THE RIGHT TO DISSENT AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR SCHOOLING

In this article Sarah Stitzlein highlights an educational right that has been largely unacknowledged in the past but has recently gained significance given renewed citizen participation in displays of public outcry on our streets and in our town halls. Dissent is typically conceived of as a negative right—a liberty that guarantees that the government will not interfere with one's public self‐expression. Stitzlein argues that, insofar as the legitimacy of the state depends on obtaining the consent of the governed, the state must allow the lively proliferation of dissent. Attending to this negative rights perspective, Stitzlein explores the educational implications of reframing the right to dissent as a positive right. This includes discussing the state's obligation to cultivate the skills of dissent in its young citizens and, correspondingly, student entitlement to this training. These educational implications, especially for civics education, are far more substantial than the thinner implications of the negative right to dissent.     

The Democratic Potential of Parental Dissent: Keeping Public Schools Public,Legitimate, and Educational

In this essay, Sarah Stitzlein describes the democratic potential of parents choosing to opt out of school testing, explaining how they ought to engage in political dissent to best fulfill their responsibilities as citizens and to practice democracy on behalf of children and schools. Parents' decisions to opt out are often based on rights claims about their oversight as parents; moral claims regarding the potential undue pressure testing places on children and the misuse of students' scores; political and economic concerns with the role of corporations in testing; and educational claims about the validity of scores, the narrowing of curriculum, and the deprofessionalization of teachers who feel they must teach to the test. By building publics around these rationales and shared concerns, parents may increase the political legitimacy of public schools and create public schools that are more deeply public; in some cases, they may also provide an educational model of democratic life for budding citizens in schools to observe and learn from.     

Teaching Honesty and Improving Democracy in the Post-Truth Era

In this paper, Sarah Stitzlein considers the consequences of honesty on our democracy, especially for citizens' ability to engage in civic inquiry together as they face shared problems. Honesty is a key component of a well-functioning democracy; it develops trust and fosters the sorts of relationships among citizens that enable civic dialogue and reasoning. Post-truth attitudes and truth decay pose serious obstacles to good civic reasoning as citizens struggle to draw clear distinctions between fact and opinion, weigh personal beliefs and emotions over facts, and increasingly distrust traditionally respected sources of information. Stitzlein employs a Deweyan pragmatist account of truth and a distinctly social account of democracy to build a case for foregrounding honesty in the development of citizens. She describes how schools can employ communities of inquiry to cultivate habits of honesty within citizenship education. She explains how a better democracy — one grounded in a wider understanding of social life and relationships — might head off the temptation to be dishonest for self-serving reasons, focusing on how dishonesty jeopardizes our relationships to each other as citizens and our ability to engage in civic reasoning together to fulfill shared goals.     

The Role of “Small Publics” in Teacher Dissent

In this essay, Sarah Stitzlein and Amy Rector‐Aranda, drawing on John Dewey's theoretical suggestions regarding how to best form publics capable of bringing about change through deliberation and action, offer teachers guidance on how to form and navigate spaces of political protest and become more effective advocates for school reform. Using Aaron Schutz's analysis of teacher activism as a point of departure, Stitzlein and Rector‐Aranda argue for the development in schools of “small publics,” that is, Deweyan democratic spaces within which teachers can dialogue and exchange ideas about the problems they face in the classroom. While Schutz treats this type of space merely as a stepping stone toward the real locus of political action, the power public, Stitzlein and Rector‐Aranda argue that small publics are themselves important spaces where teachers can work together to frame problems and build coalitions and solidarity with other groups in order to take action in the wider public sphere and bring about change in schools.     

