One widely accepted narrative in Singapore concerns access and reads thus: education is the main vehicle for upward income mobility. Students are sorted into Normal and Express programmes through the Primary School Leaving Examinations at 12 years of age. Academic overachievement is the socially validated norm. Rising incidents of youth suicide…

The job of an education system-level leader in urban environments is becoming more demanding, and the environment in which they operate more complex. Filling these very critical roles with individuals who possess the right characteristics could mean the difference between success and failure at improving the educational outcomes of students who…

Recent census data indicate that student populations in U.S. classrooms continue to become increasingly racially diverse. Despite these changes, many early childhood teachers remain reluctant to teach children about race and racial justice. In this article, I argue that multicultural picture books can and should be used to promote racial awareness…

This article reports on urban elementary teachers' understandings of cultural relevancy and the practices they enacted after a professional development on culturally relevant education (CRE) and cognitive apprenticeship. Focus group interviews support that participating teachers understood some principles of CRE but did not always match the theory…

Currently there is no urban forestry and natural resources curriculum available to Louisiana K-12 students. In addition, there has not been any assessment of the perception, willingness of teachers and or students in Louisiana for Urban Forestry. This study assessed the above gaps in urban forestry and natural resources education and addressed the…

This article examines how three Black women educators disrupt oppressive norms in urban schooling through their applications of critical race womanist pedagogy (CRWP). Using narrative excerpts formed from semi-structured interviews exploring how they contend with sociopolitical injustices through their pedagogical choices and actions, CRWP…

Mainstream thought on Pacific education tends to highlight the relatively poor educational achievement and sub-optimal experiences of Pacific learners in Aotearoa New Zealand. This article explores further understandings of the links between Pacific learners, their environments, and relational learning experiences. The argument is supported by…

This dissertation explores everyday interactions and opportunities for teachers and families to collaborate in spite of forces that often put Black families and schools at odds in one predominantly Black elementary school. I examine interactions among Black families and teachers to consider how organizational norms, values, and routines influence…

This in-process study investigates experiences of Lincoln Center's first teaching artists, connecting their work in the 1970s to contemporary practice.

In commemoration of the germinal 1995 critical race theory (CRT) in education manuscript offered by Gloria Ladson-Billings and William Tate IV, the following account seeks to perform several tasks. As CRT has traveled throughout the myriad of disciplinary foci in education (curriculum, foundations, special education, educational psychology, youth…

This article provides an account of the ways in which students and adult supporters of an urban turnaround high school mobilized to defy the rhetoric of neoliberal reforms and the subsequent deficit narrative imposed on them and on their school. Their counternarratives refute the master narratives advanced by federal and state educational reforms.…

Background/Context: Culturally relevant education (CRE) is a powerful tool for improving students' educational experiences and outcomes. Yet CRE is not the norm in U.S. public education systems (Achinstein & Ogawa, 2011, 2012; Borrero et al., 2016; Coffey & Farinde-Wu, 2016), perhaps because teachers are socialized into systems that…

This forum explores contradictions that arose within the partnership between Teach for America (TFA) and a university teacher education program. TFA is an alternate route teacher preparation program that places individuals into K-12 classrooms in low-income school districts after participating in an intense summer training program and provides…

Awareness of the impact of education on health remains relatively low among the public, professionals, and policy makers. Virginia Commonwealth University's Center on Society and Health sought to raise awareness among key decision makers about the impact of education on health outcomes through its Education and Health Initiative (EHI). EHI…

Students from urban high schools are usually faced with adverse environmental factors in their pursuit of academic success. These factors make learning more challenging and may confound the measurement of academic performance itself. This study explores how one such factor, ambient noise, affects the measurement of mathematics achievement.…