The invisible subject in educational science

The crisis of education frequently is framed in terms of methods, where quantitative research is accused of making the subject invisible through quantification, whereas qualitative research is credited for the emphasis on subjectivity and the discursive construction of reality. Such formulations fail to take into account a long-standing critique that interpretive (constructivist) research, too, makes invisible the real, living subject who is coping with an inherently open life, placing in its stead a ratiocinating individual. In this article, an argument is made for a concrete educational science concerned with the person who is not only (agential) subject but also subject and subjected to the condition it contributes to producing. This subject never is in complete control over its condition, cannot ever know precisely what is currently happening, and at best witnesses rather than grasps or constructs what is going on. This viewpoint requires a rethinking of the subject in/of educational science. Such a project of rethinking the subject involves shifting the minimum units of analysis: from (inter-) action to transaction, from an experience [Erfahrung] to inchoate lived-experiencing [perezhivanie, Erleben], from entities and processes to dramatic events.     

Straight Roads and Winding Tracks: Swedish educational policy from a gender equality perspective

A review of Swedish educational policy and educational research indicates that labour market considerations have had a high visibility. Straight routes through the educational system have been laid out in order to equalise and make the system more efficient. Empirical studies show that women's strategies to combine education, work and family often resulted in ‘winding tracks’ through education. Predominant research models tend to adjust to the ‘straight roads’ of educational policy while women's winding routes have been set aside. The current Swedish goal of equality between men and women gives work and parenthood the same weight for both sexes. This article discusses whether this goal could set a challenging framework for a research agenda where more gender‐sensitive methodologies are developed as well as gender‐sensitive concepts, upgrading women's knowledge, experiences and values.     

The invisible impact of educational research

Although there are policy calls for educational research to discover ‘what works’ and thereby inform decision making directly, the research literature argues instead for research to have a ‘conceptual’ impact on practice. Empirical studies also suggest that, when teachers use research, their use is conceptual; research influences the content and the process of their thinking, changing attitudes and perceptions and making educational decision making more intelligent. This study investigates the ways in which educational research has achieved impact on practice from the perspective of the researchers. A sample of highly-rated impact case studies in the UK’s research assessment exercise (REF2014) were subject to content analysis, using qualitative coding techniques. Analysis shows that most research is ‘invisible’ to education practitioners because it is embedded in educational policies, technologies, and services. This ‘invisible use’ is unlikely to realise the conceptual benefits claimed for research utilisation. If educational research is to make educational decision making more intelligent at its point of use, it will be necessary to re-think current notions of quality in research impact.     

Coming to discursive-deconstructive reading of gender equality

Researchers often find themselves reflecting on either/or questions. This article examines the multiple discursive reality of gender equality, a topic comprising several juxtapositions connected to either/or thinking which also provide the topic its legitimacy. The examples come from the context of gender equality work and gender equality policy, which has been shaped in Finland by public bodies focused on equality, the Government and Government bodies, ministries, political parties, labour market organizations and NGOs, particularly the women's movement. Our aim was to establish a discursive-deconstructive reading that would allow us to move from either/or thinking to a both/and approach. This kind of approach enables to consider and acknowledge differences as cultural categorisations enabling to categorize and hierarchise people.     

论我国教育公平的困境与反思

近年来,教育公平问题作为教育领域的突出问题,一直受到教育界乃至社会各界的重要关注。我国教育在教育起点、教育过程、教育结果中都出现了一些问题,应从我国社会经济的发展、教育制度、教育政策和传统思想等方面来反思。     

从教育公平原则看中国城乡教育差距

教育公平是社会公平的前提与基础,追求教育公平是当今人类社会教育发展的趋势,是世界各国教育改革和发展的基本出发点和重要目标。近年来城乡教育不公平问题日益突出,中国社会长期存在的城乡二元分割是导致城乡教育不公平的根源。城乡二元经济结构和二元教育结构直接影响到城乡间教育资源的配置和教育政策的制定。缩小城乡教育差距不仅要以发展经济、完善教育制度为依托,更有赖于树立公平的教育理念。     

The educational design of textbooks: a text for being interdisciplinary

This paper provides insights into both the educational design of textbooks and interdisciplinary education. The author introduces two educational principles for textbook design – instructional alignment and balancing diversity and meaningful guidance for readers – and applies them to writing his own textbook chapter for being interdisciplinary. The two broad conclusions are: textbook design can be a new area of study in higher education, illuminated by curriculum design and reflective practice; and textbooks can provide a useful method of interdisciplinary education.     

