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Given that a large proportion of refugees and forced im/migrants today are school-age, schools are widely assumed to be sites where integration will happen. How this integration will occur and whether education policies facilitate social cohesion is unclear. Focusing on California and Berlin as examples of politically left-leaning states that receive immigrants in substantial numbers, this chapter seeks to examine their immigration, integration, and education policies. Using an original conceptual framework, this chapter analyzes how relevant federal and state policies have evolved since the 1980s in these two contexts. This chapter considers integration to be the process by which immigrants identify with the receiving country (RC) and their previous contexts, provided that the RC is supportive and accepting. The goal of integration is less inequality along ethnic or cultural lines. By analyzing policies in terms of immigrant students’ identity formation and conceptions of equality, this chapter argues that the evolution of such policies in Berlin and California has not always been linear. Moreover, while both states consider diversity to be positive, their policies do not extend to facilitating a new culture that productively operationalizes the diversity of immigrant and non-immigrant students.

The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the public policy reshaping the assessment terrain for English learners (ELs) across the USA and to consider the implications and impact of these practices on sustaining and supporting a diverse student population in today’s schools.

The authors review the literature and publicly available policy documents to trace key policy trends over the past 15 years that have shaped the current educational landscape and assessment practices for ELs in the USA.

In the USA, the 2015 Common Core State Standards (CCSSs) assessments generated worrisome results for ELs, as significant numbers had failing scores in English language arts and math. These results are juxtaposed to public policies that impact the educational experience of ELs, including No Child Left Behind and the CCSS, and which, despite their stated intentions to ameliorate the achievement gap, are found to be assimilationist in nature. Indeed, a review of the initiatives of developing common EL standards and English language proficiency tests and the recommendations for EL accommodations in state tests suggests several areas of concern. The recently passed Every Student Succeeds Act focuses on this vulnerable population, but there are concerns that the continued focus on accountability and testing will do little to facilitate academic progress for these students.

The paper recommends a need to reevaluate the support and testing process for ELs to stem widespread failure and ascertain the sustenance of democratic and diversified schools.

The study provides an overview of key policy trends, outlines and critiques recent changes in the assessment of ELs and draws implications for practice.

This article probes the dimensions of a newly constructed, modern citizenship within the context of post‐war tensions between a national history that recognised and asserted sexual, racial, and cultural differences and an assimilationist state drive that enshrined one law and one way of life. In particular, I address the question of what we can learn about gender and race relations and their relationship to national identities and citizenship by studying government and educational policies and publications. As recent scholarship on education and citizenship has observed, issues surrounding national identity/identities, citizenship, and education in Australia were critical to state formation from the late 1940s to the 1960s. This research has done much to expand our understanding of the pedagogical and curriculum components of citizenship education and the central role of teachers within the education enterprise. As well, other scholars have informed our understanding of the related processes of post‐war social adjustment of young people. This article draws on a range of theories and perspectives from post‐colonial literature, cultural and performance studies, and critical ‘race’ and feminist theories to analyse the texts and images. A discourse analysis of these documents highlight the complex and competing forms of identity/identities, colonialism, ‘race’, and gender. In particular, I address the following questions: First, what representations of modern young citizens were featured as part of the ‘Australian way of life’ in both state education policies and publications? Second, in what ways were gender and ‘race’ constitutive of Australian citizenship? Third, how do the images and texts in these publications manifest the multiple performances of education in the 1950s and 1960s? Although this study focuses on education reforms, the results of the research speak to wider issues of historical representation, gender, and culture and the complicated relationship between state policy, nationalism, and reform.

This article explores the negative ramifications of pursuing a policy of multi‐culturalism. It suggests that such a policy is foreign to the western philosophical tradition. It argues that the merits of multi‐culturalism are assumed rather than demonstrated. It questions whether multi‐culturalism is reconcilable with democracy, systemic maintenance and stability, and economic viability. Focusing on the USA it defends the traditional melting pot/assimilationist policy toward cultural variety.

