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Aligning research with action and reflection: The Lead the Change Interview with Jackie Pedota

Posted on July 18, 2024 by T Hatch | Leave a comment

In this month’s Lead the Change (LtC) interview, Jackie Pelota discusses the role of research in remdying education inequality. Pelota is a Postdoctoral Associate in the Educational Leadership and policy department at the University of Texas at Austin. The LtC series is produced by Elizabeth Zumpe and colleagues from the Educational Change Special Interest Group of the American Educational Research Association. A pdf of the full interview will be available on the LtC website.

Lead the Change (LtC): The 2025 AERA theme is “Research, Remedy, and Repair: Toward Just Education Renewal.” This theme urges scholars to consider the role that research can play in remedying educational inequality, repairing harm to communities and institutions, and contributing to a more just future in education. What steps are you taking, or do you plan to take, to heed this call?

Jackie Pedota (JP): At this pivotal moment, it is more crucial than ever to align our research with action and reflection, bridging the gap between theory and practice. Since Hamas’ attack on Israel on October 7th, 2023, Israel’s counterattack and invasion of Gaza has led to the death of over 30,000 mostly civilian Palestinians, including young children. Students, faculty, and others across campuses have shown their support for the Palestinian people in the aftermath. These overwhelmingly peaceful campus protests took a turn for the worse in April 2024 when they were met with aggressive tactics, retaliation by administrators (e.g., withholding degrees), and police violence. On April 24th, 2024, I witnessed this police violence against students and faculty first-hand at my own campus of the University of Texas at Austin, and it was horrifying.

Students, primarily Arab, Muslim, Jewish, and other minoritized students, bravely stand at the forefront of ongoing protests, actively participating in democratic processes and demanding justice for the Palestinian people. These students work tirelessly to posit alternative futures, repair harm, and alleviate suffering. Yet, they have been met with unprecedented violence and harsh resistance from the very leaders and administrators who promised to support them–and who likely urged them to “change the world” in speeches when they first stepped onto campus at orientation. As an early career scholar and someone who aspires to hold a faculty position one day, it has been disheartening to witness this decoupling of academic researchers’ ideas from their everyday actions.

We in the Educational Change field can learn so much from these students if we listen to them. They are applying what they have learned. They are putting theory into practice to push for substantive change.

Thus, we must ask ourselves: How can we, as scholars, produce research that creates more just, equitable, and liberatory educational systems? To better align these research aims with everyday actions, I think the bare minimum we all can do is to hold space to hear from these students, taking their concerns seriously and advocating via our institutional channels for leaders to drop disciplinary charges. I also believe it is important for me to use my privilege as a scholar to uplift these students’ experiences and, in my research, draw attention to the underlying driving force behind these institutional actions—the well-funded right-wing political infrastructure that is increasingly shaping policies and practices within higher education.

“There is an urgent need to affirm, support, and empower faculty, especially faculty of color, to uphold principles of academic freedom and racial inclusion.”

In the months leading up to the 2025 AERA annual meeting, I hope to see more students, faculty, scholars, and leaders stand in solidarity. If we truly believe in higher education’s role in sustaining a multi-racial democracy, we all should be finding ways to support these students—working with, not against them. We will be working for decades to repair the trust that has been shattered for so many students at colleges and universities across the country. However, we can start this work now. At AERA and beyond, there is hope that we, as Educational Change scholars, will answer the call to produce research while actively repairing our educational systems for those who have been most marginalized by these very systems.

LtC: Your work has involved examining increasing pressures from state legislation restricting teaching and scholarship focused on race and racial inclusion in higher education. What are some of the major lessons that practitioners and scholars of Educational Change can learn from your work and experience?

