Ett komplext fenomen; Skolpersonals berättelser om arbetet med hemmasittare

Sammanfattning: The purpose of this paper was to gain an in-depth understanding of the phenomenon of “stay-at-home children” and how the personnel at a school explain their work with pupils who are “stay-at-home children”. We also aimed to explore the opportunities school staff have to prevent pupils from becoming “stay-at-home children” and how they collaborate as a team. This is a qualitative study involving five semi-structured interviews with six staff members at a school, each with different professional roles such as principal, counselor, and special teacher. The theoretical frameworks of our analysis included system theory, Street-Level Bureaucracy, and discretion. Our study revealed that personnel at this particular school approached working with“stay-at-home children '' in a highly individualized manner, tailoring their methods to each pupil's specific needs due to the complexity of the phenomenon. Additionally, the school staff reported strong cooperation in dealing with “stay-at-home children”. When asked about underlying causes, participants often mentioned either a diagnosis or some form of mental health issue. Despite having a relatively large budget compared to other schools, our findings indicated that resources were perceived as a challenge. Notably, participants viewed "stay-at-home children" as more of an individual problem than a structural one.