53.012 - Telling Perspectives on the Struggles and Hopes for Public Education

Session Type: Invited Speaker Session

Abstract

We live in a world deeply divided. Although what divides us has been especially palpable over the past year, our contemporary rifts and conflicts have deep roots in our histories as nations and communities. Running through these divisions and accordant struggles are issues of diversity and unity, public and private interests, power and privilege, and social policies that alternately redress and preserve inequities.

Nowhere have these struggles and hopes been more visible than in schools and in the debates over public education. As we enter a new chapter of political, economic, and social forces playing out in public schools, we could benefit from thoughtful consideration of what is known—from different perspectives, voices, and methods—about democracy and public education. The goal of this panel is to foreshadow the focus and ambitions for next year’s program.

The session is designed as a discussion among four scholars, including a moderator, whose work varies in disciplinary foundation, epistemology, purpose, and method. A moderator will encourage cross talk around three central questions:

1. What are the most important legacies of past efforts to create schools in and for democracies?
2. What compromises have been made, what compromises might we have to make, and what compromises must we not make?
3. How can research, from a range of methodological, epistemological, and theoretical perspectives, contribute both to our understanding of our current context as well as how to take action as scholars to stand up for public education?

Sub Unit

• AERA Presidential Session

Chairs

• Deborah Loewenberg Ball, University of Michigan - Ann Arbor

• Carla D. O'Connor, University of Michigan

• Suzanne M. Wilson, University of Connecticut

Participants

• Marybeth Gasman, University of Pennsylvania

• James G. Ladwig, The University of Newcastle

• Patricia Baquedano-Lopez, University of California - Berkeley

Discussant

• Carl Cohn, California Collaborative for Educational Excellence