This proposal presents the results of a research project funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation that explores educational inequalities affecting non-European migrant students in urban areas. The study pursues three main objectives: (a) to identify structural and emerging forms of educational inequality exacerbated by urban segregation; (b) to analyse the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the rising politics of fear and the criminalisation of immigration; and (c) to provide tools and methods to engage and empower young migrants in co-creating innovative joint solutions to combat educational inequalities and urban segregation.

In the recent health crisis, educational systems around the world had to adapt to enormous change, such as the suspension of face-to-face activities that has affected millions of students at all educational levels. As many reports show, the pandemic had a disproportionate impact on migrant youths, as they were particularly vulnerable to direct and indirect consequences of this health crisis for many reasons: among others, barriers that limit their access to living and working conditions, the lack of consideration of their cultural and linguistic diversity in service provision, xenophobia, their limited networks, local knowledge and access to rights in host communities. This daunting panorama was accompanied by the growing “toxicity” of the migration debate which has further intensified worldwide in recent years with the politics of fear and division increasingly framing discussions that raise inequity through criminalization and neo-racism.

In this paper, we will present the results of a specific objective of the project, focused on the analysis of the representation of migrant students in the print press and social media. Based on a critical discourse analysis of a sample of news articles published in the five most widely read print media in Spain and their social media channels, we identify and analyze different discursive frames surrounding the educational opportunities and barriers these young people experience, and how the education system responds to these opportunities and barriers. The analysed sample consists of articles published between March 1, 2020, and March 31, 2024, in four Spanish national newspapers: El País, La Vanguardia, ABC, and El Mundo. The search tools used were MyNews (a national database that allows the retrieval of full articles) and Onclusive Social to analyze social media interactions. Different types of texts (news, reports, editorials, opinion pieces, and editors' letters) were analysed and retrieved using a Boolean search with different combinations of specific terms and with a minimum match of 70% for the established search criteria.

The results allow us to analyze the role of the media in the social construction of segregation, exclusion, and educational disaffection, taking as a starting point the context of fear and social tension caused by the pandemic, where anti-immigrant narratives have been transformed and disseminated, increasing stigmatization and disaffection toward migrants, particularly young people. Among other results, we delve into how the media and social networks relate immigration to notions such as academic success and failure, educational inclusion and exclusion, school violence, racism, and educational segregation, identifying different discursive and educational mechanisms that reproduce stigmatisation.

Keywords: Media discourses, migration, educational inequities, urban segregation, COVID-19 pandemic.