This research explores the educational participation, cultural identification, and linguistic practices of Middle Eastern refugee youth in Vancouver, Canada. Twenty refugee youth aged 15 to 30 participated in this critical ethnography that provided new information about the impacts of pre- and post-migration experiences on their educational attainment, language, and identity construction. Evidence reported here indicates that refugee youth are subject to institutional challenges in both their home and host countries. The youth experienced educational assimilation, biased curriculum, and language discrimination with devastating impacts on their educational participation and overall well-being. In response, this study indicates that young people resist assimilation and racism in educational and wider social settings. This study further suggests that refugee youths’ educational experiences, linguistic practices, self-identification, and well-being should be examined in relation to their pre- and post-migration experiences, and the dominant meta-narratives of their home and host countries (e.g., nationalism).

This paper contributes to the analysis of the relationship between sociological discourse on ethnic relations and social changes produced by immigration in Italy. It is organized in three parts. The first part investigates the reasons that until recently prevented European and Italian academic debate from using the concept of ethnic minority to analyze international migration.

Immigration has been a subject of intense historical and contemporary debate in US political life. Proponents of immigration cite the important contributions immigrants have made and continue to make to the USA’s national development and evolution. Advocates of more restrictive immigration policies stress concerns over the USA’s ability to support immigrant residents and whether newer immigrants threaten the US national identity and social cohesion. Proponents and opponents of current US immigration policy will use figures from the 2000 census to justify their respective arguments in upcoming debates on this subject. This article examines a variety of immigration literature resources such as scholarly books, government documents, and Websites and seeks to emphasize the subject’s complexities and contradictions along with US and transnational perspectives.

The purpose of this paper is to document experiences of Aboriginal students in community colleges from the perspective of Aboriginal communities rather than policymakers and shows how these communities support student persistence in college.

Interviews with 16 Aboriginal college students, staff and community members were undertaken with Aboriginal guidance, and analysis was undertaken informed by the writings of Aboriginal scholars.

The major finding was that First Nations students experience a disconnect between the epistemology of Aboriginal peoples and ways of being in community colleges. Most demonstrate bravery and persistence in their studies as well as resistance to assimilation. Understanding and support is provided by surrounding Aboriginal communities, based on their appreciation of the epistemological roots of the problem.

Frequent reference to the absence of Indigenous Knowledges suggests that more must be done to make Aboriginal students feel safe in colleges where they are in the minority. In view of their feeling of “disconnect,” safe Aboriginal centers, or “homes away from home” are one of many ways to support these students.

The research challenges assimilationist approaches to Aboriginal college students, and highlights supporting Indigenous peoples, as described in global terms by Indigenous scholars.

This paper draws on the archival records of the Victorian Education Department, literature produced by the governing authority of Tally Ho (the Central Mission), and newspaper reports produced in the mid-20th century about school and education at Tally Ho. This paper also draws on material from the Victorian Aborigines Welfare Board and the Northern Territory Department of Welfare, as well as two historical key government inquiries into the institutionalisation of children.

This paper uses Tally Ho Boys’ Training Farm as a case study to examine the intersection of welfare systems, justice systems and schooling and education for Aboriginal children in institutions like Tally Ho in the mid-20th century. Further, it provides perspectives on how institutions such as Tally Ho were utilised by governments in Victoria and the Northern Territory to pursue different agendas – sometimes educational – particular to Aboriginal children. This paper also explores how histories can be reconstructed when archives are missing or silent about histories of Aboriginal childhood.

This paper demonstrates how governments used Tally Ho to control and govern the lives of Aboriginal children. By drawing together archives from a range of bodies and authorities who controlled legislation and policies, this paper contributes new understandings about the role of institutions in Victoria to the assimilation policies of Victoria and the Northern Territory in the mid-20th century.

Scholarship on the institutionalisation of children in the post-war era in Victoria, including the ways that schooling and justice systems were experienced by children living in care, has failed to fully engage with the experiences of Aboriginal children. Historians have given limited attention to the experiences of Aboriginal children living in institutions off Aboriginal reserves in Victoria. There has been limited historical scholarship examining the experiences of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children at Tally Ho. This paper broadens our understandings about how Aboriginal children encountered institutionalisation in Victoria.