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Over the past two decades, scholars have noted an increasing global convergence in the policy and practice of education that predominantly contains Western ideals of mass schooling serving as a model for national school systems (Bieber & Martens, 2011; Goldthorpe, 1997; Spring, 2008). A number of transnational organizations contribute disproportionately to global educational discourse, particularly the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) through its international comparative performance measure, the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). This study conducted a critical discourse analysis of the OECD document PISA 2012 Results: Excellence through Equity (OECD, 2013) to examine the ways that PISA and the OECD conceive of educational equity in a global context. Given the growing convergence of global educational policy, the way that transnational educational organizations address equity has crucial implications for the ways that the world intervenes in schooling to promote or diminish equitable outcomes. Analysis revealed that the OECD and the PISA foreground economistic notions of educational equity, which diminishes the role of other factors (i.e., race/ethnicity, gender, immigration status, language) that mediate equity in schools. Findings and implications are discussed.

Equity in education has been on the education research forefront for many decades, but there is now much more of a political consensus that investing in equity in education needs to be at the heart of education agendas. As the link between education, equity, and growth is becoming even more evident, so is the search for policies that can contribute to improve educational outcomes of the more disadvantaged groups in our societies as a way to strengthen social cohesion, development, and growth. While there has been in-depth analysis of system-level policies that can contribute to improve equity, at the school level, there is sparse comparative analysis of the particular role school leaders can play in the equity-quality agenda. This chapter focuses on the types of policies that can support school leadership in education for disadvantaged students and schools across OECD countries. It builds on qualitative and quantitative comparative studies that focus on equity (OECD, 2012), on reforms implemented across OECD countries (OECD, 2015a) as well as on data from international surveys such as the Project for International Student Assessment (PISA) and the Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS). More concretely, the chapter (1) reviews why investing in equity is not only a social imperative but also an economic investment; (2) discusses how different OECD countries reform in terms of equity and quality in education; and (3) explores evidence and country practices to conclude on how school leadership can positively influence equity in education.

This chapter undertakes a comparative analysis of discourses on equity found in OECD and Norwegian policy documents. This is an interesting area to study as the OECD is found to be an important agenda setter for many countries' educational policies. A comparative analysis of OECD and Norwegian educational policies is especially interesting because the OECD is often found to be pressing for a neo-liberal agenda, while Norway has a socialist-alliance government. Combining Basil Bernstein's theoretical framework with key principles from Critical Discourse Analysis, the author investigates power relations within OECD and Norwegian educational policy documents. Two equity models serve as analytical tools: equity through equality and equity through diversity, which can be described along the three dimensions: de-/centralization, de-/standardization and de-/specialization. Using the analysis of two key documents on equity in education from the OECD and Norway, the author points out the similarities and differences in two documents. Both the OECD and Norwegian approaches to equity in education can be related to a centralized decentralization or a conservative modernization of education. However, there are also important differences between the two documents. For example, the Norwegian ministry has more emphasis on equity through equality and is less influenced by neo-liberalism and authoritarian populism than the OECD. In conclusion, the author argues that neither of the two described approaches appears to improve the inequities in education. A different way of targeting these inequities could be based on critical theory and research.

Purpose and methodology – Focusing on the policy contexts of gender education in Taiwan, this chapter uses data from interviews with elite policymakers and policy documents to examine how feminist activists sought to legitimatize gender equity in education in the wake of the comprehensive social and educational reforms of the 1990s and early years of this decade.

Findings – The embedding of gender in education did not follow a smooth path in terms of policy formulation. Feminist activists drove the process of reform by retaining control over the naming of the legislation, and its wording, thus preserving the language and imperatives of gender equity.

Social implications – In this chapter, I examine the formation of the Gender Equity Education Law, detailing the struggles, contentions, and negotiations that underlay the eventual approval of gender reform in education.

Originality/value of chapter – The chapter contributes significantly by identifying the necessity to recognize the nature of the state and its relations with society in order to research gender in education in Taiwan.

