International Scholarship and Perspectives on/for Educational Advocacy

Session Type: WERA Symposium

Abstract

Achieving ideals of democracy – equity, inclusion, social justice – requires broad citizen engagement in education. The session brings together scholarship and perspectives on educational advocacy from seven national contexts. Members of the newly formed WERA International Research Network on Families, Educators, and Communities as Educational Advocates build on and expand traditional understandings of school-family-community engagement by presenting research focused on different kinds of communities that engage and advocate for educational change in ways and for purposes not always recognized in the extant literature. A discussant for each paper from a country other than the one(s) studied will discuss how the advocacy examined is undertaken in his/her national context and support the session’s exchange of international perspectives on educational advocacy.

Sub Unit

• World Education Research Association

Chair

• Sue Winton, York University

Papers

• Challenging Special Education Assessment Policy in Public Schools in Ontario, Canada - Sue Winton, York University; Lauren Jervis, York University

• Changing Unions in Challenging Times: Advocacy, Democracy, and Union Renewal - Howard Stevenson, The University of Nottingham; Nina Bascia, University of Toronto - OISE

• Everyday Activism in Extraordinary Times: School Leaders Advocating for Public Education in England - Steven John Courtney, University of Manchester; Ruth McGinity, The University of Manchester

• The Lives and Identities of Black and South Asian Head Teachers in the United Kingdom: 1968–2015 - Lauri Johnson, Boston College

Discussants

• Radhika Gorur, Deakin University

• John C. Williamson, University of Tasmania

• Maija Salokangas, Trinity College Dublin

• Camille M. Wilson, University of Michigan