Justice Education Research Articles

Constructing solidarity through social justice in education: from collaboration and conflict to amalgamation between Swedish teacher unions

ABSTRACT Trade union collaboration on issues of social justice connects workers to each other and to their wider communities and is therefore considered a strategy of union renewal. Prior to their amalgamation on 1 January 2023, Lärarförbundet (Swedish Teachers’ Union) and Lärarnas Riksförbund (National Union of Teachers in Sweden) collaborated intermittently to challenge educational injustices in the highly segregated Swedish school market. Through documentary research, with dialogue as method, this case study explores the policies and politics of this inter-union collaboration. Using ‘framing’ and ‘intermediation’ as conceptual lenses, we argue that the two unions collaborated predominantly, but to varying degrees, on bargaining, political, and professional issues. However, these joint actions were conducted in the context of declining union membership, competitive national recruitment agendas, and the rise of grassroots teacher-led ‘rebellion’ groups campaigning for public education. External solidarity in organising was therefore limited by inter-organisational and intra-professional differentiation and both unions’ orientation towards a service model of unionism. Future research might explore the complexity of intra-union collaboration in the newly amalgamated Sveriges Lärare and the extent to which regional branch activism and broader alliances with social movements could promote a more democratic organising agenda.

A Roadmap for Sustainable Community-Engaged Partnerships in Athletic Training and Using a Traveling Athletic Training Camp as an Implementation Strategy.

Improving access to athletic trainers and increasing diversity in the profession have been major goals of the Strategic Alliance, with a particular interest in the secondary school setting. Within many marginalized communities, individuals are often faced with a lack of resources, high rates of poverty, and limited access to health care. This social and economic climate often extends to inequitable athletic training services and patterns of disparate health. Widely used and recognized strategies to cultivate diversity and address health inequities include community-engaged partnerships; however, these approaches are not well implemented across the athletic training discipline. Successful community-engaged partnerships link communities and universities, and they are rooted in intentionality to address intermediate and long-term health equity outcomes. Athletic training professionals and scholars frequently encounter gaps in resources and process-oriented methods to participate in community-engaged efforts that could include a roadmap or pathway to follow. To bridge this gap, our aims were 2-fold: (1) to disseminate a roadmap for building sustainable community-engaged partnerships in athletic training with the intent of promoting diversity, equity, inclusion, and social justice across athletic training education, research, and professional service and (2) to demonstrate how the roadmap can be implemented using a community-based athletic training education camp as an example. Implementation of the athletic training camp using the roadmap took place at secondary schools where community-engaged partnerships have been established throughout a geographic region known as the Alabama Black Belt, a region burdened with poor health outcomes, limited athletic trainer presence, and lower quality of life, exacerbated by racial and socioeconomic inequalities. Implementing this roadmap as a strategy to build sustainable community-engaged partnerships offers an innovative, interactive, and effective approach to addressing community needs by exposing secondary school students to the athletic training profession, advancing equitable athletic training research practices, and upholding and promoting the principles of diversity, equity, inclusion, and social justice in athletic training education.

Unravelling epistemic injustice in medical education: The case of the underperforming learner.

Epistemic injustice refers to a wrong done to someone in their capacity as a knower. While philosophers have detailed the pervasiveness of this issue within healthcare, it is only beginning to be discussed by medical educators. The purpose of this article is to expand the field's understanding of this concept and to demonstrate how it can be used to reframe complex problems in medical education. After outlining the basic features of epistemic injustice, we clarify its intended (and unintended) meaning and detail what is required for a perceived harm to be named an epistemic injustice. Using an example from our own work on introversion in undergraduate medical education, we illustrate what epistemic injustice might look like from the perspectives of both educators and students and show how the concept can reorient our perspective on academic underperformance. Epistemic injustice results from two things: (1) social power dynamics that give some individuals control over others, and (2) identity prejudice that is associated with discriminatory stereotypes. This can lead to one, or both, forms of epistemic injustice: testimonial and hermeneutical. Our worked example demonstrates how medical educators can be unaware of when and how epistemic injustice is happening, yet the effects on students' well-being and sense of selves can be profound. Thinking about academic underperformance with epistemic injustice in mind can reveal an emphasis within current educational practices on diagnosing learning deficiencies, to the detriment of holistically representing its socially constructed and structural nature. This article builds upon recent calls to recognise epistemic injustice in medical education by clarifying its terminology and intended use and providing in-depth application and analysis to a particular case: underperformance and the introverted medical student. Equipped with a more sophisticated understanding of the term, medical educators may be able to re-conceptualise long-standing issues including, but also beyond, underperformance.