'The Trouble with Our Schools': A media construction of public discourses on Queensland schools

This paper gives an account of competing public discourses on schooling. In particular, it investigates one newspaper's coverage of the release of an educational report. The paper combines interview data with a critical discourse analysis of newspaper texts to show how media reporting of Queensland schools constructed a preferred discourse on education that represented schools as being in crisis, 'in trouble'. The analysis describes how the paper shaped popular opinion on educational policy through the construction of public discourses of crisis in education. Further, the analysis shows how this discourse positioned particular groups as the authoritative voice on standards in Queensland schools. It shows how, at a time when teacher quality was under question, the media constructed a public discourse that diminished the authority of teachers to speak about education policy, granting that authority to the newspaper's editor, who assumed the people's voice on educational issues. This analysis of the construction of public discourses about education policy gives insights into the media's place in educational policy-making. In so doing, the paper adds to the small body of literature that investigates the relationships between the media and education.     

《思想新闻》与民众教育：杜威的方案可行吗

《思想新闻》旨在通过知识传播来提升民众的理智水平,增进其参与社会公共事务的意愿和能力,以达到应对民主危机的目的。该方案的原理,贯穿在杜威的教育理论当中,是杜威民众教育方案的一个缩影。尽管该方案放弃了古代精英教育的传统,在设计上也有让人存疑之处,但是《思想新闻》的确代表了一种应对民主危机的方案。对于民众处境的关切,是教育哲学研究的一个出发点。     

法国公民教育述评

法国是公民教育起步比较早的国家。法国学校通过教学活动、课外活动、与校外教育机构合作和互联网等多种途径和形式向学生传授诸如平等、民主、权利和义务之类的“共和国价值观”,旨在培养能够积极参与社会生活的合格公民。法国公民教育在凸显民族意识、重视社会整合,多种途径综合施教以及重视实践能力的培养等方面表现出明显的特征。     

Civic education in Lesotho: implications for teaching of democratic citizenship

This paper investigates the extent to which civic education is achieving its goals of teaching democracy and producing responsible democratic citizenship in Lesotho. This is done by analysing the conceptions of civic education, democracy, public participation, human rights, freedoms and responsibilities that appear in Lesotho’s documents that are used to teach people about democracy through formal, non-formal and informal education. I therefore argue that in the current Lesotho’s political history, these conceptions do not provide enough conditions for the cultivation of active democratic citizenship. Instead the materials dwell too much on teaching citizens about the systems and structures of government, preoccupied with inconsistent definitions and characteristics of democracy and with informing citizens of the importance of knowing how to vote and abide by the laws of the country; without showing how democracy should operate in a democratic country. The findings reveal that civic education for adults in Lesotho is offered informally, through the civil society organisations and politicians that are largely based in urban parts of Lesotho. This suggest that civic education should be tailored for the rural and urban citizens in a context of democratic transition in a country that still embraces strong traditional ties to communitarian living.     

Parental Participation and Accountability in Primary Schools in Uganda

Participation, a 'buzzword' in social development in both developed and developing countries, has several different interpretations in terms of purpose, form and implication. For instance, parents are encouraged to participate individually in choosing the school for their own children, and they are expected to participate collectively in school development through the work of school governing bodies. Furthermore, participation in education is often considered to be a means of assuring accountability of decentralised institutions. This paper explores the notion of parental participation in school governance, based on data obtained from field research in Uganda. It argues that parents' perceptions of the accountability of the school affect the way they participate in education. Thus, accountability is one of the crucial factors for realising local democracy through decentralisation.     

Necessary Educational Reform for the 2lst Century: The Future of Public Schools in our Democracy

We offer a theoretical and ecological argument for the preparation of citizens in U.S. public schools. This democratic education draws legitimacy from the concern of the nations founders for a populace educated to govern itself. We also emphasize the need for new democratic skills and knowledge in the face of today’s challenges, and our responsibility to prepare the young for the 21st century. A critique of the current school reform movement is provided because of its undemocratic nature. We issue a call for the transformation to democratic schools. We specifically argue that current efforts at reform are maintaining historical inequities, while also depriving those that enjoy social and economic advantages of the education needed to meet the challenges of a rapidly changing world. The democratic education proposed is based on three goals: citizenship preparation, inclusion, and an optimum learning environment. Seven well established principles of democracy and their relationship to schooling are presented. These include; the nature of authority, inclusiveness, equal availability of the understanding required for deliberating the most serious challenges to democracy and livability, equal access to centers of political decision-making, guaranteed inalienable rights, equality, and universal access to an optimum learning environment. We offer a fundamentally different approach to educational reform: calling for a reassessment of the role of public schools in a democracy that recognizes the importance of citizenship preparation, and a “bottom up” reform model that starts in the classroom and can be implemented by individual teachers.     

