Education Equity Policy Research Articles

INCLUSION AND EQUITY POLICIES IN BASIC EDUCATION

This study investigated inclusion and equity policies in basic education, seeking to understand how these policies are structured and what impacts they have on pedagogical practice. The problem addressed was: what are the main challenges and effects of inclusion and equity policies in education? The general objective was to analyze how these policies are implemented and their implications for the educational environment. The methodology used was a bibliographic review of the main references in the area, covering legislation, programs, challenges and inclusive pedagogical practices. The main laws and guidelines that guide inclusion policies were examined, as well as the specific programs implemented to promote equity. In addition, challenges related to regional and socioeconomic inequalities, teacher training and the availability of educational resources were identified. The results showed that, although inclusion and equity policies have advanced, there are still significant challenges in their implementation. Successful pedagogical practices include diversified methodologies and the use of assistive technologies, but the effectiveness of these practices is limited by the lack of resources and adequate teacher training. The final considerations highlighted the need to improve teacher training and school infrastructure to ensure effective implementation of policies and suggested continued research to broaden understanding and develop new strategies for inclusion and equity in basic education.

Comparative Study of Education Equity Policy in Remote Areas in Indonesia and Malaysia

This research aims to compare the education equity policies in remote areas of Indonesia and Malaysia to identify the differences, similarities, and effectiveness in addressing socioeconomic disparities between urban and remote regions. The study examines policy documents, government reports, and previous research using a qualitative comparative approach. Indonesia employs a regional autonomy approach, while Malaysia adheres to a centralized system in education policy. Both countries have adopted financial assistance programs to increase the participation of students from low-income families in remote areas. Critical challenges in policy implementation include limited facilities and infrastructure, demanding access to transportation, limited human resources, and sociocultural barriers. The study finds that policy successes are evident in increased student participation, improved infrastructure accessibility, provision of teaching staff, and community support. However, budget constraints and human resource limitations remain significant obstacles. The research concludes that effective education equity policies require proactive government involvement, active community participation, and periodic monitoring and evaluation to enhance policy effectiveness.

More Is Required of Us: Complicating an Ontology of Experience at the Heart of Community-Based Research

More Is Required of Us: Complicating an Ontology of Experience at the Heart of Community-Based Research

Supporting students from equity groups: experiences of staff and considerations for institutions

ABSTRACT In light of widening participation initiatives internationally, including those in Australia, much has been written about equity policies in education. There is a growing body of research related to the outcomes of such policies and the experiences of non-traditional students, including those from low socio-economic status (LSES) backgrounds and students who are First Generation and/or First in Family, as well as other equity groups. This paper presents data related to a less researched effect of widening participation: the experiences of and impact on academic staff and those providing support services to students. We focus particularly on students from LSES backgrounds. Qualitative data were collected through focus groups with academic and student support staff in a large regional Australian university, with several themes emerging. In this paper, we investigate staff experiences related to diversity in student cohorts, drawing on Bourdieu’s concept of capital. Results show that the academics are supportive of LSES students and sensitive to the range of student backgrounds in their courses, including differences in cultural capital and students experiencing extreme hardship, but the support provided is affected by staff gender. It is evident that staff endeavour pedagogically and pastorally to support students, often at personal cost. There are workload and welfare implications evident for staff, institutions and funding.

Exploring equity in educational policies and interventions in primary and secondary education in the context of public health emergencies: A systematic literature review

School disruptions during public health emergencies (PHEs) have a detrimental effect on students, families and societies, and exacerbate pre-existing education inequalities. Built on OECD's six education equity policy options and PROGRESS-Plus framework, this systematic review produced a narrative account of consequences of and barriers to access to primary and secondary educational policies and interventions implemented during PHEs through an equity lens. By examining 52 included studies, the review found that disadvantaged learners lacked reliable access to essential learning materials and resources. Families from disadvantaged socio-economic background and those with learning difficulties required extra support services during remote learning. Schools faced unique challenges in delivering inclusive teaching during PHEs. Recommendations were provided for practitioners to uphold education equity during school disruptions.

