Special Education as Neoliberal Property: The Racecraft,Biopolitics, and Immunization of Disability

Through the juxtaposition of 2 recent Supreme Court actions—Allston v. Lower Merion County School District (2015) and Endrew F. v. Douglas County School District (2017)—this article argues that special education is a neoliberal property that works to recruit disability through scientific-juridical qualifications of educational life that are more likely to be available for White students who have essentialized disabilities than students of color who are ascribed disability labels. This thesis draws from a variety of theoretical perspectives—including, racecraft, biopolitics, and immunization—to formulate a crip reading of present special education policy. Although critiquing overrepresentation and disproportionality, this article also suggests a way of dialectically attenting to the uses of disability labeling toward the reciprocal production of pathological ableism and biopolitical racism. Moving from a racecraft of disability labeling to a biopolitics of special education, this article concludes by arguing that Whiteness recruits disability into its self-enclosed and propertied boundaries with the effect that educational life is contractually immunized against communal obligations to human difference. James Baldwin’s (1963/1998), “A Talk to Teachers,” critically inflects this conclusion and also motivates the article’s analytical excursion into the troubling nexus of special education policy, neoliberalism, and Whiteness.     

Myths of Environmental Education

Abstract

A review of environmental education literature reveals a paucity of constructivist-based research. To support the case for this approach, the author reviews theoretical aspects of science education research of this type. It first situates different approaches to educational research in relation to different epistemologies and then reviews constructs used in constructivist science education research. Issues associated with the adoption of this epistemology—topics deemed worthy of research, importance given to the learner's pre-instructional knowledge, and perspectives on learning and understanding—are considered. The article concludes with proposals for constructivist research in environmental education across the educational commonplaces.     

Recovering the Lost Métier of Philosophy of Education? Reflections on Educational Thought,Policy and Practice in the UK and Farther Afield

A Special Issue of the Journal of Philosophy of Education in November 2012 explored key aspects of the relationship between philosophy of education and educational policy in the UK. The contributions were generally critical of policy developments in recent decades, highlighting important shortcomings and arguing for more philosophically coherent approaches to educational policy‐making. This article begins by focusing on what the contributions to the Special Issue—particularly two of them—have to say about the relationship between philosophy of education and educational policymaking. It then goes on to argue that this relationship can best be understood through an exploration of education as a practice in its own right (as distinct from a subordinate practice). Such an exploration seeks to shed light on the proper métier of philosophy of education. In the course of the exploration the kind of thinking predominant in recent international patterns in educational policy is contrasted with a different kind of thinking which has yielded rich gains in Finland. Important distinctions are drawn between the inherent and extrinsic benefits of educational practice and between the internal and external politics of practice. These contribute to the articulation of philosophy of education as a distinctive discipline of thought and action which is necessary to the work of practitioners and policymakers alike.     

Grouping in Education in Light of Theory and Results in Motivation

Abstract

Homogeneous and heterogeneous grouping as well as research on either have not taken into account the implications of the pupils’ achievement motives. This theoretical contribution attempts to analyze why some pupils take advantage or disadvantage of being grouped in a homogeneous class — and why others take advantage or disadvantage of being grouped in a heterogeneous class. Suggestions for new grouping procedure in education are offered. The principles guiding the new procedure are that the pupils should be grouped in a way which releases and utilizes the potential positive influence of the motive to approach success — and avoids the possible negative effects of the motive to avoid failure. Is it possible to create such an educational setting?     

The politics of education and the misrecognition of Wales

Abstract

This paper examines the positioning of the Welsh education system within contemporary policy debate and analysis. It begins by outlining some of the ways in which education policy and provision in Wales differs from that of its neighbour, England, and then goes on to critique how these differences have been represented in both the media and by members of the educational research community. Indeed, the paper argues that these representations constitute a form of misrecognition. It is tempting to counter this misrecognition with assertions of the superiority of the ‘Welsh way’—and certainly pronouncements of a ‘crisis’ in Welsh education appear to be as much politically-driven as evidence-based. However, such an approach would underplay the very real challenges that face Wales—challenges which are both like and unlike those facing England, Scotland and Northern Ireland. The paper concludes that we need a serious engagement with national divergences across the four nations of the UK—as well as elsewhere. The case of Wales highlights the need to undertake not only comparative analysis but also relational analysis if we are to enhance our understanding of the changing politics of education.     