JP: Currently, I am studying how faculty are changing their practices in response to a wave of legislative efforts to curtail the curriculum, research, policies, and practices focused on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in higher education. As of May 24th, 2024, 85 bills have been introduced to state legislatures across the country, with 14 successfully passing into law, limiting racial inclusion efforts, free expression, and academic freedom (Lu et al., 2024). Ongoing efforts spearheaded by external right-wing organizations and think tanks, like the Manhattan Institute, represent a coordinated campaign to roll back long-fought civil rights advancements within higher education via the erosion of academic freedom (Kamola, 2024).

Through interviews and observations over the last three years, my colleagues and I have found that, without adequate institutional support, many faculty change their teaching and research on race to protect themselves even when laws are not yet in effect (Pedota, 2023). In response to political and legal threats, faculty, particularly faculty of color, find themselves navigating a complex and shifting landscape with little to no guidance from senior leaders and department-level administrators (Pedota, 2023). Moreover, the communication and guidance faculty receive from higher education administration often reflect an overinterpretation of vague bill language (Reilly, 2024). This results in guidance that is more restrictive than necessary, a dynamic called repressive legalism (Garces et al., 2021). These overly cautious responses are partly driven by public university leaders fearing political backlash and funding cuts (Moody, 2023).

“Without adequate institutional support, many faculty change their teaching and research on race to protect themselves even when laws are not yet in effect.”

When faculty are left alone to interpret and respond to these legal pressures, many act from a place of self-preservation and safety to ultimately suppress racial inclusion work otherwise protected under academic freedom (Pedota, 2023). As faculty of color are the most visible of targets for potential disciplinary action or professional attacks, they feel even more pressure to change their teaching approaches, cancel courses, remove course content, and pause research (Golden, 2023). Ultimately, proposed bills targeting race scholarship and DEI work, even when not enacted into laws, are taking a psychological toll, resulting in poor working environments and the loss of faculty from impacted states (Melhado, 2023; Pedota, 2023). These curricular impacts and departures substantially threaten higher education and democracy, as faculty of color play a vital role in cultivating critical thinking, innovation, and democratic participation (Milem et al., 2005).

Thus, there is an urgent need to affirm, support, and empower faculty, especially faculty of color, to uphold principles of academic freedom and racial inclusion. It is imperative for all faculty to be in solidarity and work as a collective to leverage and uphold academic freedom. My work thus offers timely insights that will benefit faculty as they navigate the current sociopolitical context. Notably, my prior and ongoing work demonstrates the need to create long-term ongoing structures and processes to better educate not just faculty but also college-level administrators on their rights and protections under academic freedom (Pedota, 2023). Previous studies confirm faculty’s uncertainties around academic freedom, highlighting the need to specifically bolster faculty of color’s understandings and access to its rights and protections (Hutchens & Miller, 2023; Kateeb et al., 2012; Rangel, 2020).

The research also illuminates how external actors (e.g., advocacy organizations, civil rights groups, professional associations) are essential for bolstering faculty’s work. However, many faculty are unsure how to begin cultivating these connections, and faculty of color largely feel unsupported and unacknowledged by external actors’ efforts (Pedota, 2023). These external organizations should proactively work with faculty on the ground in impacted states to share information and build organizing capacity.

LtC: Your research has used participatory methods, including oral history, to examine dynamics of organizational change focused on racial equity in higher education institutions. What might practitioners and scholars take from this work to foster better school systems for all students?

JP: I have long been drawn to oral history as a methodology for transformational change. Oral history is the practice of gathering, preserving, and interpreting the unique, first-hand experiences and memories of individual people and communities involved in past events (Oral History Association, n.d.). Many organizations, like Voice of Witness, have pushed the field of oral history further with the goal to democratize storytelling, allowing communities to share their stories in their own words, illuminating contemporary issues in a deeply personal and impactful manner. This approach to oral history, which aligns most with my own, challenges harmful stereotypes, showcases the diversity of experiences, and positions those with lived experiences as experts on racial equity issues, fostering a greater understanding and empathy among listeners.