The future of education equity policy in a COVID-19 world: a qualitative systematic review of lessons from education policymaking

Background: COVID-19 had a major global impact on education, prompting concerns about its unequal effects and some impetus to reboot equity strategies. Yet, policy processes exhibit major gaps between expectations and outcomes, and inequalities endured for decades before the pandemic. Our objective is to establish, from education research, how policymakers seek equitable outcomes. Our study emulates its partner review of ‘Health in All Policies’ (HiAP) to ask: How does education equity research use policy theory to understand policymaking?Methods: A qualitative systematic review (from 2020-21), to identify peer reviewed research and commentary articles on education, equity, and policymaking, in specialist and general databases (ERIC, Web of Science, Scopus, Cochrane/ Social Systems Evidence). We did not apply additional quality measures. We used an inductive approach to identify key themes. We use these texts to produce a general narrative and explore how relatively theory-informed articles enhance it.Results: 140 texts (109 articles included; 31 texts snowballed) provide a non-trivial reference to policymaking. Limiting inclusion to English-language produced a bias towards Global North articles. The comparison with HIAP highlights distinctive elements of education research. First, educational equity is ambiguous and contested, with no settled global definition or agenda (although countries like the US, and organisations like the World Bank, have disproportionate influence). Second, researchers critique the narrow equity definitions – focusing on performance – that dominate policymaking. Third, more studies provide ‘bottom-up’ analysis of ‘implementation gaps’. Fourth, more studies relate inequity to ineffective policymaking to address marginalised groups.Conclusions: Few studies use policy theories to explain policymaking, but there is an education-specific literature performing a similar task. Compared to HIAP research, there is more use of critical policy analysis to reflect on power and less focus on delivering top-down aims. Most studies criticise current educational equity aims and expect them to fail.

Three decades of misrecognition: defining people with disability in Australian higher education policy

In Australia, the Disability Discrimination Act and associated Educational Standards prevent educational institutions from treating people with disability less favourably than those without disability – directly or indirectly. However, people with disability are still subject to both economic and cultural disadvantage in Australian higher education policy. In this article we describe this as a ‘recognition–redistribution dilemma’, whereby this population must both deny and claim their subjectivity. This is in large part due to the lack of transparency around how disability is defined, coded and recorded. Drawing on three stages of development of Australian higher education equity policy across three decades of higher education disability policy, the article provides insights into how people with disability have been categorised, classified and counted in higher education and the implications this has for how they are supported. Points of interest Australian higher education institutions ask students with disability to identify not only that they have disability, but the ‘category’ of disability and whether or not they need support. The disability categories used are not fit for purpose and it is not clear whether the data being collected have value, in terms of how they advance social understandings of disability. Disability support staff understand and advocate for the need to focus on functional support, not disability definitions, but the policy and reporting environment does not reflect this need. Higher education institutions should only collect information from people with disability if it is needed to support the person specifically, or if it can be used to improve support more widely for people with disability.

On \u2018being first\u2019: the case for first-generation status in Australian higher education equity policy

For more than three decades, Australian higher education policy has been guided by a national equity framework focussed on six underrepresented target groups: Indigenous Australians, people from low socioeconomic status backgrounds, people from regional and remote areas, people with disabilities, people from non-English speaking backgrounds, and women in non-traditional areas of study. Despite bringing equitable access to the forefront of university agendas, this policy framework has fostered a somewhat narrow conceptualisation of how educational disadvantage should be addressed. Responding to calls for reform, this paper draws on survey data from 6492 students in NSW government schools to examine the extent to which a new category warrants inclusion in the national framework: first-generation status. We illustrate how being the first in a family to attend university brings distinct equity status and argue for a revision of the national equity framework to recognise and support students who are ‘first’.

