Examining How Equity Becomes Recontextualized by Policy Actors in the Enactment of Educational Policies

• In Event: 77.015 - Canadian Educational Researchers' Association

Abstract

Educational equity policies as the Trinidad and Tobago Education Sector Strategic Plan (TTESSP: 2011-2015) and the Ontario Education Equity Action Plan (OEEAP: 2017-2019) are geared toward achieving equity for all students in the education system in both Trinidad and Tobago, and Ontario, Canada.
However, a key problem in the enactment of educational equity policies, is that policy principles and mandates may become recontextualized by policy actors, thus shifting the focus, and meaning of equity to the periphery of policy processes.
To explore how educational equity policies become recontextualized, this paper examines the influence of policy actors in the enactment process.
The paper utilizes policy enactment and critical policy analysis as theoretical perspectives for examining how equity principles and mandates become interpreted and re-interpreted by policy actors in enacting educational equity policies into practice.

Author

• Kathleen Sandy-Thompson, University of Western Ontario