I have been involved with many local and national oral history projects over the past six years that mostly focused on the experiences of Latino/a/x individuals and communities. For instance, when the Black and Latino cultural centers at my undergraduate institution were at risk of being consolidated into one multicultural center, folks within the Samuel Proctor Oral History Program sprang into action to document and archive the rich and important histories of these spaces to combat this proposed erasure. These efforts amplified the voices of those who had experienced injustice firsthand at a predominantly white institution and underscored the essential role of these cultural centers in ensuring their histories and communities ultimately survive and thrive. In this way, deeply personal narratives, like those gathered through oral history, can be effective in highlighting and humanizing systemic issues within education.

Through my work, I have seen how oral history can promote racial equity by demonstrating storytelling as a powerful tool for social change. This approach to research promotes deeply listening to and learning from marginalized communities—communities that have been deliberately silenced or remain unheard. From my experience with the Voces of a Pandemic Oral History project through the Voces Oral History Center at the University of Texas at Austin, I learned that oral history requires an ethics-driven approach to storytelling to ensure narrators have power and choice in the storytelling process, viewing them as collaborators rather than subjects.

In this oral history project, many narrators were still processing the hardship and trauma experienced during the COVID-19 global pandemic. Listening and learning from communities in this context required me to create and maintain a safe and brave space for folks and employ a trauma-informed approach to interviewing. For instance, interviewers must be cognizant of how trauma can manifest and be vigilant as they interview narrators, providing moments to breathe and be attentive to what that person needs at that moment. Voice of Witness’s Ethical Storytelling Principles and other resources like “Say It Forward: A Guide to Social Justice Storytelling” can provide guidance on these issues, ensuring that stories are told responsibly and respectfully.

Ultimately, by using oral history to document and share powerful first-person testimonies, we can foster a more inclusive and equitable society, where the experiences and insights of those impacted by injustice are not only heard but valued and acted upon to promote change within education. As such, I believe that the many principles that undergird oral history have much to offer practitioners and scholars.

LtC: Educational Change expects those engaged in and with schools, schooling, and school systems to spearhead deep and often difficult transformation. How might those in the field of Educational Change best support these individuals and groups through these processes?

JP: Through my work with student affairs practitioners, college students, alumni, and advocacy organizations, I have learned that disrupting and transforming historically inequitable educational systems requires broad collaborative networks. It is not enough to solely work with people inside of P-20 educational systems, like students and administrators. Transformational work requires coalition building, brave leadership, and redistribution of resources to minoritized groups who remain disadvantaged by current organizational arrangements. To organize for transformational work, scholars must develop and leverage the influence and expertise of those within the broader community, such as families, community leaders, local non-profits, faith-based organizations, and national advocacy and civil rights groups.

On January 1^st, 2024, both HB 1 and SB 17 went into effect in Texas, banning the use of state funds for DEI-related efforts, including designated offices, trainings, and diversity statements in faculty hiring. Within this current restrictive context, I have seen the power that the broader community can have to pressure and influence policymakers and institutional leaders. I am part of a coalition of students, alums, faculty, unions, civil rights groups, advocacy organizations, professional associations, and grassroots collectives who work across Texas to combat the legislative efforts by state policymakers to undo decades of racial progress in an increasingly diverse state. In this work, I have witnessed how establishing networks and coalitions outside of formal educational spaces allows those working within these constrained and often oppressive systems to more freely exchange ideas, share experiences, and provide mutual support. Such spaces are especially important during a time when many students, staff, and faculty are receiving little to no information. This coalition has also fostered a sense of community and collective responsibility, making advocating for educational change less challenging and more empowering by knowing you have a group of committed folks behind you.

I believe that scholars within the field of Educational Change should be seeking out and engaging in these kinds of civil rights coalitions and other similar community-based grassroots collectives. Scholars have an important role to play in such coalitions, sharing insights from their scholarship that could inform strategies and approaches for systems change. Transforming educational systems in our deeply divided and inequitable society is a long-term and ongoing process that will require fervent research-informed advocacy and activism for years to come. Ultimately, such change depends upon building a community and a critical mass of stakeholders invested in racial equity.

