The bright and dark faces of the school through students’ voice

Abstract At a time when governments, commentators, journalists, and teachers are debating what is best for education, it is crucial to listen to students and understand their hopes and fears about school. With this in mind, we invited students from 9th to 12th grades to write a free text responding to the question: “How do you see and feel about school if we associate it with two metaphors - School of Hell or School of Paradise?”. Methodologically, we adopted a qualitative research approach. For the analysis of the texts, the NVivo qualitative data analysis software was used, allowing the content to be coded into categories aligned with the research objectives. The results show that, despite progress in listening to students, further efforts are still needed to ensure their voices are truly valued.