Creating Good Schools for Children in Poverty Through Title I Schoolwide Programs

The Improving America' s Schools Act--the 1994 reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act--will make schoolwide Title I programs available, beginning with the 1996-97 school year, to schools in which at least 50% of students are from families in poverty. Through schoolwide programs, eligible schools may combine Title I funds with other federal, stare, and local resources to upgrade the quality of education for all children. The legislation explicitly encourages schools and districts to design their own ambitious curricula for all students, keeping them in Title I programs within their regular education classrooms while minimizing the time they spend in "pullout" programs. In this article, we synthesize research on schoolwides with the views of experienced practitioners in 21 highly regarded schoolwide projects under Title I's predecessor, Chapter 1, to identify the principles guiding effective schoolwides. Findings are based on in-depth interviews with teachers and principals and on evidence of success found in reviews of project materials and outcome evaluations. Although schoolwide programs are locally devised and unique, the most successful build on a framework that includes these eight features: a shared vision, time and resources for planning and program design, skillful management and a well-defined organizational structure, a clear focus on academics, continuing professional development schoolwide, a commitment to cultural inclusiveness, patent and community involvement, and an accountability orientation. The study highlights promising practices that future Title I schoolwide programs can adopt to reorganize schools, streamline management, and upgrade the curriculum for children in schools serving communities with the highest concentrations of poor families.     

GOVERNMENT'S CONSTRUCTION OF THE RELATION BETWEEN PARENTS AND SCHOOLS IN THE UPBRINGING OF CHILDREN IN ENGLAND: 1963–2009

In this essay David Bridges argues that since most families choose to realize their responsibility for the major part of their children's education through state schools, then the way in which the state constructs parents' relation with these schools is one of its primary levers on parenting itself. Bridges then examines the way in which parent‐school relations have been defined in England through government and quasi‐government interventions over the last forty‐five years, tracing these through an awakening interest in the relation between social class and unequal school success in the 1960s, passing through the discourse of accountability in the 1970s, marketization in the 1980s and 1990s, performativity extending from this period into the first decade of the twenty‐first century, and, most recently, more direct interventions into parenting itself and the regulation of school relations with parents in the interests of safeguarding children. These have not, however, been entirely discrete policy themes, and the positive and pragmatic employment of the discourse of partnership has run throughout this period, albeit with different points of emphasis on the precise terms of such partnership.     

Special Education in American Charter Schools: State level policy,practices and tensions

The US charter school movement is based upon the supposition that granting individual public schools increased autonomy from state and district rules and regulations in exchange for more accountability will foster the creation of innovative, effective and efficient schools. However, while state charter school laws free these schools from various state and district rules and regulations, the schools must still operate within the civil rights parameters legislated by federal statutes. Of particular import are federal laws that guarantee that children with disabilities receive a free appropriate public education. Project SEARCH, a 3 year qualitative study of special education in US charter schools revealed that there is a fundamental philosophical gap between the individualised, autonomous nature of charter schools and the highly regulated nature of special education. The philosophical gap is complicated by some charter schools' inability to amass the fiscal and human capacity needed to meet the needs of individual children with disabilities.     