LtC: Where do you find hope and inspiration for the possibilities of Educational Change going forward?

JP: As someone who studies DEI efforts at this moment, I often feel like my work is a continual uphill battle just to end up in the same place I started. It requires constant effort just to hold our ground, leaving less time and energy for transformational advancements. Those who have been engaged in Educational Change work for a while likely understand these sentiments and can relate. And yet, there is always hope.

During times when Educational Change work feels particularly daunting and almost impossible, I draw hope and inspiration for grassroots activists in the South. I was born and raised in Miami and have lived in South and North Florida for most of my life. I have seen how media outlets and those on social media have characterized politics and policies in the state of Florida with little to no attention to the brave grassroots activism historically led by People of Color.

In the most difficult and dehumanizing of conditions, grassroots organizations like Dream Defenders have persevered to fight for change across Florida. Despite passed anti-DEI legislation, the folks at Dream Defenders remain steadfast in their #Cantbanus campaign, organizing school walkouts and legislative advocacy days to fight against political attacks on public education. Even within the current environment, the Dream Defenders believe change is possible. If they can believe this in the most challenging of environments, then so can I. Their efforts help me see change as a long-term project—where the movement for racial equity is about both the short and long game. The unwavering commitment of Southern activists reminds me that, despite the difficulties, our collective efforts in DEI and educational change can and will pave the way for a more equitable future.

References

Garces, L. M., Johnson, B., Ambriz, E., & Bradley, D. (2021). Repressive legalism: How postsecondary administrators’ responses to on-campus hate speech undermine a focus on inclusion. American Educational Research Journal, 58(5), 10321069.https://doi.org/10.3102/00028312211027586

Golden, D. (2023, January 3). ‘It’s making us more ignorant’. The Atlantic. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/01/ron-desantis-florida-critical-race-theory-professors/672507/

Hutchens, N. H., & Miller, V. (2023). Florida’s stop WOKE act: A wake-up call for faculty academic freedom. Journal of College and University Law, 48(1). 

Kamola, I. (2024, May). Manufacturing backlash: Right-Wing think tanks and legislative attacks on higher education, 2021-2023. American Association of University Professors. https://www.aaup.org/sites/default/files/Manufacturing_Backlash_final.pdf

Kateeb, I., Lewis, M., & Hamoush, S. (2012). Understanding the concept of academic freedom in North Carolina A&T State University. International Journal of Science in Society, 3(2), 9–22. https://doi.org/10.18848/1836-6236/CGP/v03i02/51322  Lu, A., Elias, J., June, A. W., Marijolovic, K., Roberts-Grmela, J., & Surovell, E. (2024, March 8). DEI legislation tracker. The Chronicle of Higher Education. https://www.chronicle.com/article/here-are-the-states-where-lawmakers-are-seeking-to-ban-colleges-dei-efforts

Melhado, W. (2023, September 7). Texas’ political environment driving faculty to leave, survey finds. The Texas Tribune. https://www.texastribune.org/2023/09/07/texas-higher-education-faculty-dei-tenure/

Milem, J. F., Chang, M. J., & Antonio, A. L. (2005). Making diversity work on campus: A research-based perspective (pp.1–39). Association American Colleges and University.  

Moody, J. (2023, March 30). The silence of Florida’s presidents. Inside Higher Ed. https://www.insidehighered.com/news/faculty-issues/academic-freedom/2023/03/30/silence-floridas-presidents

Pedota, J. (2023). How faculty contend with threats to academic freedom and racial inclusion. UC National Center for Free Speech and Civic Engagement. https://freespeechcenter.universityofcalifornia.edu/fellows-22-23/how-faculty-contend-with-threats-to-academic-freedom-and-racial-inclusion/ 

Rangel, N. (2020). The stratification of freedom: An intersectional analysis of activist-scholars and academic freedom at U.S. public universities. Equity & Excellence in Education, 53(3), 365–381. https://doi.org/10.1080/10665684.2020.1775158  

