attributable to the historical organisation of the schools estate based on religion, and the latter is associated with a system of academic selection that filters children into grammar and non-selective post-primary schools according to their performance in tests taken during the final year of pr…
By law, custom or local atmosphere’
Allport’s intergroup contact theory outlines four conditions for effective contact: equal status between participants within the contact situation, cooperation, common goals and institutional support. While the literature indicates that institutional support may be a particularly important condition for effective contact, its role and impact remain under‐researched, particularly in studies of contact within real‐world contexts. This article seeks…
The role of school-based contact in reducing social distance
Education plays an important role in bridging divisions and promoting positive intergroup relations. A number of initiatives aimed at improving relations in conflict-affected societies have been based on the contact hypothesis. However, very little attention has been devoted to the potential of such interventions to reduce social distance between groups. Moreover, the voices of the young people involved in such programmes have rarely been taken i…
Plugging the gap’
Although there is no consensus among educationalists as to the role schools play as drivers of hostilities in divided societies, there is broad agreement that they can facilitate more positive intergroup relations. In Northern Ireland the promotion of school based intergroup contact has been offered as a means through which this can happen. Until 2007, the approach was twofold, reflected on the one hand in short‐term contact opportunities for pup…
Balancing Cultural Diversity and Social Cohesion in Education
This article considers how the education systems of divided societies have been shaped in response to the experience of ethnic and religious conflict. The analysis identifies two competing priorities in such contexts – the development of social cohesion and the protection of cultural, ethnic and religious identities – and explores how these may be reconciled through a model of ‘shared education’. Drawing on research evidence and recent experience…
By law, custom or local atmosphere’
Allport’s intergroup contact theory outlines four conditions for effective contact: equal status between participants within the contact situation, cooperation, common goals and institutional support. While the literature indicates that institutional support may be a particularly important condition for effective contact, its role and impact remain under‐researched, particularly in studies of contact within real‐world contexts. This article seeks…
The role of school-based contact in reducing social distance
Education plays an important role in bridging divisions and promoting positive intergroup relations. A number of initiatives aimed at improving relations in conflict-affected societies have been based on the contact hypothesis. However, very little attention has been devoted to the potential of such interventions to reduce social distance between groups. Moreover, the voices of the young people involved in such programmes have rarely been taken i…
Shared spaces, separate places
Education in Northern Ireland continues to be organised along denominational lines, with more than 90% of pupils attending separate Catholic or de facto Protestant schools. Since 2007, an initiative known as ‘shared education’ has operated in the region to provide opportunities for pupils from separate schools to meet and learn together on a regular basis. This involves the formation of collaborative partnerships between Catholic and Protestant s…
Is academic selection in Northern Ireland a barrier to social cohesion
Northern Ireland has a deeply divided education system with demarcation most notable along ethno/religious and social class lines. The former is largely attributable to the historical organisation of the schools estate based on religion, and the latter is associated with a system of academic selection that filters children into grammar and non-selective post-primary schools according to their performance in tests taken during the final year of pr…
Shared education
Adopting a social cohesion framework, we consider how the shared education model in Northern Ireland reflects distributive, ideational and relational dimensions of social cohesion, and the processes through which its implementation may be contributing to a more socially cohesive society. We use this case study to reflect on the current conceptualisation of social cohesion in the literature and to argue for dynamic and interdependent connections b…
Adolescents’ and teachers’ experience of shared education
This article explores adolescents' and teachers' interpretations of shared education through interviews with participating teachers and pupils in one school partnership in Northern Ireland.As an initiative explicitly designed to bring pupils from Catholic and majority Protestant schools together, shared education offers potential for building intergroup relations in Northern Ireland where, despite a peace agreement in 1998, life continues to be c…
The educational response to ethnic and cultural diversity in transitional Northern Ireland
Ethnic diversity has increased substantially in Northern Ireland’s schools over the past two decades, with statistics showing that the number of minority ethnic pupils doubled between 2013 and 2023. In this article, we examine how two features of education in Northern Ireland, the school system and the curriculum, have responded to this greater ethnic and cultural diversity. Adopting the lens of critical multicultural education to review relevant…
Equality of Condition? Exploring Minority Ethnic Group Experiences of Education in Northern Ireland
The period since the signing of the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement in 1998 has seen an exponential rise in inward migration to Northern Ireland, with around 8% of the school-age population now comprising children and young people from minority ethnic groups. In this paper, we examine the experiences of families from minority backgrounds, including recent migrants and those from generations previously settled in Northern Ireland, as they navigate s…
Sociology (10 works) · Political science (9 works) · Pedagogy (7 works) · Irish and British Studies (6 works) · Religious Education and Schools (6 works) · Social science (6 works) · Psychology (5 works) · Public relations (5 works) · Ethnic group (4 works) · Gender Studies (4 works)