Fifteenth International Conference on Interdisciplinary Social Sciences

Abstract

State selective schools in Greece represent historical -in most cases- institutes and are entitled as either “Model” or “Experimental”, “Music”, “Artistic” and so on. They are chosen by parents and guardians and are different from those in the families’ catchment areas. They have been the alma mater of many prominent Greeks. But their most important “heritage” is the optimistic habitus they offer to students and families. A guide to describing the culture of parental choice in Greece is the schema of American sociologist James Coleman, which links macro-level i.e. the regulatory texts and public discourse, to the micro-level i.e. family strategies. Statistical analysis of the professional status of parents has shown that the parents who consciously choose these schools belong to the middle class with middle and high social status and high level of education. Phenomenographic interviews with parents have shown that parents who consciously choose these schools are active, interfering, supportive, and feeling optimistic. In the Greek highly centralized educational system, there is little room for choosing a school other than the local comprehensive school. Different schools with different “alibis”, such as “experimenting”, “excellency”, “talent” and so on, reflect the need of the middle-class Greek parents, who choose these schools as public elites, aiming at a separated state school that will provide security and social mobility.