Critical Perspectives on Education Policy and Schools, Families, and Communities


Book Description

Critical Perspectives on Education Policy and Schools, Families, and Communities offers scholars, students, and practitioners important new knowledge about how current policies impact families, schools, and community partnerships. The book’s authors share a critical orientation towards policy and policy research and invite readers to think differently about what policy is, who policymakers are, and what policy can achieve. Their chapters discuss findings from research grounded in diverse theories, including institutional ethnography, critical disability theory, and critical race theory. The authors encourage scholars of family, school, and community partnerships to ask who benefits from policies (and who loses) and how proposed reforms maintain or disrupt existing relations of power. The chapters present original research on a broad range of policies at the local, state/provincial, and national levels in Canada and the USA. Some authors look closely at the enactment of specific district policies, including a school district’s language translation policy and a policy to create local advisory bodies as part of decentralization efforts. Other chapters reveal the often unacknowledged yet necessary work parents do to meet their children’s needs and enable schools to operate. A few chapters focus on challenges and paradoxes of including families and community members in policymaking processes, including a case where parents demonstrated a preference for a policy that research demonstrates can be detrimental to their children’s future education opportunities. Another set of chapters emphasizes the centrality of policy texts and how language influences the educational experiences and engagement of students and their families. Each chapter concludes with a discussion of implications of the research for educators, families, and other community partners.




EBOOK: Students' Perspectives On Schooling


Book Description

Students' Perspectives on Schooling explores how schools might be transformed for the better, by giving greater weight to the views of students. Osler explores various arguments for involving learners in decision-making processes, including: The potential benefits to schools and the wider community Moral and legal reasons based on human rights principles Gaining fresh insights into the processes of teaching and learning Firmly grounded in research, it analyses data collected from young people living in both the UK and US. Almost 2000 students reported on their current education provision and the degree to which they felt it met their needs. In keeping with the spirit of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, Students' Perspectives on Schooling engages with the voices of these young people to consider how they might inform educational policy making. It argues that consulting young people is not only beneficial to the everyday life of schools, but that the future health of democratic societies demands that we re-think relationships between adults and young people. A must read for teachers, school leaders, educational researchers, and anyone involved with educational policy-making and planning.




EBOOK: EFFECTIVE TEACHING AND LEARNING


Book Description

This book examines how teachers and students actually go about their classroom business. It carefully avoids the assumptions of policy-makers and theorists about what ought to be happening and focuses on what is happening. In doing so, Cooper and McIntyre offer: a detailed look at how teachers are responding to the National Curriculum a unique insight into secondary school students as learners a grounded analysis of teaching and learning strategies drawing on the psychological theories of Bruner and Vygotsky The book follows on from Donald McIntyre's previous book Making Sense of Teaching and will be of interest to student teachers, teachers studying for advanced degrees and academics involved in teacher education.




Student Engagement in Higher Education


Book Description

In the updated edition of this important volume, the editors and chapter contributors explore how diverse populations of students experience college differently and encounter group-specific barriers to success. Informed by relevant theories, each chapter focuses on engaging a different student population, including low-income students, Students of Color, international students, students with disabilities, religious minority students, student-athletes, part-time students, adult learners, military-connected students, graduate students, and others. New in this third edition is the inclusion of chapters on Indigenous students, student activists, transracial Asian American adoptee students, justice-involved students, student-parents, first-generation students, and undocumented students. The forward-thinking, practical, anti-deficit-oriented strategies offered throughout the book are based on research and the collected professional wisdom of experienced educators and scholars at a range of postsecondary institutions. Current and future faculty members, higher education administrators, and student affairs educators will undoubtedly find this book complete with fresh ideas to reverse troubling engagement trends among various college student populations.




Global Perspectives on Education Research


Book Description

Global Perspectives on Education Research echoes the breadth and scope of education research worldwide. It features the work of established and emerging scholars from a range of universities and research institutions in Africa, Europe, and North America. The book's ten chapters are organized around four themes: Education Policy, Teaching and Learning, School Context and Student Outcomes, and Assessment and Measurement. Each chapter offers cross-cultural, transnational, or comparative insights on some of the most pressing challenges and promising opportunities for improving education around the world. Across thematic areas, these perspectives shape new ways of understanding context as an influence on, and a framework for, conceptual insights into education policy and practice at the international, national, and local levels. With chapters on topics including the cultural complexities of literacy, the effect of socioeconomic inequality on student learning, and the tension between education for global competitiveness and education for global citizenship as national policy strategies, Global Perspectives on Education Research addresses issues and questions that will interest education researchers, educators, policy makers, and societal leaders worldwide. This volume is a publication of the World Education Research Association (WERA). WERA is an association of major national, regional, and international specialty research associations dedicated to advancing education research as a scientific and scholarly field. WERA undertakes initiatives that are global in nature and thus transcend what any one association can accomplish in its own country, region, or area of specialization.