Universal versus targeted approaches to prevent early education gaps. The Netherlands as case in point

There is strong evidence that high quality early childhood programs targeting disadvantaged groups can have lasting benefits and high returns on investment. The evidence for universal programs, however, is less conclusive. The present paper examines the claims of universal and targeted approaches to preventing early education gaps. First, recent findings on the universal unitary early education and care systems in Denmark and Norway are reviewed regarding the educational quality and compensating effects on disadvantaged children. Second, the advantages and disadvantages of targeted approaches are discussed, focusing in particular on the trade-off between cost-effectiveness and aggregated impact on society. Third, the Dutch educational equity policy will be analyzed as a case in point to illustrate the dilemmas, contradictions and paradoxes of equity policy pertaining to targeted and universal approaches. Finally, as a synthesis of the findings, two complementary approaches are outlined: a universal within targeted and a targeted within universal approach.

Enhanced use of educational accountability data to monitor educational progress of Australian students with focus on Indigenous students

In Australia, under the National Assessment Plan, educational accountability testing in literacy and numeracy (NAPLAN) is undertaken with all students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 to monitor student achievement and inform policy. However, the extent to which these data have been analysed to report student progress is limited. This article reports a study analysing Year-3 and Year-5 NAPLAN reading and numeracy data, school and student information for a single student cohort from Queensland, Australia, to examine student achievement and progress. The analyses use longitudinal multilevel modelling, incorporating an enhanced approach for missing data imputation, given that such data frequently involve large amounts of missing data and failure to account properly for such missing data may bias interpretations of analyses. Further, statistical adjustments to deal with the impact of measurement error, an aspect not previously addressed in such analyses of data, are undertaken. A special focus of analyses is achievement of Australian Indigenous and non-Indigenous students. International and national data demonstrate a considerable achievement gap between these students. “Closing the gap” is a core Australian education equity policy, with NAPLAN data used as a primary indicator of policy impact. Overall, analyses indicate greater understanding of student progress for all students is available from Australian data if appropriate analyses are undertaken. However, analyses also demonstrate not only that the gap between Australian Indigenous and non-Indigenous student progress increases as they move through school but also diversity of achievement within the Indigenous student cohort. Implications for policy are considered.

On "being first:" reconsidering Australian higher education equity policy through a comprehensive analysis of the aspirations of prospective first-in-family students

On "being first:" reconsidering Australian higher education equity policy through a comprehensive analysis of the aspirations of prospective first-in-family students

Las Políticas Educativas de Equidad en Honduras: un análisis desde la perspectiva de género con una mirada en la situación de niñas y adolescentes

En el presente ensayo, se realiza un análisis de las políticas de equidad en la educación desde una perspectiva de género, documentándose, a través de una revisión bibliográfica de diferentes estudios escritos sobre el tema, incluyendo, los instrumentos legales hondureños: La Política Nacional de la Mujer, La Ley Fundamental de Educación y El Currículo Nacional Básico. Tomando como enfoque el ciclo de políticas de Stephen Ball, para comparar el contexto de influencia, el contexto de producción del texto de la política con el contexto de la práctica.Evidenciándose, en el contexto de la práctica que la equidad de género plasmada teóricamente en los instrumentos legales hondureños no se aplica, debido, a que en las prácticas pedagógicas, se sigue perpetuando el sexismo, la discriminación y la exclusión hacia el sexo femenino, y que en el acceso y permanencia en el Sistema Educativo hondureño, se refleja un 19 % de analfabetismo y una temprana deserción escolar, siendo las niñas, las adolescentes, pertenecientes a los pueblos originarios y afrodescendientes los más afectados, igualmente, por la falta de una educación sexual integral, el país ocupa el segundo lugar en Latinoamérica con mayor tasa de fecundidad en adolescentes. Por tanto, no basta solo con cumplir los lineamientos y exigencias de los Tratados y Convenios Internacionales para la inclusión de la equidad de género en la producción del texto de la política, sino que también, hay que reflexionar para tener una mirada crítica ante las desigualdades en los micro espacios, donde conviven, tanto profesores como estudiantes.

Educational equity policy as human taxonomy: who do we compare and why does it matter?

