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1 – 10 of 39Maeve Wall, S. Shiver, Sonny Partola, Nicole Wilson Steffes and Rosie Ojeda
The authors suggest strategies for addressing and combating these attempts at racelighting.
Abstract
Purpose
The authors suggest strategies for addressing and combating these attempts at racelighting.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors of this article– five anti-racist educators working in various educational settings in SLC– employ the Critical Race Theory counter-story methodology (Delgado and Stefancic, 1993) to confront resistance to educational equity in Utah. They do so by first providing a historical context of race and education in Utah before presenting four short counterstories addressing the racelighting efforts of students, fellow educators and administrators when confronted with the complexities of racial injustice.
Findings
These counterstories are particularly important in light of the recent increase in color-evasive and whitewashed messaging used to attack CRT and to deny the existence of racism in the SLC school system in K-post-secondary education, and in the U.S. as a whole.
Originality/value
These stories are set in a unique environment, yet they hold national relevance. The racial and religious demographics in Utah shed light on the foundational ethos of the country – white, Christian supremacy. They reveal what is at stake in defending it and some of the key mechanisms of that defense.
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Melanie Maksin and Debra J. Bucher
In describing these projects, the authors hope to encourage academic librarians and archivists to participate in, and even facilitate, similar work at their own institutions…
Abstract
Purpose
In describing these projects, the authors hope to encourage academic librarians and archivists to participate in, and even facilitate, similar work at their own institutions. Although both of these projects began in the library and included readings and discussions related to library and archival practices, the most generative conversations rapidly shifted from “how should the library handle these materials?” to “what might this institution do to reckon with its history?” When traditional library practices were de-centered and community perspectives were sought on the college archive, the authors were able to have more inclusive, authentic conversations about the college's history and future.
Design/methodology/approach
This case study explores two projects undertaken at a liberal arts college: a working group and a credit-bearing course intended to reckon with racist, xenophobic or otherwise harmful materials in the college archive. Both projects were informed by the authors' engagement with Tema Okun's White Supremacy Culture and guided by inclusive pedagogies and practices that participants had explored in workshops and within the context of the college's Engaged Pluralism Initiative.
Findings
The working group and the course underscore the centrality of relationships, trust-building and time to the work of addressing difficult histories. The “campus-wide conversations” the authors had hoped to have about the college archive evolved into smaller spaces developed with intention and care. The diverse perspectives of working group members and students in the course demonstrate the value of bringing together viewpoints from outside the library and beyond institutional or disciplinary silos, to consider far-reaching systemic issues.
Practical implications
Many US colleges and universities have begun, or will begin, to investigate the myriad ways in which racism, racial exclusion, or racial violence have marked their institutions and how these troubled legacies persist in the present day. This case study proposes possible approaches that academic libraries and librarians may take to contribute to this essential work.
Originality/value
These two projects propose that work that typically happens solely within libraries and archives (cataloging and description of potentially harmful materials) or within institutional or disciplinary silos (reckoning with legacies of racism and bias) can be discussed, debated, and shared among the campus community. All of the participants in the working group and the course, regardless of their title, role, or academic credentials, bring necessary expertise and experience to these projects. Inclusive practices, when paired with grassroots energy, suggest ways in which a college archive can be used as a site of evidence, reflection, interrogation, and repair.
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This chapter presents a critical reflection on delivering a lecture on the impacts of colonialism to a cohort of predominantly white, undergraduate students in the UK. This…
Abstract
This chapter presents a critical reflection on delivering a lecture on the impacts of colonialism to a cohort of predominantly white, undergraduate students in the UK. This chapter provides an overview of the lecture, including its key content and how it built on a wider programme of learning. It then discusses student reactions to the lecture content, reviews the literature on teaching sensitive subjects, highlights what pedagogues in Higher Education (HE) can learn from this literature, and explores both teacher and student positionality. The chapter concludes that pedagogues in HE should pursue the teaching of sensitive subjects and not ‘give in’ to student discomfort. Not creating the conditions to discuss such issues in learning spaces ultimately sides with existing structures of power and privilege in HE that should be challenged. However, strategies need to be put in place to overcome students’ fears of discussing sensitive subjects. These strategies include pedagogues building up trust, facilitating open dialogue, and reflexively exploring positionality. These present both students and teachers with the opportunity to recognise and transform their own biases, perceptions, and attitudes to facilitate deeper and more democratic learning; and challenge existing structures of privilege in HE that benefit more powerful groups.
