Race and School Vouchers: Legal,Historical, and Political Contexts

This article investigates legal and political issues as they relate to school vouchers serving students of color. Specifically, we draw on the empirical, historical, and legal research to examine whether school vouchers will create a more equitable system of education for poor students of color. First, we present a history of vouchers, including how they were used to support segregation. We then discuss how vouchers as a broad opportunity for educational equity for poor children (of color) might present particular challenges in light of, first, the race-neutral approach in contemporary case law and state statutes and, second, the relatively small percentage of U.S. children taking advantage of such programs. Finally, we present empirical results regarding African American families’ support and use of vouchers and a discussion of the racial politics of school vouchers. We argue that unless voucher programs and proponents address race directly, operate on a larger scale, and attend to the broader social justice issues facing urban communities, it will be difficult for such policies to support the greater good for African American children or society as a whole.     

A Review of The Teaching Transgender Toolkit: A Facilitator's Guide to Increasing Knowledge,Decreasing Prejudice & Building Skills

This is a review of the book The Teaching Transgender Toolkit by Eli R. Green and Luca Maurer (2015 Green, E. R., &; Maurer, L. (2015). The teaching transgender toolkit: A facilitator's guide to increasing knowledge, decreasing prejudice &; building skills. Ithaca, NY: Planned Parenthood of the Southern Finger Lakes. [Google Scholar]). Overall, the book is an extremely helpful guide for facilitators of varying skill levels and gender identities implementing educational interventions. The authors' familiarity with the range of participant/learner responses led them to include several helpful components. With helpful sections on how to use the book, how to compile lessons to conduct one's own trainings, and resources for further reading, the authors effectively give educators the tools they need to educate various populations about transgender identities. Limitations include the ever-changing language around gender identities and the lack of specific focus on workplace discrimination. The authors do include an online, frequently updated resource for changing terminology. This is a recommended resource for those who educate about gender and gender identity.     

Adolescent Weak Decoders Writing in a Shallow Orthography: Process and Product

It has been hypothesized that students with dyslexia struggle with writing because of a word-level focus that reduces attention to higher level textual features (structure, theme development). This may result from difficulties with spelling and/or difficulties with reading. Twenty-six Norwegian upper secondary students (M = 16.9 years) with weak decoding skills and 26 age-matched controls composed expository texts by keyboard under two conditions: normally and with letters masked to prevent them reading what they were writing. Weak decoders made more spelling errors and produced poorer quality text. Their inter-key-press latencies were substantially longer preword, at word end, and within word. These findings provide some support for the word-level focus hypothesis, although we found that weak decoders were slightly less likely to engage in word-level editing. Preventing reading did not affect differences between weak decoders and controls, indicating that their reduced fluency was associated with production rather than reading difficulties.     

Career Decisional States of Australian and South African High School Students

The influence of contextualfactors on the career decision states of 429South African and 623 Australian male andfemale students in grades 8 to 12 wasinvestigated. The results for both nationalsamples on the Career Decision Scaledemonstrate that grade, gender, and theinteraction of grade and gender impact on thedevelopmental progression of career decisionbehaviour. Gender differences across nationswere more pronounced for males than females.Both South African and Australian students aremore decided in lower grades. Internationaldifferences suggest that South African studentsare less certain and evidence greaterindecision than Australian students. Theimplications for educational decision pointsand career education practices are discussed.     

Reforming practice or modifying reforms?: Elementary teachers' response to the tools of reform

Understanding the interaction between internally constructed and externally imposed aspects of the teaching context may be the missing link between calls for school reform and teachers' interpretation and implementation of that reform. Although the context of the local school culture has a profound impact on teachers, there are other external forces that are specifically aimed at influencing teachers' pedagogical and curricular decisions. These externally imposed aspects of context include some of the existing tools of reform, such as national standards, mandated state core curricula, and related criterion‐referenced testing. However, little is known about how these reform tools impact teachers' thinking about science and science teaching or how teachers respond to such tools. This study examined the interactions between individual teachers' beliefs about teaching and learning science in elementary school and the tools of reform that are imposed upon them. Comparative case studies were conducted in which two elementary teachers' science instruction, teaching context, and related beliefs were examined, described, and analyzed. In this study, the teachers' fundamental beliefs about science and what it means to teach and learn science influenced their interpretations of the sometimes contradictory messages of reform as they are represented in the standards, mandated curriculum, and end‐of‐level tests. Suggestions about what these findings mean for needed aspects of teacher professional development are offered. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 44: 396–423, 2007     

The implications of size for educational development in small territories: The case of Macau

The educational issues associated with the small size of countries have long been neglected by administrators and academics. Recent work by the Commonwealth Secretariat has done much to remedy this neglect, but the topic is still in its infancy. This paper contributes to the body of literature by providing a specific case-study. By focusing on Macau, it also helps balance the bias of existing work, most of which concentrates on Commonwealth countries.

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Zusammenfassung Erziehungswissenschaftliche Fragen, die mit einer kleinen Ländergröße verbunden sind, sind lange von Verwaltungsbeamten und Wissenschaftlern vernachlässigt worden. Jüngere Arbeiten des Commonwealth-Sekretariats haben viel dazu beigetragen, diesem Versäumnis abzuhelfen, aber die Behandlung dieses Themas steht noch im Anfangsstadium. Dieser Artikel stellt einen Beitrag zur Gesamtheit der Literatur dar, indem er eine spezielle Fallstudie liefert, und dadurch, daß das Augenmerk auf Makao gerichtet ist, hilft er darüberhinaus, die Einseitigkeit bereits vorliegender Arbeiten, die sich überwiegend auf Commonwealthländer konzentrieren, auszugleichen.

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Résumé Administrateurs et universitaires ont longtemps négligé les problèmes éducatifs liés aux petits pays. Le travail qui a été entrepris récemment par le secrétariat du Commonwealth a contribué pour une grande part à pallier cette négligence, mais ce thème en est encore à ses débuts. Cette étude de cas spécifique apporte sa contribution à l'ensemble de la littérature qui existe sur ce sujet. En mettant l'accent sur Macao, elle permet également de rétablir l'équilibre dans les travaux existants qui se focalisent essentiellement sur les pays du Commonwealth.

     

A tale of two countries: comparing civic education in the Philippines and Singapore

This article provides a comparative analysis of citizenship education in the Philippines and Singapore. Through an analysis of historical contexts, citizenship education policy and curriculum, it examines Makabayan in the Philippines and National Education in Singapore. It identifies particular policy and curriculum trajectories as responses to national and global imperatives to demonstrate how countries are redefining the kinds of knowledge, skills and values deemed necessary for national citizenship in global contexts. This comparative case study illustrates some of the tensions and contradictions facing citizenship education in new global contexts and highlights the different ways countries try to manage these tensions through citizenship education policies and curricula. Findings point to different factors that shape and constrain the implementation of citizenship education programmes in both countries.