Redefining Diversity: Political Responses to the Post-PICS Environment

This article examines the federal and local political response to the Parents Involved decision. At the federal level, developments suggest a reaction to Parents Involved that, since President Obama has taken office, has been largely supportive of voluntary efforts to promote racial diversity. The administration has also been seeking to enforce more traditional race-based civil rights cases. Locally, even though reactions to the decision are as varied as the districts themselves, three broad categories of political responses emerge from our review of post–Parents Involved student assignment policies. They are the adoption of multifactor student assignment plans, the adoption of class-based (e.g., race-neutral) student assignments, and the elimination of efforts to pursue diversity. This article is particularly interested in examining the first two categories of responses. In doing so, we argue that some school districts are pursuing a redefined conceptualization of diversity in a challenging legal and political climate.     

Childhood,neo‐liberalism and the feminization of education

This paper brings together analyses from childhood and gender studies with macro‐economic analysis to offer new perspectives on current educational debates, including the current role of education within broader discussions. Girls’ recent (supposed) educational success is situated within economic and cultural contexts to explore how discussions of gender, childhood and development both express and, paradoxically, obscure these. Analysis of popular discourses surrounding children and childhood is used to suggest that the sentimentalized (girl) child has come to represent a new neo‐liberal subject, such that contemporary discourses of childhood and feminization typically distract attention from more meaningful structural analyses ‐ that would crucially include further analyses of gender and childhood.     

W(h)ither practitioner research?

The purpose of this paper is to understand better the possibilities for practitioner research as a mode of educational inquiry that is yet to be legitimated within the academy. The paper maps the current state of play, and then moves on to consider what might yet be done to optimise its potential to contribute to rigorous new thinking about educational practice. Its exploration is in three parts: first, it seeks to account for the ambivalent status of practitioner research in the larger context of the modern university; second, it moves on from this account to argue both the value and the limitations of practitioner research as a contemporary mode of knowledge production in education; and finally, it suggests ways that practitioner research might be less delimited in terms of its capacities to produce knowledge that is useful to a wider range of stakeholders.     

Using Performance-Based Assessments to Prepare Safe Science Teachers

Standard 9 of the National Science Teachers Association Standards for Science Teacher Preparation is designed to ensure that science teacher preparation programs provide preservice science teachers with the knowledge and skills to understand and successfully engage students in a safe and ethical manner. This standard contains four components describing science teachers’ legal and ethical responsibilities, appropriate use of instructional materials (chemicals in particular), emergency procedures and safety equipment, and guidelines for proper use of living organisms in the classroom. In this article, we describe the requirements of Standard 9 and provide guidance on assessments that can be used to present evidence for preservice teachers’ competence in each of the four components.     

Exploiting Distance Technology to Foster Experimental Design as a Neglected Learning Objective in Labwork in Chemistry

This paper deals with the design process of a remote laboratory for labwork in chemistry. In particular, it focuses on the mutual dependency of theoretical conjectures about learning in the experimental sciences and technological opportunities in creating learning environments. The design process involves a detailed analysis of the expert task and knowledge, e.g., spectrophotometry as a method for the determination of the concentration of a compound in a solution. In so doing, modifications in transposing tasks and knowledge to the learning situation can be monitored. The remote laboratory is described, as well as the specific features that alter the degree of fidelity of the learning situation in comparison with the expert one. It is conjectured that these alterations might represent actual benefits for learning.     

Prevention is better than cure: coping skills training for adolescents at school

Children and adolescents today face a plethora of stressful problems, including family and relationship conflict, death of close family members or friends, and academic and social pressures. Such problems have been found to contribute to an increased risk of various emotional–social–cognitive difficulties in adolescence. These include academic failure, social misbehaviour, interpersonal problems, and depression.

Programmes that promote coping with normative stress, delivered to the whole population, have been considered to represent a promising direction for the prevention of social emotional difficulties. The Best of Coping: Developing Coping Skills Program (Frydenberg & Brandon, 2002 Frydenberg E Brandon CM (2002) The best of coping Melbourne: Oz Child [Crossref] [Google Scholar]) was introduced in two school settings on four separate occasions. Evaluation of the results provides modest support for coping skills enhancement but provide a warning about the need for caution when implementing and evaluating the Programme. First, it appeared to have some opposing effects on males and females. Second, improvements in students' coping responses were apparently related to the authenticity of implementation of the Programme.

The findings are discussed with regard to the need to implement programmes through which we can teach adolescents coping responses, which include optimism and problem‐solving skills, so that they may handle problems and stressors more effectively. Additionally, an important feature of such programmes is a focus on the reduction of the use of non‐productive coping skills. With an increase in psycho‐social problems, the need to provide school‐based programmes is discussed, with emphasis placed on programme implementation. In particular, the probable need for ongoing involvement of psychologically trained school counsellors with teachers, through the life of the programme.