The author explicates the life story of Anne Smyth, a deaf teacher in 19th-century Ireland. The story was written and published in 1858 by another deaf teacher, Charlotte Mary Kelly, who traced Anne Smyth's life trajectory from her birth to the day she began life in a deaf school until her untimely death at the age of 18 years. The study examines…

The faith-based identity of Catholic schools is increasingly problematic in a secularised society where the numbers of teachers belonging to religious orders are diminishing rapidly. Teachers' views regarding the characteristics of Catholic schools are an important aspect of the identity of such schools. The authors locate Catholic schools in the…

There has been extensive research internationally describing teachers' homogenous socio-demographic backgrounds and critiquing the associated equity and diversity issues, most especially with regard to ethnicity and gender, and to a lesser extent, social class and disability. Yet, teachers' religious affiliations and/or convictions have rarely…

The current COVID-19 crisis has significantly impacted all teachers throughout the country, in particular, those teaching in urban schools. The urgent nature of this crisis has brought new challenges to urban Catholic school educators specifically, and their ability to enact and model Catholic Social Teachings which include; respect for the life…

Research has established the connection between the academic success of culturally and linguistically diverse students, and their schools' ability to recruit and retain teachers that reflect such diversity (Shirrell et al., 2019). Studies have also highlighted the criticality of the students' home language use as a way to enhance academic growth…

This paper examines the extent to which school team members' professional relationships are affected by being part of a certain generational cohort. These professional relationships provide opportunities for intergenerational knowledge flows and can therefore be relevant for intergenerational learning. Nowadays these topics have gained more…

Core self-evaluations, effective leadership styles and employee job satisfaction are essential factors for organizational success. This paper aims to determine the relationship of the leader's core self-evaluations, transformational leadership and servant leadership styles to their follower's job satisfaction in selected Parochial Schools in…

The multiple academic and social advantages of a dual language education are well known; yet there is little practical guidance for Catholic school leaders who are taking on this whole school change. This paper explores the necessary steps for Catholic school leaders to develop equitable dual language schools. Guided by the Gospel principles of…

Over the last three decades, there has been a burgeoning of research on teacher identity. While the various bodies of work produced are very valuable, further lines of enquiry need to be pursued in order to take account of the complexities involved. This paper on the conception, construction, and maintenance of the identity of Roman Catholic…

The number of people applying for school based religious education leadership positions is scarce in most regions throughout Australia as well as other geographical regions. Drawing on the insights from key stakeholders associated with religious education leadership in schools this qualitative study aimed to identify factors which militated…

The technological, pedagogical, and content knowledge (TPACK) framework considers the role of technology in teaching. Although TPACK is grounded in context, one limitation is the lack of understanding about the interactions between particular contexts, knowledge development, and instruction. This qualitative multiple-case study was designed to…

This paper reports on the opinions of teachers in Queensland Catholic schools regarding the identity, purposes and characteristics of Catholic schools. It draws on survey data from 2287 teachers in Catholic schools as well as semi-structured interviews with 20 teachers. Respondents were asked about their reasons for working in Catholic Education…

Catholic elementary and secondary schools across the country recently adopted standards reflective of the Common Core State Standards to align instruction with state and national guidelines requiring the revision of curriculum and the adjustment of instruction to meet the new standards from an ideological model. This article describes a…

Catholic educational historians note that although preserving Catholic identity has been a constant in the mission of Catholic schools, their curriculum and instructional practices evolved in ways that were similar to public schools, thus enabling Catholic parents to select schools that were both faith based and modern. Since there is an absence…

The present work aims at presenting and comparing challenges faced by religion teachers in Catholic and state schools in Poland. For that purpose, 10 religion teachers from Catholic and 10 from state high schools were interviewed. First of all, the concept of teaching religion was discussed, followed by an analysis of the Catholic schools'…