An examination of school accountability from the perspective of Singapore school leaders

School accountability is such a familiar concept in many education systems that questions about what it actually means and entails are rather uncommon, especially to busy practitioners on the ground. This paper reports a research that examines each of the questions of what and to whom Singapore schools are accountable, from the point of practitioners holding leadership positions in Singapore schools. This research was a qualitative study with a sample of 36 vice-principals. This analysis was enriched and interpreted with a literature-based discussion, which pointed out the implications of the research findings. According to the findings, the participants felt that Singapore schools were accountable for students’ holistic development; site, funding and staff management; national survival and nation building; and humanity and the future. Singapore schools were accountable to students, parents, country and citizens, and themselves. Interestingly, for a system that was reputed for its academic achievement, none of the participants mentioned examination results directly but referred to the importance of holistic education. The findings also suggested an inseparability of the concepts ‘accountability’ and ‘responsibility’ in the participants’ minds.     

Engaging City Hall: Children as Citizens

In this article, the authors suggest that current notions of advocacy in early childhood education should be expanded to include a view of young children as citizens. The authors ground their discussion in a how-to book project in Providence, Rhode Island, consider different concepts of children and citizenship, share commentary from City Hall and propose four key features of their perspective: (a) highlighting the civic nature of schools as central to the teaching and learning process; (b) focusing on young children's distinctive perspectives and competencies, not just their needs; (c) providing professional development around shared projects that promote literacy and higher order thinking skills; and (d) documenting children's learning in order to challenge assumptions about their capabilities and put forth an alternative image of teaching and learning.     

Leadership for Urban Public Schools

Not far from my office is a unique and important landmark: America's first public school. From this small beginning in 1635, a vast movement grew and resulted in public education for all the nation's children. The education of the young, at public expense, was important in the formation of the United States as a republic. The early leaders of this fledgling nation wanted to ensure that citizens would be prepared to make informed decisions about its governance.     

Racial injustice and disposable youth in the age of zero tolerance

The author argues that economically, politically, and culturally the situation of youth in the U.S. is intolerable and unforgivable. Childhood has been demeaned by popular news media and no longer is regarded by society as the future of democracy. Rather, young people are increasingly isolated, treated with suspicion, and subjected to diminished rights of privacy and personal liberties. Zero-tolerance policies in communities and schools amount to the criminalization of youth, and schools grow more like prisons than institutions of education. The multiple social and political costs of negative perceptions of youth are considered. It is argued that repressive social policies and neglect of children, as evidenced by the growing state of poverty, hunger, and homelessness among America's children, threatens the future of democracy. The author encourages policy reforms and individual and community commitment to policy reforms.     

The Moral Ends of Band

This article provides a theoretical framework through which to reimagine and revitalize contemporary music education practices, using the large ensemble paradigm called band as the primary unit of analysis. Literature suggests that band places too much emphasis on teacher control and external measures of validation. Critics propose replacing this historic art form with ones that exist outside of school. It is argued in this article that band's crisis of legitimacy can be resolved by refocusing on student welfare and student well-being. Because band is the only indigenous American art form that exists in and has come into fruition through the public school, band directors are bound by a public trust to put the education of students first. Using Dewey's understanding of the role of public schooling in a democracy, a vision of moral education through music education is advanced. Band is ideally poised to illustrate what moral education can be.     

高等教育绩效评价的缘起及功能

20世纪70年代以来,西方发达国家为摆脱财政危机和公共管理信任危机,普遍开展了“新公共管理运动”,其核心内容之一是将绩效评估应用到政府管理之中。受其影响,美国高等教育领域也引入了绩效评价机制,并在强化高校责任、提高高校效率、优化资源配置、建设透明高校、推进高校改革等方面取得了一定成效。此后,高等教育绩效评价逐渐扩展到其他国家,有效地推动了各国高等教育的改革与发展。     

New Rules for Business in a Flat World: A Trustees Call to Action

As policymakers, community college trustees have a responsibility to help keep their communities strong. How they do this is by helping to give everyone a chance for higher education. Thomas Friedman says that John F. Kennedy's vision was to put a man on the moon. His vision is to put every American on a campus. To do this, trustees can use these 7 “New Rules of Business:” (a) having a renewed focus on higher education accountability, (b) continued anxiety over college affordability, (c) waning public support, (d) growing expectations, (e) increasing competition, (f) changing demographics, and (g) the growing leadership crisis.