An enduring concern for educational policy in many affluent countries is the endemic nature of educational inequalities that are predominately located in poor urban contexts. Given the inabilities of school reform "per se" to deal with these inequalities, the paper focuses on issues of scarcity and spatial processes that are implicated…

This article explores a framework for an ethics of choice in urban education. It outlines the educational ambitions and ambivalences of a group of middle class families in one locality. The research on which we draw involved interviews with 28 middle class parents in the London Borough of Hackney and is part of a comparative study of urban middle…

Schools are essentially expected to provide all students with the same educational opportunity despite where they live, or their ability levels. Education Action Zones (EAZs) and Zones d'Education Prioritaire (ZEPs) have been implemented to help eradicate the issue of student equity, promising innovation and a solution to inequalities evidenced in…

This volume of transformed research utilizes an activist approach to examine the notion that nothing is apolitical. Research projects themselves are critically examined for power orientations, even as they are used to address curricular problems and educational or societal issues. Philosophical perspectives that have facilitated an understanding…

Both the United States and England initiated ambitious standards-based education reform to eliminate large gaps between their highest and lowest achievers. England appears to be ahead, having started in 1988 with a national curriculum, tests, and performance tables. The United States' No Child Left Behind Act began rewriting state rules in 2002…