Queer of Color Agency in Educational Contexts: Analytic Frameworks From a Queer of Color Critique

Although queer students of color face multiple obstacles to safe and full participation in numerous educational contexts, cultural and scholarly narratives that emphasize their vulnerabilities can lead educational stakeholders to overlook, and thus miss opportunities to capitalize on, the agency that these students possess to negotiate the barriers to their academic success. To counterbalance discourses on youth as at risk or in crisis, this article explores how a body of critical scholarship known as a queer of color critique can serve as a heuristic for educational research on the agentive practices of queer students of color. Situated largely outside of educational studies, a queer of color critique—much like critical race theories, disability studies, and similar discourses on difference—can organize analytic works across subfields of educational scholarship into a more coherent educational research agenda on queer of color difference while also contributing to broader critiques of homophobia, racism, and other threats to social justice in education.     

Two ways of acquiring environmental knowledge: by encountering living animals at a beehive and by observing bees via digital tools

ABSTRACT

Pollinating animals are profoundly affected by the current loss of biodiversity, a problem that is of concern to science, policy-makers and the public. One possibility to raise awareness for pollinator conservation is education. Unfortunately, insects such as bees are often perceived as frightening creatures; a negative emotion that may hinder successful learning processes. Thus, any educational initiative must conquer this obstacle and promote conservational knowledge. Using a quasi-experimental design, we evaluated the effectiveness of an educational programme using two student-centred learning approaches: One by encountering living honeybees (Apis mellifera) at a beehive (N?=?162), the other by using an eLearning tool connected to a remote beehive (N?=?192). We monitored secondary school students’ environmentally relevant knowledge of bees, their environmental attitudes and their perception of bees in regard to conservation and dangerousness. The results indicate that both approaches lead to the acquisition of conservational knowledge in the short and medium term. Direct experiences with nature are regarded as crucial, but using an eLearning tool in environmental education constitutes an outstanding alternative to acquire knowledge. Adolescents with low ‘green’ attitudes responded positively to the online beehive, and the perceived danger of bees played no role in the learning process.     

Diffractive pedagogies: dancing across new materialist imaginaries

ABSTRACT

We theorise an interdisciplinary arts practice university course and consider the forms of educational imaginary challenged by our curriculum. We argue for the disruptive and generative potential of what we call diffractive pedagogy as an example of the type of learning that can take place when materiality and entanglement are considered as vital constituents. Through self-expression and interweaving across disciplinary boundaries, the potential to produce, embody and theorise simultaneously can be realised. Student bodies do not exist in isolation from one another, or from the environment. It is indeed impossible to separate the dancer from the dance, the teacher from the student, and the bodies from the environments and objects to which they relate. This being true, our student body reproduced our teaching bodies as abject, as messy and peripheral to their imaginings of university education. Materially, student bodies remade the limits to which their consciousness was imaginatively drawn. Through our embodied work, unconscious change began the processes of affecting students’ imaginaries of university education.     

From Brown to Ayers v. Fordice: the changing shape of racial desegregation in US higher education

Racial desegregation in higher education is taking on a new direction as the twenty‐first century approaches. The Brown v. Board of Education decision brought down legal racial barriers to segregated education, and this landmark US Supreme Court ruling was implicitly intended to apply to higher education as well. The positive changes for African Americans in removing racial barriers contributed significantly to the civil rights movement and opening avenues of opportunity. Yet, there has always been a fundamental tension between the removal of the vestiges of racial segregation to create equal educational opportunity, and the activist stance of addressing historical and current discriminatory educational policies. This is evident in the recent higher education desegregation and affirmative cases as the Federal Courts advocate the colour‐blind interpretation of higher education desegregation law and educational policy, while African Americans argue in favour of the enhancement of the public Historically Black Colleges and Universities and the explicit use of race as a form of diversity. This article examines the salient positions and racial identity politics surrounding this tension. I also argue that broader issues of racial control and power need to be addressed by educational institutions, the courts and the larger society in the debate about race, social justice and the removal of the vestiges of segregation.     

A message for faculty from the present-day movement for black lives

Abstract

The present-day movement for Black lives calls attention to the antiblackness that is supported and reinforced in White America. Antiblackness ostensibly contextualizes what it means to Learn While Black at predominantly White institutions. This article presents a content analysis of the demands that pertain to faculty and faculty work Black students submitted to institutional leaders in the aftermath of Ferguson and the campus rebellion led by Concerned Student 1950 at the University of Missouri. Study findings point to the classroom as a pedagogical site of Black Liberation; that is, interrogating Whiteness. This article concludes with recommendations to help faculty, especially White faculty, in interrogating whiteness and advancing Black Liberation in higher education.     

