Education or service

Discursive themes and contradicting ideas about preschools in Icelandic media

Abstract

The article explores recent media discussion about preschools in Iceland. We selected two events in 2020 and 2022 with concentrated media coverage, including opinion articles and news. On the 14th of January 2020, the Education and Youth Council of the Reykjavík City Government decided to reduce the opening hours of preschools so that they would close at 4:30 pm instead of 5 pm. We observed all 27 articles published in the next 13 days. We also analysed 32 opinion articles written by political candidates published in the last thirteen days before the municipal elections were held on the 14th of May 2022. Altogether, for both events, there were 59 articles which we analysed to answer two questions: What is preschool, and what is the purpose of preschool? What is expected that children receive from being in preschool?

We approached the material with a six-step method called historical analysis of discourse (Ingólfur Ásgeir Jóhannesson, 2010). Steps one and two are selecting a topic and the material. At step three, we analysed six discursive themes: pressure on the children, the workload for the staff, development and play, equality, the service role of the preschools, and a theme we labelled as quick solutions. The themes of pressure on the children and workload for the staff are partly interwoven. One example is the worry that an eight-tonine-hour school day is too long for young children. These worries were often put into the context of it being easier to hire staff with reduced opening hours. The development and play theme involved the authors’ emphases on preschool as an educational institution, not least the importance of preschools keeping the focus on play and being constructed as different from compulsory education which focuses more on learning. One of the statements about equality was an argument that the preschool system’s development had resulted from some of the most important recent political decisions. It was pointed out that the existence of preschools made it possible for women, in particular, not to have to choose between a career in the labour market and having children. Another theme included discussions about the role of preschools in servicing parents and the labour market. The last theme, quick solutions, included many suggestions on how to solve some of the immediate problems with which the preschool system is dealing. The solutions included cash-for-care schemes, strengthening the system of self-employed childminders, making six or seven hours free of charge, and finding space in compulsory school buildings for five-year-old children.

We identified two legitimating principles constructed in the media coverage. The first one involves the idea that preschool is an educational institution with societal roles, such as contributing to Iceland’s longstanding status as the most gender-equal country in the world (World Economic Forum, 2022). The schools service the labour market by caring for the children in a safe environment while their parents work. Other conditions, such as the staff shortage, make it difficult to fulfil their role to provide flexible, whole-day provisions. The other principle is that almost everyone who discussed preschools in the media wanted preschools to be a different kind of educational institution than compulsory schools children attend from age six. Attempts to shorten children’s preschool time may be consistent with the educational role. At the same time, they simultaneously contradict the roles of service to equality, parents, and the labour market.

The study shows that there is a lively debate about the future of the Icelandic preschool system. It also clearly suggests that the municipalities do not have an easy task to solve when the communities equally expect the preschools to use play as the main ideology in their day-to-day activities as well as be a provider of services essential to continue the development of a gender-equal society where all genders, especially mothers, can participate in paid labour outside the home. We underline the importance of considering these multiple roles when it comes to further developing the preschool system in Iceland.