Building Relationships and Decolonizing Possibilities Through Education Change Networks

• In Event: Decolonizing Professional Learning

Abstract

Purpose
Indigenous scholars point out that education for Indigenous students must be “viewed in the context of systemic barriers and inequalities inherent in the current education system that marginalize Indigenous knowledge systems and result in significant challenges to the educational success of Indigenous children and youth” (Hare & Davidson, 2019, p. 204). Therefore, reconciliation and educational and system transformation need to work in tandem if we are to disrupt hierarchical practices and structures that enact a hidden curriculum of privilege and racism.

Perspectives
Many educators and school districts seek to better support Indigenous students (Battiste, 2013). Research suggests the promise of collaboration between teachers and community partners (Bouvier, Battiste, & Laughlin, 2016; Goulet & Goulet, 2014). We are investigating how an Education Change Network (ECN) supports educators to collaborate with Indigenous community members and researchers to better meet the needs of all learners by taking up Indigenous ways of knowing and being in classrooms. This study explores reconciliation indigenization (Gaudry & Lorenz, 2018) in research by bringing together Indigenous and non-Indigenous scholars, educators, and community partners.

Methods
We are conducting a critical case study (Grosvenor & Pataki, 2017; Merriam, 2009) guided by Indigenous Storywork principles (Archibald, 2008) to research ECN processes and outcomes. An Indigenous Storywork principle-informed critical case study design enabled us to engage in respectful and responsible data collection, analysis, and knowledge mobilization approaches that position Indigenous communities as curriculum development and educational change partners.

Data Sources

Welcoming and honouring Indigenous pedagogies, we engaged in data collection by observing ECN processes; receiving artifacts from participants’ classroom activities; listening during interviews and small and large group sharing; reading the reflections of participants, and co-planning and co-facilitating ECN gatherings. Iterative analyses informed ECN sessions.


Results

Analyses revealed the following themes: white/settler participants engaging with difficult knowledge and awakening to structural inequities; educators emphasizing their need for external resources and additional learning to decolonize their practice; and participants’ preliminary actions.
Participants reported awakening to structural inequities and racism. This level of awareness involved reflexivity, coming to understand one’s own power as an educator, and how classrooms and schools typically privilege Eurocentric/colonizing forms of knowledge and learning.
The teachers in our study articulated specific resource needs and ideas to support their inquiry into decolonization and indigenization which emerged from their involvement in the ECN. Participants were keen to make connections to the land and engage in outdoor learning activities. Finally, the connections the participants made to anti-racism work were particularly promising, with many participants seeking to find ways to recognize and honour specific Nations’ protocols and practices. However, making larger systemic changes was met with resistance.

Scholarly Significance
Findings revealed that participants reported significant learning with regard to engaging with difficult knowledge and awakening to structural inequities and the need for external resources and additional learning to decolonize practices. This study contributes to understanding how to develop teacher capacity to enact decolonization and reconciliation.

Authors

• Leyton Schnellert, University of British Columbia

• Bonny Lynn Donovan, University of British Columbia - Okanagan

• Sara Florence Davidson, Simon Fraser University