Exploring Program Process at Movimiento La Libertad: Examining Nuances of Youth Programs That Develop Latinx Critical Consciousness Toward Educational Injustice and Anti-Immigrant Politics

ABSTRACT In the midst of political attacks on public schools to prevent discussions on social injustice and Latinx youth culture, there are after-school programs that nurture Latinx youth critical consciousness and social justice activism. This study uses agencies of transformational resistance (ATR) as a framework to explore one after-school program’s organizational processes that foster Latinx critical consciousness and social justice activism. Using semi-structured interviews, the data revealed the (a) curriculum, (b) pedagogy, and (c) co-conspirators are three organizational processes that nurtured Latinx youth critical consciousness. This study contributes to the critical youth development scholarship by highlighting nuances of three program processes of one Latinx youth afterschool program in an urban city in Iowa. This study suggests afterschool programs afford Latinx with organizational processes that nurture their critical consciousness. The Midwest, and specifically Iowa, have a growing Latinx population that is understudied.

Vulnerable reading practices for ecosocial justice in environmental education

Environmental education has the potential to extend its transformative potential by reframing social and ecological justice as always interconnected. This paper introduces vulnerable reading as a method for unsettling anthropocentric and colonial influences on how educators conceptualise and respond to environmental precarity through a socio-ecological lens. It has emerged from a six-month walking project during which the authors developed vulnerable reading practices as they walked with young children, educators, and a weedy landscape in Boorloo (Perth), Western Australia. With a focus on reimagining pedagogies to be inclusive of multiple weedy ideas, bodies and voices, the paper uses empirical examples of practice to illustrate how vulnerable reading across temporalities, scales, disciplines, and genres draws attention to the complex relations humans share with weedy worlds. The paper shows how vulnerable reading is a feminist and anticolonial practice that makes visible the complexity of relations humans share with more-than-human worlds and is an example of ecosocial justice in action.

Measuring Inclusion in Vocational Education and Training through the Prism of Justice of Education

The highest possible level of inclusion and justice are the primary goals of most contemporary education systems, including vocational education and training. The Index for Inclusion, which was developed two decades ago, defines inclusion on three levels, i.e. policy, culture and practice, and provides a methodological framework for measuring the inclusive orientation of schools. This paper raises the question of whether the selected Index for Inclusion indicators can be used to also measure different dimensions of justice, which is defined as a multidimensional concept. The just redistribution of basic goods is complemented by recognition, representation and relationality. A study with the aim to determine the multidimensionality of the implementation of inclusivity in Vocational Education and Training institutions using statistical analysis was carried out. An online questionnaire was created and completed by 427 education professionals (head teachers, teachers and school counsellors) employed in vocational education and training. The dimensionality of the measured constructs was checked using a set of 28 variables with factor analysis, i.e. the Maximum Likelihood method and Varimax rotation. It was found that the statements that had been formulated on the basis of the Index for Inclusion can also be used to measure different dimensions of justice. The final version of the questionnaire (modified questionnaire), which contains a set of twenty items, adequately measures the redistribution and recognition aspects of justice, whereas the representation and relational aspects have proven to be two-dimensional concepts. A modified questionnaire could be a suitable starting point both for the self-evaluation of schools and a general measurement of inclusion in terms of justice.

Epistemic Reciprocity Through a Decolonial Crip Literacy in Accommodated Language Education for Adults

Abstract This linguistic ethnography was conducted in accommodated language education in Sweden, aimed at adult learners with deafness, hearing impairment, post-traumatic stress disorder, migration stress, or intellectual disability, here, focusing on the latter group, who attended Swedish language learning courses. We empirically investigate a decolonial crip literacy, by connecting language education to epistemic reciprocity. The decolonial lens is understood with regard to the marginalized and dis-abled body, under-represented in Applied Linguistics. More specifically, we focus on teacher positionality and ethical stance-taking among three of the teachers, to contribute an in-depth and situated account of a decolonial crip literacy, as counteracts of ableism and linguicism, and an orientation toward epistemic justice. Based on our linguistic ethnographic data, we suggest that the decolonial crip literacy project engages with disability-as-difference, positioning the dis-abled body as knower, via epistemic reciprocity, which is communicated through a multiplicity of communicative resources, materialities, and creativity. The paper contributes both to the theorizing of injustice in language education and to alternatives in pedagogical practice.

