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The purpose of this study is to explore the leadership experiences of four female secondary principals (two Black, two White) in one south‐western state to create significant discourse for understanding school leadership nested in complex social, political and cultural contexts. These women confronted education challenges of social justice, democracy, and equity in their schools.

The philosophical tradition of phenomenology was chosen as the qualitative methodology for this study “which is understood to be a concern for human meaning and ultimately for interpreting those meanings so that they inform our practice and our science”. As a secondary analysis of a specific finding (i.e. female leaders who exemplified a values‐orientation around issues of social justice in their leadership practices) from the original study the lived experiences of four female secondary school leaders were further explored.

All four women engaged in leadership praxis by: transforming school practices to promote equity and access for all students and embracing diversity of their student populations; connecting the world of research and practice; adopting democratic and participative leadership styles that relate to female values developed through socialization processes including building relationships, consensus building, power as influence, and working together for a common purpose.

While the focus is secondary school female leaders and educational leadership in a North American context, the implications have a broader transnational focus, exploring themes and issues that may span national boundaries and cultures.

For purposes of this article, the original data were revisited to conduct secondary analyses of the experiences of four women. Research contends that this approach can be used to generate new knowledge, new hypotheses, or support for existing theories; and that it allows wider use of data from rare or inaccessible respondents.

The purpose of this paper is to focus on social justice issues identified by American principals. A research question that guided this qualitative study was: do educational leaders relate to the concept of leadership for social justice?

The standardized protocol for focus group discussions was based on Krueger and Casey's work on how to conduct effective focus group interviews. Each focus group carefully followed the protocol, which was designed to give voice to the informants and not to be led by the moderator in preconceived directions. This procedure provided a framework to maintain consistency in eliciting and collecting information but not leading participants to discuss social justice issues just to please the researchers.

This paper both confirmed that principals are concerned with social justice and identified that some principals do not explicitly discuss issues that relate to social justice. Principals who raised social justice issues felt that leaders should be courageous enough to make decisions that are best for children, even though they may not be popular.

Qualitative research such as this adds to the breadth and depth of human understanding, but findings cannot be generalized to any larger population.

The term social justice has become pervasive in US academic discussions, yet there has been little dialogue with practitioners and even less data examined concerning if the term has any relevance to practitioners. This paper explores the voices of practitioners in relation to a pervasive term in US academic discourse.

This chapter will provide examples of how Chicano faculty teach and practice social justice in the U.S. college classroom, where subtle forms of racism operate through White privilege, and influence faculty credibility and authority. From a Latino Critical Theory (LatCrit) perspective, the authors address the question, What are the similarities and differences in classroom experiences of Chicano faculty in Predominately White Institutions (PWI) and Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSI)? In addressing this question, the authors will provide examples from their teaching experiences at both PWIs and HSIs, and how a Chicana/o-centered social justice perspective can help to mediate and overcome classroom challenges. The chapter will end with a discussion of how a social justice framework is necessary in college classrooms that are becoming increasingly diverse; and recommendations for how PWIs and HSIs can support Chicana/o faculty in endeavors to institutionalize a social justice framework in the college curriculum.

This chapter introduces an initiative of the Spectrum Doctoral Fellows to build an online resource that engages the Library and Information Studies (LIS) community in a discussion of social justice initiatives within the field. This tool further develops a social justice framework that raises awareness of and integrates social justice methodologies into LIS curricula and library practices. This framework facilitates community building and the empowerment of the populations they serve.

Using an iterative approach to user-centered design, the Social Justice Collaboratorium (SJC) development process consists of input from a community of engaged users to inform the wireframe, prototype, testing, and development phases. This includes gathering substantial qualitative and quantitative data such as surveys of LIS faculty, practitioners and students, as well as tracking web analytics once the tool is live.

The SJC allows for the confluence of research, resources, networks, best practices, and LIS school models in a centralized medium. Designed for LIS practitioners, faculty, staff, and students, as well as those interested in project management, resource development, and collaborative work, the SJC supports different approaches to social justice in LIS.

The SJC will be accessible to a distributed community of social justice LIS scholars, practitioners, students, and activists. Contributions from the community of users throughout every stage of the development process ensures participation, stewardship, and intentionality. In this way, the SJC will be a transformative tool for the LIS community as a vehicle for promoting equity and social change.

Fundamental aspects of educational leadership preparation programs regarding social justice are embodied in program design elements, yet the scholarly community did not adequately address these issues. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

The essay suggests that organizational theories dealing with person-environment fit can shed light on the models, possibilities, and limitations of various preparation programs.

The essay proposes a meta-conceptual framework that builds on Schneider’s attraction-selection-attrition theory and on the socialization literature to classify leadership preparation programs by design. In addition, the paper reflects on the implications of program design in relation to the power and the responsibility of the faculty.

The essay argues that design decisions made by the faculty a priori enable and constrain its power and responsibility. The conclusion is that design decisions should be made by faculty with awareness of these issues.

