FreshEd

Today we review the field of comparative and international education for 2019. With me for the last show of the year are Susan Robertson and Roger Dale, co-editors of the journal Globalisation, Societies and Education.

In our conversation, we touch on many topics, including the rise of global populism, the power of youth, and the impending climate crisis. The end of the second decade of the 21st century was a watershed year in many respects. What were the big events and ideas and where are we headed in 2020?

Susan and Roger also make a big announcement at the end of the show. So stay tuned until the end!

Susan Robertson is a Professor of Sociology of Education at the University of Cambridge, and Roger Dale is Emeritus Professor of Education at the University of Bristol.

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What role does higher education play in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals?

My guest today is Tristan McCowan, author of the new book entitled Higher Education for and beyond the Sustainable Development Goals, which was published earlier this year. Tristan interrogates the idea of a so-called developmental university working towards the SGDs, identifying both positive and negative outcomes.

Tristan McCowan is a Professor of International Education at the Institute of Education, University College London. I spoke with Tristan in his office in London, which just so happens to be around the corner from mine. This is actually the first episode that I’ve recorded at my new intuitional home at the Institute of Education. There’s a lot more to say about the future of FreshEd now that I live in London, but I’m going to wait until next year to tell you all about it. For now, enjoy our latest episode and stay tuned for our end of year show with Susan Robertson and Roger Dale, which will air next week.

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Play is a foundational element of a child’s life. Yet, how much is play embraced inside schools? My guests today, Pasi Sahlberg and William Doyle, argue play is the fundamental energy of learning. And schools need to embrace play much more than they currently do to support child development.

For Pasi and William, screen time and the global education reform movement that emphasizes standardized tests have reduced the amount of time children are allowed to play in school.

Pasi Sahlberg is a professor of education policy at the Gonski Institute for Education of the University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia. He is a globally renowned educator, author, speaker, and scholar, and one of the world’s most respected authorities on educational improvement.

William Doyle is New York Times bestselling author and TV producer. Since 2015 he has served as a Fulbright Scholar, a Scholar in Residence and lecturer on media and education at the University of Eastern Finland, and as advisor to the Ministry of Education and Culture of Finland

Their new co-written book is called Let the Children Play, which was published by Oxford University Press earlier this year.

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The timeframe to achieve the sustainable development goals is tight. We have just over a decade to complete the 169 targets across 17 goals. Target 4.7, which aims for all learners to acquire knowledge and skills needed to promote sustainable development, is particularly challenging. What are the knowledge and skills needed for sustainable development? And how can they be integrated into policies, programs, curricula, materials, and practices?

My guest today is Andy Smart, a former teacher with almost 20 years’ experience working in educational and children’s book publishing in England and Egypt. He is a co-convener of a networking initiative called Networking to Integrate SDG Target 4.7 and Social and Emotional Learning into Educational Materials, or NISSEM for short, where he is interested in how textbooks support pro-social learning in low- and middle-income countries. Together with Margaret Sinclair, Aaron Benavot, Jean Bernard, Colette Chabbot, S. Garnett Russell, and James Williams, Andy has recently co-edited a volume entitled NISSEM Global Briefs: Educating for the Social, the Emotional, and the Sustainable. This collection aims at helping education ministries, donors, consultancy groups and NGOs advance SDG target 4.7 in low-and middle-income countries.

Photo by: Helena g Anderson

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What are the possible futures presupposed within the organization of refugee education worldwide? Do the understood purposes of refugee education align at the global, national and school levels?

My guest today is Sarah Dryden-Peterson, an Associate Professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education who has been researching refugee education for 15 years. Together with Elizabeth Adelman, Michelle Bellino, and Vidur Chopra, she has recently co-authored an article for the journal Sociology of Education that looks at the purposes of refugee education today. Sarah and her colleagues argue that quality refugee education must further a sense of belongingness.

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School students all over the globe have declared a “Climate Emergency.” For some time now, youth have been striking for immediate and effective action to stop global warming and secure the habitability of our planet. Greta Thunberg is perhaps the most recognizable student protesting. You’ve probably seen her moving speech at the United Nations last month.

In the context where students skip school to protest, what role do teachers play? More broadly, what is the role of education in times of climate crisis?

One group of university professors and activists have thought deeply about these questions. They have recently launched a “Call to Action” for educators, asking signatories to transform their pedagogies and curricula, realign research agendas, and reformulate policy frameworks – all in line with the climate crisis and other environmental challenges. In short, signatories are asked to voice their concerns any way they can in their professional work in and outside the classroom.

By the early of November, almost 2000 educators signed the Call to Action.

Today’s show takes you behind the scenes of this Call to Action, connecting the student protests and the climate crisis to the Sustainable Development Goals and Global Learning Metrics.

Sign the call to action here: https://educators-for-climate-action.org/petition/

Photo credit: https://unsplash.com/s/photos/climate-change

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Today I speak with Elizabeth Sumida Huaman and Tessie Naranjo about indigenous women and research. They have co-edited the latest issue of the International Journal of Human Rights Education, which was released last week.

Elizabeth Sumida Huaman is an associate professor of Comparative and International Development Education at the University of Minnesota. An Indigenous education researcher, her work focuses on the link between Indigenous lands and natural resources, languages, and cultural and educational practices in the North and South America. Tessie Naranjo lives in northern New Mexico and is an internationally recognized Indigenous community education, language revitalization, and arts advocate. She is a founder of the Pueblo Indian Studies Program at Northern New Mexico College where she served as faculty, and former co-Director of the Northern Pueblos Institute.

What does it mean to think of comparative education beyond the human? Is our field based on assumptions of individual autonomy and Western Enlightenment thinking that sees time as linear and progress as possible? Does a “posthuman future” hold new possibilities for our research? And can our field live with such dissonance?

Earlier this month, the Post Foundational Approaches to Comparative and International

Education Special Interest Group of the Comparative and International Education Society

organized a webinar entitled “Exploring education beyond the human” to think through some of these questions.

The webinar brought together Weili Zhao, Stephen Carney, and Iveta Silova. I moderated the discussion, which explored what education beyond the human would actual look like and entail.

In this special addition of FreshEd, I’m going to replay our conversation because I think the ideas discussed push our field in new and important directions.

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Controversies over school policies that impact transgender students have increasingly made headlines in the United States for the past few years. What legal protections do transgender students have in schools? And how have the Obama and Trump administrations interpreted the law in this regard?

My guest today is Suzanne Eckes, professor in the Educational Leadership and Policy Studies Department at Indiana University. She has written about the various legal cases involving transgender students.

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Teach For America developed an alternative teacher education model that spread not only around the United States but also across the world.

My guest today is Rolf Straubhaar, Assistant Professor of Educational Leadership and School Improvement at Texas State University. In his latest article in the Journal of Teacher Education, Rolf looks at the Teach For All affiliate in Brazil called Ensina! In our conversation, Rolf explores the history of TFA, the motivation of people to join the program, and how their perspectives changed over time

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