Reilly, M.L. (2024, March 5). Anti-DEI bills rely

on vague language and self-censorship. Forbes.https://www.forbes.com/sites/meglittlereilly/2024/03/05/anti-dei-bills-rely-on-vague-language-and-self-censorship/?sh=287256fd1742

School Improvement, Educational Inequality, and Politics: A Conversation with Beth E. Schueler

Posted on September 17, 2021 by T Hatch | 1 comment

This month’s Lead the Change (LtC) interview features Beth E. Schueler, an Assistant Professor of Education and Public Policy at the University of Virginia. She studies education policy, politics, and inequality with a focus on efforts to improve low-performing K-12 schools and districts and previously worked on legislative affairs at the New York City Council. The LtC series is produced by the Educational Change Special Interest Group of the American Educational Research Association; Jennie Weiner, Chair; Olga O. Fellus, Program Chair; Corinne Brion, Secretary/Treasurer; Alexandra Lamb, Series Editor; Cynthia Wise, Social Media Coordinator. A pdf of the fully formatted interview is available on the LtC website.

Lead the Change: The 2022 AERA theme is Cultivating Equitable Education Systems for the 21st Century and charges researchers and practitioners with dismantling oppressive education systems and replacing them with anti-racist, equity, and justice-oriented systems. To achieve these goals, researchers must engage in new methodologies, cross-disciplinary thinking, global perspectives, and community partnerships to respond to the challenges of the 21st century including the COVID-19 Pandemic and systemic racism among other persistent inequities. Given the dire need for all of us to do more to dismantle oppressive systems and reimagine new ways of thinking and doing in our own institutions and education more broadly, what specific responsibility do educational change scholars have in this space? What steps are you taking to heed this call?

Beth E. Schueler: The pandemic, high-profile anti-Black police violence, and threats to the health of our democracy have had me, like many other scholars, questioning whether my research priorities are the right ones to make the greatest contribution toward promoting race- and class-based equity. Recent events have only reaffirmed my belief that greater attention to the politics of education is critical to making progress toward these goals. For example, politics played a comparable, if not larger, role in shaping post-COVID school reopening plans than public health factors, with some comparisons showing partisanship to be a stronger predictor of in-person learning offerings than case rates. There continue to be substantial differences in parental preferences for learning modality by race while we know not all modes are equally effective. There are strong partisan and racial/ethnic differences in opinion over how much time should be devoted to studying the causes and consequences of racism and inequality in schools.

In many ways, educational inequality is a product of political inequality. For instance, it is difficult to revamp Title I federal education funding formulas when those who benefit from the status quo have greater political influence than those who are getting the short end of the stick—often low-income, Black, indigenous, and Hispanic families. It is difficult to get these students appropriate resources when adults in their communities are underrepresented in elected office, at least in part due to disenfranchisement of various sorts, and when voter turnout in local school board elections is so low as to not represent the public interest. It is impossible to implement and sustain public policy that effectively mitigates social inequality if there is not the political support for those reforms. Therefore, I am doubling down on a research agenda that seeks to understand the relationship between political and educational inequality with the goal of helping justice-oriented leaders learn how to effectively navigate the politics of education to implement policies that sustainably promote equity.

One challenge for me—and I would guess other educational change scholars—has been finding the right balance between keeping my head down to make progress on this research agenda while also being open to the need to periodically rethink, refresh, overhaul or even abandon aspects of that agenda based on new learnings, awareness, or shifting trends. There is sometimes a temptation to switch course entirely based on current events but there is also a danger in doing so without thought and intentionality. After all, most of us got into this field in the first place because we care deeply about fighting educational and social inequality, so there is likely value in our ongoing projects. Successful efforts to dismantle oppressive systems require sustained attention over the long run. High-quality research takes time. A key part of the battle is about maintaining an unwavering commitment to racial and economic injustice by “putting our heads down” and doing the work, day in and day out.

