Equity and justice for all: The politics of cultivating anti-racist practices in urban teacher education
Abstract
Purpose – This paper aims to examine the cultivation of anti-racist practices with pre- and in-service teachers in post-secondary contexts, and the tensions of engaging in this work for equity and justice in urban teacher education.
Design/methodology/approach – The paper relies on critical race theory (CRT) and critical whiteness studies (CWS), as well as auto-ethnographic and storytelling methods to examine how black in-service teachers working with a black teacher educator and white pre-service teachers working with a white teacher educator enacted strategies for cultivating anti-racist practices.
Findings – Findings indicate that for black and white educators alike, developing critical consciousness and anti-racist pedagogical practices requires naming racism as the central construct of oppression. Moreover, teachers and teacher educators demonstrated the importance of explicitly naming racism and centralizing (rather than de-centralizing) the political project of anti-racism within the current socio-political climate.
Research limitations/implications – In addition to racism, educators’ racialized identities must be centralized to support individual anti-racist pedagogical practices. Storying racism provides a context for this individualized work and provides a framework for disrupting master narratives embedded in educational institutions.
Originality/value – Much has been written about the importance of teachers connecting to students’ out-of-school lives to increase academic achievement and advance educational justice. Strategies for forging those connections include using assets-based practices and linking school curricula to students’ community and cultural identities. While these connections are important, this paper focuses on teachers’ explicit anti racist practices in urban education.
Reference
Kinloch, V., & Dixon, K. (2017). Equity and justice for all: The politics of cultivating anti-racist practices in urban teacher education.
English Teaching: Practice & Critique,
16(3), 331–346.
https://doi.org/10.1108/ETPC-05-2017-0074
Journal
English Teaching: Practice and Critique
Analysis
Is this article part of a larger project or series of studies?
no
Does this study draw on a large, preexisting data set?
no
Research Approach
- Ethnographic
- Qualitiative
Geographic Setting
Institutional Context
Certification Level
Programatic Focus
- Mathematics
- Science
- Urban Education
Research Location Context
- community organization
- Secondary school
- University
Preservice Participants
Preservice Sample Size
10
Other Participant Data
Duration of Data Collection
Data Sources
- Audio recordings
- Blog
- email correspondence
- fieldnotes
- Interviews
- Video
Data Analysis Tools
- humanizing research methodologies and storytelling (hooks, 1990; Irizarry, 2011; Kinloch and San Pedro, 2014; Patel, 2015)
Researcher Positionality
- A combination of their own students and students from other programs
- inside (staying their own students)
Research Questions
How do we (Valerie and Kerry) navigate the politics of teaching by centering equity, justice and anti-racist practices in our collaborations with pre-and in-service urban teachers?
Is this research question explicit from the manuscript? Yes
What are some of the ways pre- and in-service urban teachers navigate these same politics to cultivate their own anti-racist practices?
Is this research question explicit from the manuscript? Yes