This study investigates the intersections of health and social justice topics in the library and information science (LIS) curriculum. Course offerings from 60 American Library Association-Accredited LIS programs were extracted and comprised the study sample. Using a thematic content analysis, a total of 220 course descriptions were analyzed to assess the inclusion of health justice topics. A main finding was that only eight LIS course descriptions closely integrated health and social justice issues. In addition, four overarching thematic areas of LIS courses were identified from the dataset as conceptual pathways with the potential to further incorporate health justice aspects in LIS coursework. Recommendations for how to expand course offerings in these areas are explored. Overall, these preliminary findings help to map the existing health and social justice curricula and contribute the LIS educator viewpoint for both reducing health disparities and advancing health justice conversations.

The purpose of this article is to report on a six‐year self‐study of a doctoral training program intended to promote social justice leadership via an “ethic of care” framework.

The primary data set utilized was an open‐ended survey completed by doctoral students after finishing core course requirements. Data analysis included a thematic analysis of 110 respondents which examined variation in students' understanding and application of issues associated with equity, justice, and diversity, as well as the ethic of care. As a collaborative self‐study the data analysis involved procedures of open, independent, and collaborative coding, as well as peer debriefing.

Suggests that the doctoral program has been effective at creating a caring environment and changing students' understanding of diversity and equity issues. Two programmatic weaknesses were uncovered; a lack of curricular integration and student perceptions of social justice and diversity as discrete concepts. Students reported that diversity discussions and readings were centered in one class, suggesting that this lack of integration may marginalize these issues. These weaknesses are explored using the concepts of “caring” and “colorblind” curriculums.

Reports on a self‐study of one unique program; the findings may not be generalizable to other programs. Additionally, it suggests that leadership preparation programs should attend to how the issue of colorblindness may permeate curricula, structure the classroom environment, and shape interactions with students.

This paper is among the first to evaluate the potential for colorblindness in the “ethic of care” as related to supporting social justice leadership in a doctoral preparation program.

The purpose of this paper is to describe a study that explores the discreet activist strategies of educational leaders who promote social justice.

Part of a larger project, this study employed qualitative methods. In particular, researchers interviewed 26 leaders – principals, vice principals, department heads, and central office officials who presided over both homogeneous and diverse schools, departments, and districts in and around a large Canadian city. Data were analyzed during and after data collection, and themes were identified, explored, and described.

Given the resistance they faced in their efforts to promote social justice, leaders found that they had to be strategic in their efforts. In particular, they had to position themselves in ways that reduced their visibility and increased their credibility. When they took action, they tended to adopt subtle rather than obvious strategies.

The harsh reality for activist educational leaders who promote social justice is that they will likely have to be strategic in the way they go about their work. Given the nature of their relationships with the organizations in which they work and the power differentials within which they operate, educational leaders may have to adopt low key or discreet strategies if they are to successfully promote their social justice agendas.

The overarching purpose of this paper is to empower K‐12 educators, colleagues in teacher education programs, and educational leadership personnel to address social justice issues within communities where divergent perspectives abound.

The authors use a discursive method to uncover the historical and theoretical differences between global education and inclusive education, identify the ways in which the two fields are complementary, and propose strategies for education leadership personnel that build on the commonalities and best practices of both fields.

The authors argue that the two fields have essential elements that can and should inform each other. They term this intersection “inclusive global education”. They integrate the concepts from global education and inclusive education to define inclusive global education as a pedagogical and curricular stance, a way to honor the diverse cultural, linguistic, physical, mental, and cognitive complexities of all people, and a process that puts problematization of social justice issues at the center of leadership and teaching/learning activities.

Whereas global educators traditionally focus on learning to understand and come to respect the cultural, social, and political “other”, the traditional focus of special educators is to empower students to gain self‐respect. The authors argue that the first step involves a discourse that allows people with equally compelling but different views to learn to problematize issues of social justice. Once this first step is taken, inclusive global educators can come to agreements within diverse communities as to how to address local or global social justice issues. The authors further argue that global educators and special educators combine their knowledge of both fields. Together, global inclusive educators can forge pedagogical content knowledge that bridges the gap between affirming one's own identity and maintaining unity with the whole, and exemplifies a robust notion of social justice.

The authors believe this is the first attempt to integrate the conceptual and theoretical assumptions of two divergent knowledge bases (global education and inclusive education).

The purpose of the paper is to reflect on and respond to the papers contained in this Special Issue of Journal of Educational Administration.

A commentary is provided for each of the nine articles in the Special Issue.

The papers in the Special Issue constitute a substantial and important contribution toward incorporating international perspectives into an existing research discourse on educational leadership for social justice. One of the immediate challenges that will need to be addressed is how to systematically work against the hegemony of Western thought and colonialism that infiltrates all our discourses, even those that generate scholarship such as that found in this Special Issue.

The paper reflects on the current Special Issue, and provides directions for future research.