“Successful efforts to dismantle oppressive systems require sustained attention over the long run.”

The challenge is to keep up that long-term persistence without getting complacent and while being open to recognizing when we are devoting our energy in the wrong direction. Educational change scholars have a responsibility to stay the course on worthy projects but also to “put our heads up” periodically to make sure we are not wasting time on low-impact endeavors, to be aware of new evidence that could change our perspective or priorities, or to recognize action or inaction we are taking that, worst case, contributes to upholding the oppressive systems we seek to dismantle. This is a difficult balance to strike because the time horizons for producing high-quality research are long while the need to fight racial and economic injustice is urgent. I cannot claim to have found the perfect balance, but I am always trying to find it and welcome constructive critique or advice from colleagues who share a commitment to equity.

LtC: Given some of your work focused on the political viability of school takeover and turnaround for low-performing schools, specifically the model in Lawrence that yielded positive results for students, what are some of the major lessons the field of Educational Change can learn from your work and experience?

BES: Lawrence, Massachusetts represents a rare case of districtwide takeover and turnaround where things went well both in terms of the policy effects and politics. Leaders were able to generate meaningful academic gains in the early years and there was much less opposition and more support for the reforms than a stereotypical case of takeover. The public narrative around improving low-performing schools and systems has been notably gloomy in recent years. In contrast, one of the major lessons from Lawrence is that it is indeed possible to dramatically improve outcomes in a politically viable way for low-income children of color in low-performing educational contexts.

How were leaders able to improve outcomes? Half of the gains in math and all the gains in ELA were concentrated among children who participated in “acceleration academy” (sometimes called “vacation academy”), small-group programs where talented teachers work with a small group of roughly ten struggling students in a single subject over a weeklong vacation break. I have since replicated these findings with a field experiment of a similar program in Springfield, Massachusetts. These programs have high-potential for supporting students who lost learning time due to COVID-19 disruptions and are more affordable than high-dosage tutoring programs (which tend to be highly effective but challenging to implement widely due to cost). The remaining gains in Lawrence were due to a package of reforms (and it is hard to disentangle what mattered most) involving funding being pushed from the central office to schools, greater school-level autonomy (tailored to schools based on strengths and needs), extended learning time, data use, and a focus on improving administrator and educator quality.

How were leaders able to generate political support for reforms? Part of the explanation had to do with the context in which reforms were implemented. The public perceived not only low-performance but also mismanagement, and this led to more openness to dramatic change (a finding we have replicated with national public opinion data). The district was medium in size, allowing leaders to get their feet on the ground in all schools and tailor reforms at the school-level. The teachers union and district leaders were willing to collaborate with each other. The majority of teachers were white and came from outside the district, so there was not a lot of overlap between the teaching force and the majority-Hispanic local community, making it difficult for the union to mobilize parents to oppose reforms.

There were also ways the leaders designed, implemented, and framed their policy choices to minimize opposition and increase support. I describe this as a “third way” approach (Schueler, 2019)—blending the favored ideas from the traditionalist and reform perspectives in education politics to overcome criticism from either side. For instance, leaders focused on bolstering academic expectations and instruction, and on fleshing out extra-curricular offerings meant to support whole-child well-being. Leaders handed over a small number of schools to be managed by charter groups and one school to the teachers union, showing a willingness to work with groups on both sides of major education policy debates. They did not formally convert any schools to charter status, however. Even those schools that were managed by charter operators retained neighborhood-based student assignment and a unionized teaching force, addressing concerns of the charter critics. Leaders replaced nearly half of the school principals in the early years of reform but only actively replaced ten percent of the teaching force and deployed notably strong pro-teacher rhetoric. They implemented a merit-based career ladder while simultaneously giving nearly all teachers a salary increase in the process. The case provides a proof point that it is possible to overcome polarized debates in education policy to implement politically viable change.

