Attitudes of (Future) Educational Staff as a Basis for Quality Inclusion of Immigrant Children

Contemporary documents and guidelines, at both the national and EU levels, emphasize the importance of implementing the concept of inclusiveness, which also involves the principle of interculturalism. This paper provides insights into the attitudes of present and future teaching staff and towards intercultural education. The sample included 763 professional teachers and 411 students. Students expressed less negative attitudes toward immigrant children and more positive attitudes toward cultural diversity and helping immigrant children. The reasons for the negative attitudes and possible ways of promoting a change in the attitudes of the professional educational staff are discussed.
KEYWORDS: attitudes, intercultural education, immigrant children, inclusiveness

In 2018/19, approximately 14,000 immigrant children were included in Slovenian educational institutions. It is thus necessary to address potential prejudice against such children and to develop inclusiveness and cross-cultural competencies in (future) teaching staff.
The present study aimed to assess the attitudes towards inclusive education, cultural diversity and immigrants in different groups of participants: staff in preschools (n = 201), primary schools (n = 495), and high schools (n = 67), and in students who are trained for work in education (n = 411). The developed attitude scale contained four subscales, which measured: (i) negative attitudes toward immigrant children, (ii) positive attitudes toward cultural diversity, (iii) positive attitudes toward education of openness, and (iv) positive attitudes toward helping immigrants.
We found that the participants reported extremely positive attitudes toward education of openness. However, the participants had relatively reserved attitudes toward cultural diversity and immigrant children. Among the four groups, high-school staff showed the most negative attitudes toward immigrant children and the least positive attitudes toward cultural diversity; students showed the most positive attitudes toward helping immigrants.
In preschools, teachers showed more negative attitudes toward immigrant children than headmasters. In primary and high school, teachers of Slovene and foreign languages showed the least negative attitudes toward immigrant children and the most positive attitudes toward cultural diversity. In contrast, teachers of vocational subjects showed the most negative attitudes toward immigrant children, and teachers of math and STEM subjects showed the least positive attitudes toward cultural diversity. The number of experiences with immigrant children showed a weak negative correlation with negative attitudes toward immigrant children and a weak positive correlation with positive attitudes toward cultural diversity and education of openness.
Students with more practice in a work setting exhibited more positive attitudes toward cultural diversity and helping immigrants and fewer negative attitudes toward immigrant children. Students with experience working with immigrant children exhibited more positive attitudes toward cultural diversity. Students who had spent more time abroad showed less negative attitudes toward immigrant children. The results, therefore, showed that exposure to cultural diversity might contribute to accepting diversity and developing more positive attitudes toward immigrant children.