Explaining the gender gaps in mathematics achievement and attitudes: The role of societal gender equality

The gender stratification hypothesis maintains that higher levels of societal gender equity predict smaller gender gaps in mathematics achievement and attitudes. Using data from the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) across 56 countries, this study aims to provide a thorough empirical test of the gender stratification hypothesis. We employ a novel two-stage empirical strategy to investigate the link between societal gender equities and gender differences in mathematics achievement and attitudes. In the first stage, we use a semiparametric Oaxaca-Blinder (OB) method to decompose the gender gaps in each country into a part that is explained by gender differences in observable characteristics and a part that remains unexplained. In the second stage, we examine the relationships between the unexplained parts of the gender gaps and country-specific gender equity measures. The results highlight the importance of gender equity in the labor market in explaining cross-country variation in the gender math gap. We find that lower gender wage gap is significantly associated with a smaller unexplained part of the gender math gap favoring boys. In terms of the gender gaps in math attitudes, the results yield mixed support for the gender stratification hypothesis.     

The silent voices: Pupil participation for gender equality and diversity

ABSTRACT

Background: The international body of research on student voice concludes that active pupil participation has multiple positive effects on the work environment and learning for pupils. In a large study on gender equality and diversity work in Swedish schools, it became evident that pupils wanted to be active participants. However, pupils considered that their wishes were, to a large extent, ignored. Therefore, it is important to try to understand this further by investigating pupils’ perceptions of their experiences.

Purpose: The purpose of the study was to explore how discourses of participation and power are practised, not practised, and materialised, by focusing in-depth on pupils’ representations of gender equality and diversity work within a small sample of Swedish schools.

Methodology: The study is based on data from 10 focus group interviews with 43 pupils from 4 different schools, 2 compulsory schools (pupil ages 6–15) and 2 upper secondary schools (pupil ages 16–18), in Sweden. The thematic analysis utilised a gender perspective anchored in a critical policy analysis approach.

Analysis and Findings: The analysis of focus group data identified three pupil representations of gender equality and diversity work: a onetime occurrence, longing for participation and the (un)fair teacher. These representations were derived from and intertwined with discourses on pupil participation and power. Three sub-discourses were found within the discourse on participation and power: normative barriers to participation, structural barriers to participation and openings in the barriers to participation. The first two sub-discourses support the maintenance of unequal power relations between adults and pupils, while the third challenges these power relations.

Conclusions: Our study suggests that no substantial levels of participation or power among the pupils were represented at the schools. Instead, the analysis visualises pupils as expressing powerlessness and disengagement. However, the discourse Openings in the barriers to participation, together with pupils’ democratic abilities, has the potential to enable change and the development of pupil participation in schools.     

Successful girls? Complicating post‐feminist,neoliberal discourses of educational achievement and gender equality

This paper examines how an ongoing educational panic over failing boys has contributed to a new celebratory discourse about successful girls. Rather than conceive of this shift as an anti‐feminist feminist backlash, the paper examines how the successful girl discourse is postfeminist, and how liberal feminist theory has contributed to narrowly conceived, divisive educational debates and policies where boys' disadvantage/success are pitted against girls' disadvantage/success. The paper illustrates that gender‐only and gender binary conceptions of educational achievement are easily recuperated into individualizing neo‐liberal discourses of educational equality, and consistently conceal how issues of achievement in school are related to issues of class, race, ethnicity, religion, citizenship and location. Some recent media examples that illustrate the intensification of the successful girl discourse are examined. It is argued that the gender and achievement debate fuels a seductive postfeminist discourse of girl power, possibility and choice with massive reach, where girls' educational performance is used as evidence that individual success is attainable and educational policies are working in contexts of globalization, marketization and economic insecurity. The new contradictory work of ‘doing’ successful femininity, which requires balancing traditional feminine and masculine qualities, is also considered.     

The educational intentions of the Islamic State through its textbooks

This article’s results are part of project Sami, which examines the school system imposed by Islamic State (ISIS) on the territories under its control between 2014 and 2017. It describes and explores ISIS’s educational intentions as formulated in the textbooks and workbooks the organization produced to frame how secular subjects were taught in primary schools. The results shed light on how ISIS describe its curriculum and analyzes what has been included in the Arabic, mathematics, science, geography, history and English textbooks. The article concludes that each of these school subjects has been used by ISIS to further its political and religious agenda, although in very different ways like militarization, banalization of violence and the establishment of its complex and extreme but also fragile Islamic doctrine. It also suggests possible courses of action, intervention and research for internally displaced children or children in detention who have experienced this alternative education system during wartime.     