“Lawrence provides a proof point that it is possible to overcome polarized debates in education policy to implement politically viable change.”

LtC: In some of your recent work examining the effects of state takeover of school districts nationwide, you find that takeover does not lead to improved student academic performance. Given your findings and the heterogeneity of takeover models and outcomes, why do you think takeover persists as an improvement mechanism and how might successful models, like those in Lawrence, be brought to scale in more districts nationwide?

BES: Having studied a rare positive case of state takeover and turnaround, I wanted to understand whether the Lawrence experience was an outlier. In a subsequent study, we examined the average effect nationwide of state takeover on academic outcomes and inputs. We found no evidence of positive effects and some evidence of disruption in the early years of takeover, particularly in ELA. We conclude that, despite the positive Lawrence experience, leaders should be very cautious about deploying takeover as a mechanism for improving achievement outcomes, particularly in contexts that are very different from those in which takeovers have previously been successful. More specifically, takeover appears least likely to generate academic improvements in majority-Black communities and in districts that are not among the very lowest performing in the country.

My guess is that takeover persists (and indeed has increased as an improvement strategy over time), despite this evidence, in part because research does not provide a ton of easy answers for how to improve low-performing school systems. Given education is not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, states are responsible for school district performance. Therefore, it is somewhat understandable that states would feel a responsibility to take action when a district has been low performing for many years, and especially in cases where there is evidence of mismanagement or corruption. However, again, some of the research that I have contributed to suggests that there are also political factors at play. We find that takeover is more common in contexts where states are paying a larger share of educational expenses, and in majority-Black districts regardless of academic performance. While our study does not provide definitive evidence of intentional racial targeting, it is certainly consistent with such a story. Furthermore, in work on public opinion, we find high levels of support for state takeover among members of the public as a whole, but lower levels of support among teachers and those in low-performing districts most likely to be under threat of takeover. Therefore, statewide pressures can lead to takeover despite local opposition.

How can successful models of district improvement be brought to scale? If and when considering state takeover, leaders should pay careful attention to local contextual factors that have historically predicted the success of takeover reforms on average, including the racial/ethnic makeup of the district, the extent of academic underperformance, and the political landscape. The contexts ripe for these types of reforms are rare and therefore state leaders should be cautious about using this authority. For instance, they should be especially careful about takeovers of majority-Black districts and districts that are not among the very lowest performing in the country. Leaders should also consider research on the most effective reforms for improving low-performing schools and districts, such as extended learning time and efforts to improve teacher quality. Many of these reforms could be undertaken in the absence of state takeover.

LtC: Educational Change expects those engaged in and with schools, schooling, and school systems to spearhead deep and often difficult transformation. How might those in the field of Educational Change best support these individuals and groups through these processes?

BES: In my view, one of the biggest barriers to educational improvement is that it is very difficult for educational leaders (or anyone for that matter) to admit that they do not actually know what works. The political dynamics incentivize certainty and on a micro-level it is hard to acknowledge that what we are doing for the kids we care about might not be best for them. However, research and learning requires an acceptance that there is something to learn. Educational change scholars can support leaders through this process by encouraging a culture of continuous learning in which it is not only acceptable but expected to admit that we don’t always know what works. This is at the heart of the research enterprise.

“Research and learning requires an acceptance that there is something to learn.“

I recently partnered with an organization to study a phone-based tutoring intervention delivered in the context of Kenya while students were engaged in remote learning due to COVID-19. We were surprised when our research revealed that the well-intentioned program had actually negatively impacted math performance among some groups of students by causing them to spend less time studying with family members at home. It is therefore fortunate that the organization had the humility to rigorously study the intervention, so that it could improve its future offerings and so that the field could learn about the importance of carefully designing interventions to align with best practice and of targeting programs to groups of students most likely to benefit. These learnings should help maximize impact and minimize unintended consequences, particularly of inevitable upcoming efforts to address lost learning time due to COVID-19. My hope is that the field of educational change can play a role in encouraging research and learning in these unprecedented times.