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Xan Y. Goodman and Samantha Ann Godbey
The purpose of this paper is to provide readers with a deeper theoretical understanding of liminality, its utility in understanding the experiences of graduate student researchers…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to provide readers with a deeper theoretical understanding of liminality, its utility in understanding the experiences of graduate student researchers and how being explicit about the liminal nature of the graduate student experience can be especially impactful for students from marginalized communities.
Design/methodology/approach
This conceptual paper examines liminality as an essential component of researcher identity development and how an awareness of this liminality relates to effective and inclusive librarian support of graduate student researchers. The authors explore the affective and academic implications of operating in this liminal state and how direct acknowledgment of this inbetweenness, especially within the spaces of classroom instruction and research consultations, can be leveraged as an inclusive practice. The authors ground this exploration in critical pedagogy.
Findings
Graduate student researchers often operate in an unacknowledged liminal state, which causes students to question the importance of their previous knowledge and life experiences and feel discouraged and uncertain about their potential place in academia. This is particularly damaging to students from communities that have been traditionally marginalized and excluded from higher education.
Originality/value
The authors are liaison librarians to education and health sciences at a large, minority-serving, urban research institution in the western USA and draw on their experience supporting students in disciplines that include many students returning to graduate studies after substantial professional experience. This work makes a contribution to library and information studies by focusing on the concept of liminality. The authors offer a conceptual perspective on liminality relative to librarians and their support role in the graduate student experience.
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Sarah E. Brown and Kari D. Weaver
To illuminate the experience of working with students using the innovative pedagogical approach of dramaturgy, this pedagogy can more effectively address systemic bias within…
Abstract
Purpose
To illuminate the experience of working with students using the innovative pedagogical approach of dramaturgy, this pedagogy can more effectively address systemic bias within academia.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper is rooted in dramaturgical theory which suggests that how a person's identity or background is being constantly reshaped by their interactions with one another and the world around them. Within a classroom setting, it applies to contexts where group activities have a required performative aspect.
Findings
The authors found that taking a dramaturgical approach can be a very effective active learning technique within a one-shot information literacy instruction context.
Originality/value
Creative approaches to information literacy instruction often remain untried, and the combination of this work and the consideration of dramaturgical theory within the framework of inclusive pedagogy is a distinct contribution to the field.
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Within North American institutions of higher education, the sociopolitical construct of whiteness comprises an often implicit set of lessons that are reflected not only in policy…
Abstract
Within North American institutions of higher education, the sociopolitical construct of whiteness comprises an often implicit set of lessons that are reflected not only in policy and curricula but also in the teaching practices of faculty. Such lessons perpetuate white centricity and supremacy, at enormous costs to those who have been negatively racialized. Therefore, it is critical for white faculty to engage meaningfully with ongoing processes of self-reflection, self-education, and skill development so that they can contribute positively to the interrogation and disruption of whiteness in higher education. This chapter discusses seven processual considerations for white educators who seek to interrogate and disrupt the problem of whiteness in teaching and learning.
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Mia von Knorring, Hanna Karlsson, Elizabeth Stenwall, Matti Johannes Nikkola and Maria Niemi
This study aims to analyse student and teaching staff views on how higher education (HE) can contribute to sustainable development, and to provide examples of how a medical…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to analyse student and teaching staff views on how higher education (HE) can contribute to sustainable development, and to provide examples of how a medical university has adopted the sustainable development goals (SDGs) as part of its institutional strategies and practises.
Design/methodology/approach
The study is based on participant views from a conference, which aimed to identify actions needed for HE to contribute to the SDGs. More than 500 students, teachers and academic leaders participated at workshops to discuss and reflect on the role of higher education institutions (HEIs) in sustainable development. The discussion key points were recorded on flipcharts, and the analysis builds on all written statements from the nine workshops. Based on the findings from the workshop, steering documents and activities of a medical university were identified as examples of implementation.
