The challenge of inclusive (co)education in multicultural classrooms

Abstract

The arrival of multiculturality to the educational centers opens an interesting debate around the management of that diversity, and to the most adequate projects and the
educational policies to face it. In this sense, education faces the challenge of contributing to the achievement of gender equality without imposing it over other cultural identities.
This conflict (potential) can be seen every day in the main protagonists of the educational centers: the students of emigrational origin, who face the challenge of conciliating
their cultural identity with the one that comes out strongly in the society which receives them and the teachers that face the task of achieving a climate of authentic intercultural cohabitation.

This article reflects on this matter, based on the results of a research which combines qualitative and quantitative techniques developed in two institutes of Comunidad de
Madrid, Spain. The result is that the gender identity is not a static category, but it transforms in contact with other cultures by means of a series of adaptation, mediation and
negotiation mechanisms which allow the students to make compatible their culture of origin with that of the society that receives them. In this process, the inclusive (co) education shows as the right transforming tool to encourage tolerance, respect and cohabitation among equals.