Integrating social media-based community of inquiry with theory of planned behavior to promote equitable educational intentions among pre-service teachers in Gilgit Baltistan, Pakistan.

An equitable education system is essential for all students to acquire the knowledge and skills necessary to become productive members of society. Pre-service teachers in education play a vital role in fostering equitable educational practices. This study aimed to measure the association between the social media-based community of inquiry and pre-service teachers' intentions toward social justice and equity in education. It focused on pre-service teachers enrolled in the education departments of universities in Gilgit Baltistan (GB), Pakistan. Census sampling was used to include all students enrolled in teacher education departments across universities in GB. The research utilized a multi-wave survey design, beginning with a baseline survey to assess pre-service teachers' presence on social media. This information guided the design of a community of inquiry on social media centered on the theme of social justice and equity in education. After 4 months, a second survey was conducted to measure the association between the community of inquiry and pre-service teachers' intentions toward social justice and equity. For data analysis, the study employed the partial least squares-consistent structural equation modeling (PLSc-SEM) approach. The novelty of the study lies in integrating the community of inquiry framework with the theory of planned behavior. We found a significant and positive association between the social media-based community of inquiry and pre-service teachers' attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control regarding their intentions to implement social justice and equity in education. These findings hold the potential for developing prospective teachers and educational leadership with a strong focus on equity. Future research could explore creating a community of inquiry for pre-service teachers to enhance their mindset and skills for inclusive education. This aligns with the broader objective of achieving Sustainable Development Goal 4 (SDG 4) on fostering a more inclusive and equitable educational environment.

Examining student and faculty attitudes in developing a social justice studies minor

Social justice in education is becoming a more prominent and necessary area of study in higher education. Facets of social justice align directly with values of liberal arts education, and students who are exposed to social justice pedagogy develop the knowledge and skills necessary to meet critical learning outcomes associated with the liberal arts. Given such demands to incorporate social justice pedagogy and practice into curriculum, the purpose of this study was to understand student and faculty attitudes and values regarding social justice education in order to guide the creation of this academic program at our college, as well as other institutions, particularly liberal arts colleges and/or predominately white institutions, that are interested in creating or enhancing their social justice education programs. Themes from focus groups with students and faculty revealed needs, desires, and concerns from the campus community regarding social justice education. Additionally, we created a social justice studies program for our institution using a strategic review of existing curriculum, resulting in a new academic minor built on existing courses that required no new faculty lines and little additional work on behalf of the faculty. Insights from this process are shared.

Reclaiming racial justice and building solidarity in Oakland's educational justice movement

ABSTRACT This article examines the ways in which teachers and community-based activists collaborated to advance an anti-privatisation agenda within an urban school district. The article emerges from our respective studies of privatisation in Oakland, one a historical study of the advance of neoliberalism and the other a case study (Merriam 2007, Qualitative Research and Case Study Applications in Education: Revised and Expanded from Case Study Research in Education, 2nd ed. Jossey-Bass) of teacher and community organising against privatisation and school closures. Utilising interviews with key activists and organisers as well as observation and participation in the education justice movement, we describe a set of collaborative political education projects through which activists reclaimed racial justice as the framework to strengthen the movement against privatisation. In these projects, activists called attention to the centrality of antiblackness in advancing privatisation and to the shared disposability and precarity of students of color and the teachers and schools that served them. By shifting from a ‘defend’ public schools to a ‘transform public schools’ framework, they also increased solidarity between teachers, the teachers’ union, and the local community. In the context of the school reform's industry's appropriation of racial-justice language, these political education projects were both a counter-hegemonic and power-building strategy.