EBOOK: Raising Boys' Achievement in Secondary Schools


Book Description

"Boys’ achievement has attracted great attention in recent years in many countries. This comprehensive book based on sound research in schools provides practical insights into how the achievement of boysand girls can be raised. It reminds us that it is not all boys or no girlswho underachieve. It demonstrates the respective roles of teaching andlearning, school culture and social factors. No easy answers butexcellent ideas backed by evidence from authoritative, thoroughresearchers with a firm basis in schools." Judy Sebba, Professor of Education, University of Sussex "Teachers will find this book invaluable. It is based on quality researchwhich actually evaluates the impact of the various strategies suggestedfor raising boys' achievement. What is more, in contrast to many of themore 'quick-fix' works in this field, the authors’ discussion and analysisis measured and nuanced, and supported by an in-depth understandingof the wealth of theory and research around gender and achievement.It provides a welcome and weighty contribution to an evercontroversial debate." Becky Francis, London Metropolitan University In this important book, the authors evaluate different approaches and advocate practical, evidence-based strategies, which have the potential to promote boys’ as well as girls’ achievements. The approaches are discussed within the context of inclusivity, acknowledging the diverse needs and interests of different boys and the invisibility and continuing disadvantage of some girls. The book begins and ends with reflections from students of their own school experiences, and makes practical recommendations for the future. This book draws upon empirical research and work initiated as part of the DfES project on Raising Boys’ Achievement. It brings together theoretical and practical issues, and reflects upon the construction of the debate about boys’ apparent under-achievement from the perspectives of girls as well as boys. The authors critically explore notions of under-achievement and ‘value added’, and consider how useful the concept of the ‘gender gap’ is in advancing the debates. Raising Boys’ Achievement in Secondary Schools is key reading for undergraduate and postgraduate Education students, PGCE students, headteachers, senior managers within schools and local education authorities, and policy makers.




EBOOK: First Generation Entry into Higher Education


Book Description

“This book does not focus simply on the employment prospects of first generation higher education entrants but rather engages with the wider possibilities of social engagement and transformation that can arise from participation in higher education. It provides essential reading for administrators, policy-makers, managers, academics and indeed anyone else interested in how to widen the socio-economic base of higher education so that the process is informed by a significant concern with social justice and reducing inequality.” Rosemary Deem, Professor of Education, University of Bristol This book examines the proposition that parental education is a key factor contributing to the access and success of students, but that insufficient attention is paid to this by researchers, national systems and institutional interventions. Analysis of research findings from ten countries, plus a UK wide study, indicates that parental education is more important in determining access to higher education than parental employment or financial status. The book provides a clear conceptualisation of first generation entry, exploring its complex interrelationship with social class. Furthermore, it demonstrates that when first generation entry is used as a lens, it disrupts the taken for granted assumptions regarding widening participation and helps produce much more effective approaches to targeting access and supporting student success. First Generation Entry into Higher Education provides a unique and insightful examination of how first generation entrants are supported or otherwise by different national approaches and institutional responses. The book is essential reading for all with an interest in widening participation in higher education.




Ebook: Sociology: A Brief Introduction


Book Description

Ebook: Sociology: A Brief Introduction




EBOOK: New Perspectives on Bullying


Book Description

"This book provides a useful round-up of studies that help the reader understand what constitutes bullying (a much-debated point), the characteristics of bullies and children who are targeted, patterns of behaviour and common outcomes for the children involved, as well as what inhibits many schools from formulating effective policy." Children & Young People Now What is bullying? What can we learn from research findings? What are the risk factors for bullying or being bullied? How can we take account of the voice of the child? How can educators, policy-makers, health professionals and parents work together with children and young people to prevent and reduce bullying? This book provides a valuable resource for anyone responsible for the emotional health and well-being of children and young people. The authors focus on the importance of fostering positive relationships in the school community as a whole, so that young people and adults feel empowered to challenge bullying when they encounter it and protect those involved. Using case studies of real experiences, innovative practice, key research findings and perspectives from children and young people themselves, the authors provide perceptive insights into the positive ways of relating to others that are essential if we are to address the issue of bullying successfully. The material outlined in the book is directly linked to the new agenda for change in meeting the needs of the child, empowering children to be consulted and to take responsibility for issues that affect them. It explores a range of effective interventions that can counteract bullying - including restorative approaches; peer mediation; narrative approaches; and cyber support. Key features include: Chapter overviews Examples of effective practice Summaries of key research findings Children’s views and experiences Learning points at the end of each chapter List of related organisations, websites and resources to support interventions against bullying Practical guidance based on sound evaluation is provided - as well as an insight into international perspectives on bullying - to help develop a positive school environment and disseminate good practice. New Perspectives on Bullying is an indispensable resource for teachers, researchers, health professionals, social workers and parents.




EBOOK: Higher Education And Social Justice


Book Description

Is access to higher education really open to all? How does the experience of higher education vary between social groups? Are graduate jobs harder to find for some than for others? The transformation of higher education from an elite experience to a mass system delivering advanced education to a socially mixed clientele has often been conflated with a process of equalization through wider access. But is this really the case? Andy Furlong and Fred Cartmel fear not, arguing that young people from social and economically disadvantaged families suffer from unfair access arrangements, have a poorer student experience and have limited contact with their middle class peers. Moreover, students from less advantaged families who successfully complete their courses tend to face greater difficulty securing graduate jobs and may be left with higher levels of debt. Taking a holistic approach that focuses on access to higher education, experiences in higher education and gains derived from participation, the book explores the barriers that impede the progress of young people from less advantaged families and outlines the various forms of stratification that help limit the possibilities for social mobility through education. Higher Education and Social Justice provides essential reading for anyone who has an interest in higher education or a concern for social justice, including lecturers, administrators and policy makers in higher education.