Transcending the gender dichotomy in educational gender gap research: The association between gender identity and academic self-efficacy

Educational gender gap research tends to focus on differences between boys' and girls' achievement. However, substantial variation exists within the sexes concerning this educational achievement. In this study, we investigate the inter- and intrasexual differences in academic self-efficacy in a sample of 6380 Flemish seventh graders collected in the school year 2012–2013. To adequately consider masculinity and femininity on a micro level, we employ the concept of gender identity. Results show that considerable inter- and intrasexual differences exist. In line with the educational gender gap, girls scoring high on self-perceived femininity are at the top of the pack. Self-perceived masculine boys score considerably lower on academic self-efficacy; however, they still do much better than cross-gender boys and girls. The poor results of boys and girls who perceive themselves to be gender atypical are partly explained by the students' lower well-being. The results are discussed in light of masculinity and femininity.     

Mobilizing ethnic equality in admissions to schools: Litigation,politics, and educational change

This study explores the impact of litigation on the mobilization of ethnic equality in the admission to Haredi (ultra-Orthodox) schools in Israel, and examines the socio-political mechanisms that have shaped this impact. It uses a case-study approach and draws on an analysis of documents and interviews. The findings confirm the conclusions of other studies regarding the limited ability of courts to produce change in schools by showing that ethnic equality was not mobilized until the Ministry of Education reformed its policy. However, the findings also show that the legal discourse empowered a group of Haredi parents to raise the rights consciousness of other parents and to support them in surmounting barriers that had impeded rights claims. The phenomenon of rights agents exemplifies how ethnic equality in school admission is mobilized in a bidirectional process: top-down judicial rulings empowered Haredi agents, who, in turn, have mobilized rights from the bottom-up to the new appeals committees in the Ministry of Education. The phenomenon also demonstrates the significance of collaborative relationships among lawyers, politicians, and social agents in order to generate social reforms in schools of ultra-religious groups.     

论历史教科书中女性的缺失与回归

在英国20世纪70、80年代兴起的历史课程改革过程中，历史教科书中女性的缺失现象引起了普遍关注。文章通过分析英国历史教科书中女性缺失的现象及其原因，探讨呼唤女性回归历史教科书的时代因素和基本途径，以期为正在进行的新一轮历史课程改革和面临类似问题的中国历史教育提供借鉴。     

英语语言性别歧视现象的初探

英语语言存在着性别歧视现象是有目共睹的。本文以实例分析了英语中存在的这一问题，指出英语使用者在语言表达中开始重视男女平等问题．但彻底消除性别歧视现象并非指日可待。     

The track of policies for educational equality and its implications in Korea

Most countries have taken equality of education as a paramount issue, but policy initiatives have not taken the same patterns across the nations. This paper addressed the features of equality policies and their changes in South Korea through an array of target groups and types of policy measures. According to a contingency approach, Korea relied critically on non-financial instruments characteristic of regulations, when the government was not financially well prepared for equalizing opportunities. It also gave a serious consideration to out-of-school factors besides school characteristics, because the equality policy confined to schools is destined to have only so little meaning. Regulations on the advantaged group were introduced along with preferential treatment for the disadvantaged in pursuit of equality. Now Korea is in transition from outside-in movements to inside-out improvements in the process of ensuring equality, and it means that the alternatives of equality policies have become dramatically narrowed. Recently, the Korean model is facing challenges from courts and constituents who advocate for constitutional rights to free choices of education.     

Sex does not matter: gender bias and gender differences in peer assessments of contributions to group work

This paper considers the possibility of gender bias in peer ratings for contributions to team assignments, as measured by an online self-and-peer assessment tool. The research was conducted to determine whether peer assessment led to reliable and fair marking outcomes. The methodology of Falchikov and Magin was followed in order to test their finding that gender has no discernable impact on peer ratings. Data from over 1500 participants at two universities enrolled in four different degree programmes were analysed. The research indicates an absence of gender bias in six case studies. The research also found that women received significantly higher ratings than men.     

Diversity and equality in academic publishing: the case of educational leadership

There have been ongoing criticisms of the field of educational leadership and management with respect to over-reliance on research from ‘Western’ contexts. However, evidence on the extent to which voices alternative to the dominant ‘Western’ discourse are represented in the international English-medium discourse of educational leadership and management is thin. Using a three-phase sequential mixed-methods approach, this paper explores knowledge production in the field by analysing the prevalence and impact of empirical articles published in four English-medium international journals. Additionally, the membership of editorial boards and editors is analysed to geographically locate key decision makers. Findings demonstrate that an exceptionally small set of core inner-circle Anglophone and non-inner-circle Anglophone settings enjoys disproportionate influence in the field. There is need for a knowledge base enriched with leadership and management practices from different sociocultural contexts and system structures with a multiplicity of voices to portray a more nuanced and balanced picture of leadership and management practices.