Improving Researchers’ Capacity to Address Injustice: An Introduction to the Special Issue

Many education policy researchers have turned to critical policy analysis as a means to better understand and examine injustices in education and beyond. However, such work is still uncommon in educational journals. In this introduction, we describe the purposes of this special issue and offer readers a framework for understanding critical approaches to education policy research, its general tenets, and how it differs from other kinds of policy research. We then outline the contributions of the articles in this special issue. We highlight analytic moves that researchers of all kinds can make based on the critical education policy research tenets we discuss. The introduction concludes with suggestions for where we hope the field will go next.

Inclusion, Equality and Educational Justice: Enhancing Social-Emotional Learning through Children’s Literature in a Diverse and Segregated Society

Children’s literature is an essential channel for providing children with social-emotional skills. This is particularly so in diverse and segregated societies where the need for enhancing awareness and acceptance of the Other is acute. Based on the content and semiotic analysis of 25 titles included in the state program “March of Books,” the present study examines how, if at all, social-emotional skills are reflected in the Hebrew-language children’s literature in Israel. Since the selected titles reflect all skill categories determined by the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL), the findings indicate that these selected titles can support children’s social-emotional learning (SEL). Nevertheless, the selected titles lack focus on a specific category within each text. Moreover, in a manner typical of Jewish-Israeli education, the selected titles expose young readers to their specific cultures and others through translated literature that highlights gender, Jewish-ethnic, physical, and age equality. At the same time, the selected titles tend to marginalize the culture of the Arab minority. The article concludes that education programs seeking to promote SEL through children’s literature must balance all SEL categories, represent the learners’ social differences, expose the readers to other cultures, and inculcate pluralist values.

Equity and Justice in Family Medicine Clinical Care and Teaching Must Incorporate a Reproductive Justice Framework.

Since European settlement, the United States has controlled the reproduction of communities of color through tactics ranging from forced pregnancies, sterilizations, and abortions to immigration policies and policies that separate children from their families. Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer (or questioning), asexual, intersex, and gender diverse people (LGBTQIA+) have been persecuted for sexual behavior and gender expression, and also restricted from having children. In response, women of color and LGBTQIA+ communities have organized for Reproductive Justice (RJ) and liberation. The Reproductive Justice framework, conceived in 1994 by the Women of African Descent for Reproductive Justice, addresses the reproductive health needs of Black women and communities from a broad human rights perspective. Since then, the framework has expanded with an intersectional approach to include all communities of color and LGBTQIA+ communities. Notwithstanding, reproductive injustice negatively impacts the health of already marginalized and oppressed communities, which is reflected in higher rates of maternal mortality, infant mortality, infertility, preterm births, and poorer health outcomes associated with race-based stress. While the impact of racial injustice on disparate health outcomes is increasingly addressed in family medicine, Reproductive Justice has not been universally incorporated into care provision or education. Including the RJ framework in family medicine education is critical to understanding how structural, economic, and political factors influence health outcomes to improve health care delivery from a justice and human rights perspective. This commentary describes how an RJ framework can enhance medical education and care provision, and subsequently identifies strategies for incorporating Reproductive Justice teaching into family medicine education.

Learning from Our History: The Role of the New York Collective of Radical Educators in Movements for Educational Justice

Educator activists can play an important role in transforming not only what happens inside classrooms but also larger educational systems. While recent focus in research has been on social justice caucuses in teacher unions, there are also radical educator collectives like the New York Collective of Radical Educators (NYCoRE) that organize outside of union spaces. In this article, we (the current NYCoRE leadership body) analyze the historical impact of NYCoRE to theorize about the role of educator collectives in educational justice movements. Using oral history interviews with founding members of NYCoRE, we found that NYCoRE has provided a political home for radical educators, supported critical professional development, and prepared educators to contribute to educational justice movements. National implications are discussed.