ABSTRACT Descriptions of educational inequality, or ‘gap talk’, require principles of categorisation that divide humans into groups between which a ‘gap’ can exist. The principles used in education equity policies to define groups affect the nature of the educational interventions that these policies propose. Drawing on critical discourse analysis of education policy documents and political speeches, I argue that in New Zealand the dominant categorising principle is indigenous/Māori ethnicity, whereas in England it is socio-economic disadvantage. These two principles result in two very different types of policy interventions, both of which address only part of the problem. Furthermore, both principles are simplistic and one-dimensional, making it easier to blame ‘failing schools’ for educational inequality, whereas use of more nuanced principles would provide a better basis for determining the kinds of differences that ‘effective schools’ can reasonably be expected to make. While previous analyses have suggested that recognition-orientated policies can shift attention away from broader social policies that influence educational disparities, I argue here that this can also be the case for distribution-orientated policies.

Separate and Unequal: an Exploratory Study Examining College Students’ Experiences of Secondary Education and Perceptions of School Integration

Over 60 years ago, Brown v. Board of Education found educational segregation to be unconstitutional due to the gross inequity in educational opportunities. Sadly, Black and Latino children in the USA are more racially and socioeconomically segregated than during any period since data collection began. Despite multiple policy attempts aimed at education equity, this remains one of our greatest human rights challenges. Policy analysts have cited that current education policy fails to address the problem fully, because the focus is insufficiently limited to outcome data. While very important, this type of data does not provide the depth of understanding of the issues needed for comprehensive and effective education equity policy. The current study, conducted in one of the most segregated regions in the USA, involved 38 in-depth interviews that were conducted to assess access to resources and support, perceptions of the impact of segregation, and awareness of barriers to integration efforts in their community, among students of different races and ethnicities. Data were analyzed from “Empathy Maps” that were completed by the interviewers to assess both non-verbal and verbal responses. Findings suggest there are stark differences between students of different races regarding access to support and resources, and understanding of the impact of segregation. Implications suggest that future studies, policy proposals, and practice strategies targeting education equity should include greater understanding of the lived experiences of the children in the education system. This suggests a critical role for social workers who recognize equitable education as an essential human right.

The new articulation of equity education in neoliberal times: the changing conception of social justice in Ontario

ABSTRACTIn this paper, we draw attention to the impact of neoliberal globalisation in rearticulating conceptions of equity within the Ontario context. The Ontario education system has been hailed for its top performance on Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) as a high-equity/high-quality education system and created ‘PISA envy’ in the international context. Our aim in this paper is to provide some critical analysis of the neoliberal rationality and to examine its manifestations for rearticulating conceptions of social justice. Drawing on equity education policies in Ontario and one in-depth interview with an equity practitioner in one of Ontario’s large and most diverse school boards, this paper illustrates how a redefinition of equity has been made possible through neoliberal systems of accountability and performativity involving measurement and facticity. As a result of these strategies, equity policy in education has been concerned with outcome measurement and boys’ underachievement, while racial and class inequalities have become invisible. While this paper is focused on Ontario equity policy, we believe that it serves much broader interest given the current context of global education policy field.

Participation in higher education in Australia among under-represented groups: What can we learn from the Higher Education Participation Program to better support Indigenous learners?

In 1988 the release of the Higher Education: A Policy Statement White Paper focused Australia’s national higher education equity policy on “changing the balance of the student population to reflect more closely the composition of society as a whole” (Dawkins 1990, 2-3). While improvement in access and participation has been noted for women, people from non-English speaking backgrounds, and people with disabilities, the interventions has remained less effective for people from Lower Socio-Economic Status (LSES backgrounds), Indigenous peoples; rural, regional and remote residents; (Gale & Tranter, 2011; Koshy & Seymour 2014). In 2009, in response to the Bradley Review (2008), the Australian government set a new agenda again focused on equitable participation in higher education, along with associated equity targets (which have since been abandoned), and funding to enable this reform as well as increased participation. Funding was delivered through the Higher Education Participation and Partnerships Program (HEPPP), renamed the Higher Education Participation Program (HEPP) in 2015 (Australian Government Department of Education and Training, 2015). A range of national partnerships, policy initiatives and programs has been used to facilitate improved achievement in schools as well as enable access, participation and achievement in higher education. These actions have included targeted programs through the use of intervention strategies aimed at widening participation in, and improving access to higher education.