During the Covid-19 crisis, schools around the world at all levels had to respond to the situation most often without any preparation or time to reorganize their teaching. This chapter investigates how the Covid-19 pandemic amplified the need for equity and how teacher agency evolved through this time period. The study was qualitative and data were collected from 29 individuals from the same number of countries through narratives, and virtual interviews written responses to semi-structured questions. This chapter focuses on two main concepts: equity and agency. The authors met 18 times to work with the data, clarifying understanding of concepts, analyzing meanings, and writing up findings. Findings indicate that equity of access to online teaching and learning was a major challenge during the early stages of the pandemic lockdowns. However, many universities initiated some innovative strategies to minimize the inequities created by the migration to online learning platforms. Both educators' and students' agency evolved during the online and digital tuition provisions and made some agentic decisions that impacted their teaching and learning, respectively. During the Covid-19 pandemic, educators had much to say about their teaching online. Their experience and thinking can be leveraged in discussions about the best way forward after the pandemic experience. The mutual learning that we experienced collaborating internationally in this study points to the significance of using online facility to create and enhance solidarity among educators globally.

Different interpretations of what constitutes educational equity have shaped public policies and practices for students with disabilities over the past century. These differences are apparent in the clash between access to education as defined in the Least Restrictive Environment (LRE), and access to more intensive educational services which smaller special education classrooms are designed to provide. This chapter examines these differences within the context of how services have historically been provided and how students have been assessed and have achieved academically. Specifically, this chapter also describes relevant literature and current data related to services and outcomes for youth with disabilities. We describe academic and behavioral interventions and strategies that have been used in different settings. We conclude by offering recommendations for future research in developing effective interventions to help close the achievement gap and move toward true educational equity.

Our chapter addresses the balance assessment professionals must strike in supporting academic freedom, shared governance practices, and learning improvement efforts within colleges and universities in the United States. Specifically, we address how assessment professionals (faculty or staff whose primary job involves accreditation or the assessment of student learning) can encourage increased educational equity while supporting academic freedom. The authors offer a unique perspective. As former faculty members, current assessment practitioners, and a current academic administrator, we work to ensure that our institutions are using assessments of student learning to improve learning for all students. This work gives us insight into the ways in which assessment information shapes institutional efforts, balancing the rights of faculty to control the curriculum with the rights of historically underserved students (including students from underserved ethnic or racial groups, first generation college students, students from low-income households, and students with special needs or disabilities) to receive a quality education. We propose that one solution to this apparent conflict is to provide faculty with data that allow them to analyze the ways in which their assessment choices influence educational equity. To contextualize our work in this area we summarize institutional and faculty freedoms and discuss areas of conflict. We then describe ways to reduce areas of conflict by creating a culture of inquiry that centers around consideration of data and opportunities to modify assessments to increase educational equity.

This chapter considers the commitment of gender equality at universities and how it is expressed and measured via a gender equality scorecard. The Gender Equality Scorecard is seen as an accountability measure that seeks to build awareness of the magnitude of the problem (if it exists), interpret the meaning of the (in)equities, and move to action. It is regarded as a supportive mechanism to the development and implementation of a Gender Policy as articulated in The UWI Strategic Plan, 2012–2017. The development of a Scorecard is also seen as an example of collaborative governance in action that fosters engagement, commitment, and action across an institution. The proposed model draws upon the experiences of the Gender Equity Scorecards used by international development agencies and other higher educational institutions. The chapter proposes a framework and methodology using staff and student data from The University of the West Indies for the period 1990–1991 to 2011–2012 to build a Gender Scorecard. Finally, the Scorecard is seen as a tool to track performance related to the creation and enhancement of relevant structures and processes to institutionalize gender equality into the functions, operations, and governance of institutions.

Efforts to promote equity in mathematics education are becoming more widespread. The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics elevated its position on equity from one of societal need to one of six guiding principles required to ensure excellence in mathematics education. I investigate how efforts to promote educational equity in mathematics education are informed by democratic views. In particular, I examine the intersection of course taking, equity, mathematics, and democracy in the context of a case study conducted in one high school mathematics department. This case study was conducted over one academic year, and data included a focus survey, interviews, field notes from department meetings and class observations, and school documents. In this study, I investigated the curricular redesign process undertaken by one high school mathematics department addressing high failure rates in low-level courses disproportionately enrolled with students of color designed to increase access to more advanced mathematics courses. I discuss how those changes impacted access, influenced equity, and aligned with democratic aims and their relationship to mathematics education.