Reconceptualizing Global Citizenship in Turkish Social Studies Textbooks With a Focus on Social Justice

This study examines the integration of global perspectives in the social studies textbooks used in Grades 4 to 7 in Turkey using content analysis as a methodology. The analysis focuses on seven mandatory textbooks distributed across the country and the big ideas and themes reinforced as official knowledge promoted by the state. The findings reveal both strengths and weaknesses in the textbooks’ content and approach to teaching about global connections. While the textbooks aim to promote global citizenship, cultural understanding, and economic relationships, they also perpetuate nationalistic perspectives, stereotypes, and biased coverage of various forms of inequality and social injustice. Failure to critically analyze diverse cultures, perpetuation of biased views, negative portrayal of Western culture, and a lack of comprehensive coverage of inequality are some of the arising issues and emerging themes identified. Additionally, the textbooks neglect explicit discussions about equity and social justice and connections to the civic engagement of citizens. These findings promote passive citizenship and underscore the need for greater attention to inclusivity, cultural understanding, and comprehensive coverage of global issues and social justice in social studies education in Turkey and beyond as it relates to international relations.

Class Room Teaching, Education Research and Barriers for ELT in Teaching-Learning for New Entrants: An Analysis of Problems and Solutions

The traditional techniques of English language teaching (ELT) have been replaced by more modern strategies that focus on a language's relevance and actuality. The English for Specific Purpose (ESP) is the result of this search and the need for cutting-edge trends. The goal of ESP is to provide topic understanding while also preparing students to function well in a certain scenario. The purpose of this study is to look into the difficulties and barriers that exist in University of Sindh, Jamshoro, when teaching English for Science. This research provides an analysis of ESP's history as well as effective teaching strategies for ESP courses. Data from 20 English language teachers who have been teaching English have been gathered using a quantitative research methodology. This study looks into the obstacles impacting teachers' performance in public institutions that use e-learning with the goal of making recommendations that are in line with sustainable development. Among the suggestions include making investments in technological infrastructure, working with developers and legislators, and giving technology integration varying degrees of priority based on global needs. These recommendations seek to advance high-quality, inclusive education by utilizing technology to achieve better results. Universities can help ensure that education is accessible to all and empower students in the digital era by removing these obstacles. Collaborative efforts and strategic investments are essential to promoting lifelong learning and educational justice.

Moral Injury in K-12 Education: A Phenomenological Inquiry at the Intersection of Race and Class

This study is a phenomenological exploration of moral injury among K-12 professionals who work in schools in which the large majority of students are students of color and are eligible for free or reduced lunch. All participants worked in one urban school district in the Midwest of the United States. Professionals identified harsh discipline practices, insincere restorative justice programs, deceptive use of outcome data, and a pitying approach to the education of low-income students of color as morally injurious practices. The paper ends with recommendations for how the construct of moral injury can be useful in identifying and confronting sources of educational injustice.

Para Medicine Students’ Experiences of Virtual Education: A Qualitative Study

Background: The emergence of the Internet and its development led to the expansion of virtual education. The development of virtual education in recent years has had a tremendous impact on the improvement of education and the establishment of educational justice in different parts of the world. Despite its advantages, virtual education is also associated with some challenges. The present study aimed to investigate para medicine students’ experiences of virtual education. Methods: This qualitative study was conducted using conventional content analysis. The participants were 25 students in various fields of para medicine who were selected using purposive sampling. The study took place at universities in the north of Iran. The data were collected using semi-structured in-depth interviews and focus groups from January to April 2022. The collected data were analyzed using Graneheim and Lundman’s qualitative content analysis method. Results: The core category identified in this study was from helplessness to interaction which was divided into three main categories (challenges and desperation, deprivation of mutual interaction and learning, and resilience and adaptation) and fourteen subcategories. Conclusion: The main theme extracted from the interviews with the participants was from helplessness to interaction. When a person has numerous failures, cannot control environmental conditions, and feels the ineffectiveness of their activity and response, they will experience a sense of vulnerability. Thus, the person has to accept the conditions and interact with them. In other words, interaction is a skill that improves the ability to quickly learn new skills and behaviors in response to the conditions. Thus, identifying challenges and realizing the weaknesses, strengths, opportunities, and threats governing the existing virtual education environment can help to turn many threats into opportunities, promote virtual education, and support teachers and students to improve the quality and quantity of the teaching-learning process in the COVID-19 and post-COVID-19 era.