The Innovative Educational Thought of Jane Roland Martin: A Review Essay

D. G. Mulcahy highlights some of Jane Roland Martin's major contributions to the field of philosophy of education in this review essay. He focuses on several of Martin's better‐known works — including Reclaiming a Conversation, The Schoolhome, Changing the Educational Landscape, Coming of Age in Academe, Educational Metamorphoses, and School Was Our Life — tracing through them the development of her reconceptualization of the idea of a liberal education from the early1980s to the present day. Viewing Martin's contribution from the perspective of liberal education, he contends, underscores the optimistic spirit of her work as well as its originality and significance for the theory of education as a whole. Mulcahy gives particular attention to these elements of Martin's thought: the importance she attributes to educating the young for active participation in the world and not mere observation of it; her analysis of the range and complexity of our cultural wealth; her concept of a gender‐sensitive education; and her emphasis on the unique contribution of the experience of women to education. Martin's substantial body of work, Mulcahy concludes, stands as a compelling alternative to mainstream educational theorizing, one that offers hope for the potential of educational renewal.     

One step forward,two steps back? Work experience,equal opportunities and TVEI

Abstract

The funding criteria of the Technical and Vocational Education Initiative included a high profile commitment to equal opportunities for boys and girls, as well as a commitment to the provision of work experience. This paper presents data from a case study of work experience provided under the auspices of ‘Masonfield’ TVEI project, a project which had a strong commitment to tackling gender inequalities in education. It is argued that the nature of work experience ‐‐ by definition explicitly allied to the needs of the labour market ‐‐ made it virtually impossible for the project to meet its equal opportunities objectives in this area. Furthermore, work experience may have served to reinforce — if not exaggerate — existing sexual divisions within the local labour market. Whilst TVEI may now be consigned to educational history, work experience continues to thrive — yet increasingly within a policy framework which ignores equal opportunities considerations.     

It’s a Profane Life: Giorgio Agamben on the freedom of im-potentiality in education

Abstract

In this article, I explore the importance of Giorgio Agamben’s theory of potentiality for rethinking education. While potentiality has been a long-standing concern for educational practitioners and theorists, Agamben’s work is unique in that it emphasizes how potentiality can only be thought of in relation to impotentiality. This moment of indistinction—what I refer to as im-potential—has important implications. First, I argue that if potentiality and impotentiality are separated from one another, the result is a stratified educational system where some students are commanded to actualize their potentiality in the form of standardized tests while others are abandoned by the system. Second, thinking im-potentiality enables us to move beyond problematic formulations of learning and rediscover the uniqueness of studying. Here, I offer a brief example of study through an analysis of ‘Tinkering Schools’, an alternative program founded by Gever Tulley in San Francisco. And finally, without a concept of im-potentiality, the discourse of the ‘child genius’ becomes commodified as a power to be harnessed and actualized in the name of neoliberal entrepreneurialism. Only through a return to im-potentiality can we reclaim Genius and its relationship to the question of educational freedom.     

On the (Im)potentiality of an African Philosophy of Education to Disrupt Inhumanity

Abstract

Despite the advances made in the liberal Western philosophical and educational tradition to counteract unethical, immoral and inhumane acts committed by the human species, these acts of inhumanity persist. It would be inapt to apportion blame only to Western thinking, which has its roots in Greek antiquity, as Plato and Aristotle, for instance, perpetually and justifiably pursued and advocated the human enactment of civility and friendship in their writings. Instead of revisiting liberal views on education and arguing for a reconsidered view of humanity—a possible and plausible contention—this article draws on African philosophical thought on education to disturb some of the doubts in potentially disrupting atrocities committed against the human race, especially on the African continent. By drawing on the philosophical ideas of Agamben, in particular the notions of actuality, potentiality and becoming, it is argued that an instance of African philosophy of education—ubuntu (human interdependence and humanness)—can do much to trouble the escalating levels of inhumanity on the African continent.     

Analyzing Instructionally Focused Education Systems: Exploring the Coordinated Use of Complementary Frameworks

ABSTRACT

Public school districts have been operating under a decade’s long press to move beyond functioning as engines of access-oriented mass public schooling to functioning as instructionally focused education systems pursuing educational excellence and equity. This press has researchers developing analytic frameworks useful for examining different ways that districts are responding. Even so, limitations in individual frameworks suggest a need to explore the coordinate use of complementary frameworks to support more comprehensive examinations of districts. This analysis explores the coordinated use of a “coupling framework” and a “systems framework” to analyze efforts in two districts to improve educational quality and to reduce disparities. Findings suggests that the coordinated use of the coupling and systems frameworks supports deeper analyses of instructional organization and management than either framework would on its own, and that further incorporating quality and equity frameworks would support still-deeper analyses. From the perspective of this issue of the Peabody Journal of Education (PJE), the implication is that elaborating new institutional theory to capture micro-level variation in response to macro-level dynamics is but one challenge faced by organizational researchers in education, and that the deeper challenge lies in considering alternative world views—paradigmatic assumptions—underlying the use of singular and complementary analytic frameworks.