Findings
Two overarching interdependent themes were identified and indicated a need to rethink the role not only of HE per se but also that of HEIs at large, to meet the challenges of sustainable development. The study also provides an example of how such organizational change can be practically implemented at a medical university, through the establishment of overarching institutional strategies, funding opportunities and external collaborations.
Practical implications
The findings reflect a “bottom-up” call from students and educational staff for HEIs to step up and contribute to systems change – both through a change in pedagogies, as well as through an institution-wide approach and a shift in the role of HEIs in society.
Originality/value
The study is unique in providing an exemplar of the implementation of sustainable development in HE at a specific medical university.
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Satlaj Dighe, John M. LaVelle, Paidamoyo Chikate, Meral Acikgoz, Padmavati Kannan, Doris Espelien and Trupti Sarode
Although educators would likely agree that values and ethics are important in all disciplines, they have particular importance for practice-oriented fields. These applied…
Abstract
Although educators would likely agree that values and ethics are important in all disciplines, they have particular importance for practice-oriented fields. These applied professionals need to solve complex social problems that require the application of ethical standards and value perspectives. While the importance of value-engaged practice is known to the applied field, there is little research and conversation about how values can be integrated into teaching. This chapter synthesizes values-education approaches in various practice-based disciplines such as public administration (PA), program evaluation, social work, and public health. This chapter draws from empirical and theoretical works as well as the authors' experiences developing, participating in, and conducting values-based research on professionals and professional education.
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Colleen Fitzpatrick and Adam Friedman
This study explores how one novice teacher navigated his first-year teaching sixth-grade social studies.
Abstract
Purpose
This study explores how one novice teacher navigated his first-year teaching sixth-grade social studies.
Design/methodology/approach
One-sixth grade novice teacher was observed during his unit on the Islamic Empire. The teacher was interviewed before the unit began to understand his approach to combating Islamophobia and interviewed again after the unit so he could reflect on the unit and discuss if he believed he had accomplished his original goal. Classroom artifacts (handouts, slide decks, etc.) were collected.
Findings
The findings highlight the various forces that impacted the decisions the teacher made in the classroom. Lack of support from administration and various colleagues left the teacher feeling overwhelmed and unable to accomplish his goals. While the teacher started the unit with a clear purpose for teaching against Islamophobia, he ultimately taught a unit where students memorized discrete pieces of information.
Originality/value
This study adds to previous research on the need for providing administrative support for novice teachers to be able to teach in ambitious ways by highlighting the numerous shortcomings.
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Eleonora Concina, Sara Frate and Michele Biasutti
Hikikomori is a multidimensional condition, characterized by voluntarily social withdrawal, impacting the relational dimension of life. The current study aims to examine secondary…
Abstract
Purpose
Hikikomori is a multidimensional condition, characterized by voluntarily social withdrawal, impacting the relational dimension of life. The current study aims to examine secondary school teachers' beliefs, knowledge and needs on hikikomori and students' social withdrawal.
Design/methodology/approach
A qualitative method consisting of a semi-structured interview is adopted with 22 Italian secondary school teachers. The interview questions are focused on the beliefs, the profile, the conditions and the role of the school for adolescents socially retired.
Findings
Data are analysed using content analysis based on the grounded theory framework. Forty-nine codes emerged from the inductive analysis, which were sorted into the following categories: (1) Characteristics of hikikomori and social withdrawal; (2) Origin, causes and consequences; (3) Sources of information; (4) Socio-relational modalities; (5) Teachers' needs and role of the school. Teachers are aware of the educational issues and risks related to hikikomori and claim for more institutional support. Teachers reconsider the way of working in class for preventing the risk of self-isolation, supporting the development of social and emotional skills, and encouraging collaboration and positive exchanges among students. Participants mention a personalized student-centred method where families and external agencies support the school system.
Originality/value
Although several clinical and psychological interventions have been developed for treating the hikikomori’s self-isolation and concomitant mental disorders, few plans have been implemented for reducing the risk of adolescents' social withdrawal. Preventing hikikomori is crucial as well as to investigate the role and the needs of school teachers, and the current study has tried to explore these.
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