Minor pedagogy: Education as continuous variation

In this paper, the authors consider the intersections of philosophy and education. Extending the concept of a minor pedagogy first presented by Mazzei and Smithers (2020), the authors reorient thinking toward more equitable and just pedagogy as a cultivation of difference. This paper has three major sections. In the first two, the authors review Deleuze and Guattari’s (1986, 1987) concept of the minor, and then connect this to the concept of a minor pedagogy. The final section explores the work of a minor pedagogy as continuous variation with the potential to engender difference. Given that racialized neoliberal efficiency and accountability movements have perpetuated injustice across generations, the work of educational practice that contests this must be practice that slips from these major grips to produce new, more just, worlds. Minor pedagogy produces educational justice through everyday shifts in the conditions of our collective possibility, shifts that manifest difference in ways that reject re-form in the pursuit of the not yet.

Continuous training based on the needs of operating room nurses using web application: a new approach to improve their knowledge

IntroductionSince university education and intensive and limited pre-service training do not provide an acceptable level of performing the duties of operating room nurses, and considering the limitations of traditional training methods in the field of operating room; This study was conducted with the aim of determining the effect of using the electronic education approach based on web application, leveled, personalized and based on the needs of nurses on their level of knowledge and satisfaction.Materials and methodsThis research is a quasi-experimental type of single-group multi-center pre-test-post-test, which during that, four stages of educational needs assessment, educational content design, web application design for training and evaluation of operating room nurses and determining the effectiveness of this method are included. Based on their knowledge and satisfaction, during this period, 36 nurses from the operating rooms that met the study criteria were included in the study by stratified random sampling based on the determined sample size. The data collection includes a four-choice test to measure the knowledge of operating room nurses in heart anatomy (score range 0–20), the principles of movement, transferring and positioning of the patient in the operating room (score range 0–15), the principles of ergonomics in the operating room (score range score 0–10) and satisfaction questionnaire (score range 0–28). Data collected using descriptive statistical tests (percentage of frequency and frequency, mean and standard deviation) and analytical tests (paired sample t-test, independent samples t-test, ANOVA, Pearson correlation, chi-square) with the software SPSS version 16 was analyzed.ResultsGenerally, the average knowledge scores of operating room nurses before and after the intervention were 5.96 ± 3.96 vs. 13.6 ± 3.77, in the course of principles of moving, transferring and positioning the patient in the operating room were 6.3 ± 3.42 vs. 13.3 ± 1.32, respectively 8.7 ± 3.97 vs. 18.1 ± 1.07 (in heart anatomy), 1.57 ± 2.6 vs. 0.73 ± 9.1 (in the principles of ergonomics in the operating room) and the average Knowledge scores after the intervention were significantly higher than before the intervention (P<0.001). Also, the average satisfaction score of nurses was 21.3 ± 5.83 and 22 nurses (64.7%) were satisfied with the e-learning course.ConclusionThe use of the electronic education approach based on the web application, leveled, personalized and based on the needs of the nurses, led to the improvement of the level of knowledge and satisfaction of the operating room nurses. E-learning can be used as a complementary educational tool and method for continuous training of operating room nurses in other specialized fields of operating room and surgery.Highlights• Educational content in the form of educational videos taught by professors of medical sciences universities on each of the topics of heart anatomy (28 episodes of 5–10 minutes), principles of ergonomics in the operating room (7 episodes of 5–25 minutes) and movement principles. The transfer and positioning of the patient in the operating room (16 episodes of 10–20 minutes) were designed in three primary, intermediate and advanced levels.• The results of this study showed that the use of an electronic education approach based on the web application, levelled, personalized and based on the needs of nurses, led to the improvement of the knowledge of operating room nurses. Also, operating room nurses were delighted with electronic training courses. E-learning can be used as a complementary educational tool and method for continuous training of operating room nurses in other specialized fields of operating room and surgery.• Based on the results of this study, the use of an electronic education approach based on the needs of operating room nurses can be used as a complementary tool to conventional continuous education. Since this method allows interactive, personalized education is levelled, and asynchronous. It can be used at any time and place on a laptop, tablet or mobile phone; a wide range of operating room nurses in the hospitals of the Islamic Republic of Iran can use it for educational justice to Many borders should be established in the country. However, there are studies to evaluate the generalizability and the effect of using the e-learning approach on the clinical skills of operating room nurses and to compare the effect of e-learning with other methods and educational tools on the knowledge and skills of the learners and the extent of consolidating the learned material in their memory.