This phenomenological study examines the experience of middle school youth at a small public school in New Hampshire as they engaged in youth participatory action research (YPAR) designed to promote diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging within their predominantly White suburban community. This study centered the 22 participants' perspectives…

The U.S. Education system is founded on a Eurocentric focus of curriculum, and students of color are not achieving as high as white students on the National Assessment for Education Progress in science. This research aims to repay the education debt owed to students of color by decolonizing science curriculum through the implementation of lessons…

Participatory action research (PAR) with youth holds potential to spur social justice-oriented change due to its explicit orientation to transform systemic inequity. Whereas youth in PAR projects embody agency in their actions, they hold less institutional power than adults in positions of authority. In addition, youth who have been marginalized…

Background: American students represent diverse life experiences, languages, cultures, and community memberships. Given the relatively unchanged demographics of U.S. teachers (primarily middle-class, white females), it is important that teachers engage in culturally proactive pedagogy and design curriculum that both reflects their students'…

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to inquire into the effectiveness of authentic writing instruction embedded in a critical service-learning project in a middle school English Language Arts curriculum. Design/methodology/approach: This paper analyzes middle school students' survey responses before and after their participation in a critical…

This qualitative study examined the complexities of mutually engaging across differing positionalities (students and students, students and teacher) while intentionally working in spaces of distress (e.g. push and pull between oppression and liberation). The findings demonstrated the ways in which building a beloved community while situated within…

This study explored the ways in which our classroom community (students and teacher) engaged with humanizing pedagogy in a seventh grade science classroom, toward the full development of our classroom community, and the dismantling of inequitable practices and unjust policies that we recognized in our science classroom, school and/or community…

How can afterschool programs engage middle school students of color as they enter their teenage years? The authors asked this question while working with the Bridge Project, a drop-in community-based academic enrichment program serving low-income children and adolescents of color living in public housing in Denver, Colorado. Faced with dwindling…

In this article, the author contributes to the growing body of scholarship on critical mathematics pedagogy. In particular, the author advances this scholarship by outlining how critical pedagogy in the mathematics classroom can support students to engage in transformational resistance. Using a critical practitioner research approach, the author…

Preparing teachers to be civic educators is especially critical in urban schools serving marginalized populations. This paper proposal describes the use of a highly interactive, student-centered, and social justice-oriented teaching strategy -- youth participatory action research (YPAR) -- to support new urban teachers working at all grades level…

Historically marginalized students continue to experience opportunity gaps in our schools and inequities in their communities. To change these contexts, we want students to develop the skills, mindsets, and ability to act against oppression. In order for that to occur, educators must have support and opportunities to learn and practice acting as…

This study highlights the power of place, and reconceptualizes geography education as integral to the larger project of teaching for democratic citizenship. Using an interactive web platform, the researchers asked 29 seventh grade girls to research and map significant cultural and historical places associated with an ethnic group, or women, in the…

This article investigates how affluent students made sense of social justice issues that were embedded in mathematics learning activities. I present 2 case studies of such activities at the intermediate and secondary levels in 2 different schools. The analysis draws on video records and classroom artifacts and applies the theoretical framework of…

The purpose of this action research study was to better understand and improve my efforts as a Physical Education Teacher Education (PETE) instructor to transform the attitudes, beliefs, and understandings of preservice teachers (PSTs) with regard to issues of social justice, specifically by achieving equality by providing opportunities and…

As two teacher educators teaching two sections of a master's action research capstone course, we analyze (1) course content and pedagogy, (2) evolving beliefs about research, and (3) transformations in question posing as students assume the role of researchers. Our theoretical frame draws on teacher research, social justice advocacy, and the…