A forgotten cohort? Including people from out-of-home care in Australian higher education policy

People from out-of-home care backgrounds are largely absent from Australian higher education equity policy. Compared with the UK, Australia has moved slowly to consider legislative and programme incentives for young people who leave state, foster or kinship care and who wish to access higher education. One major reason for the relative inaction of the Australian higher education sector towards this cohort is the rigidity of the national equity framework established in 1990. This article argues that policy reform is required to improve the participation of people from out-of-home care backgrounds in Australian higher education. Effort could be directed into revising the national equity framework, in particular by including out-of-home care as a specific group to be monitored. In addition to revising the national policy architecture, further devolution of equity policy to institutional level may enable greater engagement with the out-of-home care cohort.

‘Unleashing aspiration’: The concept of potential in education policy

This paper examines the promises made in education policy regarding people’s future education, employment and social mobility. Specifically, the paper analyses how the term ‘potential’ functions in education policy texts and discourses to make tacit promises at an affective level. Contemporary education policies often invoke the need to realise personal and national economic potential, and speak of the risk of ‘wasted potential’, when justifying reform agendas directed at both increasing human capital investment and reducing educational inequity. Drawing on the work of Gilles Deleuze, the paper develops a philosophical concept of potential that provides a theoretical framework for the analysis. The aim of the paper is to analyse how the term ‘potential’ functions in policy to: (a) couple economic and equity purposes for education; and (b) imply a relationship between talent, opportunity and aspiration, and particular a distribution of responsibility between governments and citizens for ‘realising potential’. While primarily theoretical, the paper is informed by analyses of interview data and documents in two research projects: (1) a small pilot study of higher education equity policy in England and Australia since the mid-1990s and (2) a study of the expansion of human capital theory and large-scale educational assessments to include non-cognitive skills. The paper diagnoses the potential of ‘potential’ as a key word in policy and raises questions about the risks of becoming invested in the promises of education to ‘realise potential’.

Unlocking the gates to the peasants: are policies of ‘fairness’ or ‘inclusion’ more important for equity in higher education?

Attempts to make higher education more equitable more readily succeed at the aggregate (sector) level than at the institutional, with students from disadvantaged groups being overrepresented in low-status institutions. It is suggested that this is because policies of ‘fairness’ (i.e. proportional representation) dominate the contemporary policy framework and are strongly resisted by elite universities. However, using the Australian higher education sector as an example, this paper argues that equity policy is actually a mix of ‘proportional fairness’ and ‘inclusion’ and elite institutions resist not because the policy is deficient but because it might actually work. An alternative approach to higher education equity policy is proposed; one which requires elite institutions to engage meaningfully with disadvantaged students but allows them to retain their status advantage.

‘There Was Something about Aspiration’: Widening Participation Policy Affects in England and Australia

This paper discusses the emergence of aspiration as a keyword linked to higher education equity policy in England and Australia since 1997. Aspiration serves multiple purposes when constructed as a problematic site in which policy must intervene. For example, it can be understood as a vector for new technologies of governance that operate through the production of entrepreneurial dispositions; as a signifier for groups that have experienced upward social mobility; and as a personality trait that correlates with future earnings and thus can be defined as a dimension of human capital. It has also provided a rallying point for equity work in higher education. Focusing on English and Australian policy contexts, as well as the recent education work of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), we examine the different perspectives of a range of stakeholders on the strategy of ‘raising aspiration’ for higher education and how these have changed over time; the partnership work undertaken in the HE systems of both countries under the aegis of aspiration-raising policies; and recent policy developments in both contexts. In particular, we consider how aspiration-focused policies have affective effects on policy actors and seek to control affects directly by modulating feelings about capacities for action in the future. Two data sets provide the empirical basis for the paper: (a) document analysis of major equity policies in England since 1997 and in Australia since 2008, as well as a review of relevant OECD policy documents; and (b) analysis of nine interviews with equity practitioners and policy personnel in England, Australia, and located within the OECD.