Considering Epistemic Violence,Scarcity and Student Voice in Relation to Educational Goods

‘Educational Goods’ is a provocative text which makes important contributions relevant to a wide readership, and this examination of the text suggests it may be necessary to further complicate the concept of educational goods. In particular, it takes issue with the universalising of the ‘good’ which has been a key feature of colonisation that demands assimilation of marginalised peoples and amounts to epistemic violence. It also holds that notions of scarcity in the educational sphere, which leads the authors of this text to consider the importance of decision-making which they insist involves trade-offs, often fail to make space for less zero-sum, and more intersectional and interdisciplinary approaches to the challenges facing schools. Finally, it suggests that the text addresses teachers, parents and other school administrators as key actors shaping the contours of education today, though the voices of students remain relatively obscured. It proposes that it may be fruitful to consider how researchers might begin to develop more meaningful ways to gauge childhood goods based on student self-reporting, student narrative and student priority setting in a way that can inform policy making.