LtC: Where do you perceive the field of Educational Change is going? What excites you about Educational Change now and in the future?

BES: Two things come to mind. First, I am encouraged by the recent interest and enthusiasm around individualized instructional approaches—such as high-dosage tutoring and small-group instruction—to supporting students who have experienced COVID-related learning disruptions. It is the right time for these programs to gain traction, not only because a large and rigorous body of evidence indicates that they can improve academic outcomes in a range of subjects and grade levels, but also because these more personalized programs have the potential to support students’ social and emotional well-being and to help them reconnect with schools and teachers after a time of relative isolation. That said, we have a lot to learn about how to modify these programs for the given context and how to implement them in ways that will mitigate rather than reinforce inequality, such as through careful targeting that avoids stigmatizing students in need of support.

The second future direction for the field that excites me is the renewed interest in civic education. Given politics shapes policy, it is paramount that schools play a role in developing students’ abilities to effectively participate in collective decision-making, particularly students from groups that have historically been disenfranchised or otherwise excluded from the political process. In my view, these civic competencies include the ability to make a complete argument supported by reasoning and evidence, the ability to critically interrogate others’ arguments, media literacy, social perspective taking, and civic engagement. I am energized to see the field thinking about how to incorporate these competencies into measures of school quality and to cultivate these skills, particularly in ways that will reduce the political inequalities that are at the root of so many of our most pressing social challenges.

References

Brenneman, R. (2021). Poll: Calif. Voters worried about pandemic’s impact on K-12 students. https://rossier.usc.edu/poll-calif-voters-worried-about-pandemics-impact-on-k-12-students/

Schueler, B., Goodman, J. & Deming, D. (2017). Can states take over and turnaround around school districts? Evidence from Lawrence, Massachusetts. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 39(2), 311-332.

Schueler, B. (2019). A third way: The politics of school district takeover and turnaround in Lawrence, Massachusetts. Educational Administration Quarterly, 55(1), 116-153.

Schueler, B. (2020). Making the most of school vacation: A field experiment of small group math instruction. Education Finance and Policy, 15(2), 310-331.

Schueler, B. (2020). Summer “vacation academies” can narrow coronavirus learning gaps. Education Next. https://www.educationnext.org/summer-vacation-academies-narrow-coronavirus-learning-gaps-springfield/

Schueler, B. & West, M. (2019). Federalism, race, and the politics of turnaround: U.S. public opinion on improving low-performing schools and districts. Annenberg Institute Working Paper No. 19-129.

Schueler, B. & Bleiberg, J. (In Press). Evaluating education governance: Does state takeover of school districts affect student achievement? Journal of Policy Analysis and Management. Also Annenberg Institute Working Paper No. 21-411.

Schueler, B., Asher, C., Larned, K., Mehrotra, S. & Pollard, C. (2020). Improving low-performing schools: A meta-analysis of impact evaluation studies. Annenberg Institute Working Paper No. 20-274.

Schueler, B. & Rodriguez-Segura, D. (2021). A cautionary tale of tutoring hard-to-reach students in Kenya. Annenberg Institute Working Paper No. 21-432.

Robinson, C., Kraft, M., Loeb, S., & Schueler, B. (2021). Accelerating student learning with high-dosage tutoring. EdResearch for Recovery Design Principles Series.

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Tagged Educational change, Educational Leadership, inequity, Politics

Looking Ahead at Education Policy in the US in 2021

Posted on January 20, 2021 by T Hatch | 4 comments

Last week, IEN focused on stories describing how educators were responding to the insurrection at the US Capitol. This week, with the inauguration of Joe Biden as the 46^th President of the United States, we’ve collected headlines and links for a number of stories that center on what many expect to be a dramatic shift in US education policy. Some of the stories look back, assessing the tenure of Betsy Devos; many look ahead to examine what Miguel Cardona and the new administration might do; and a few look at the roles that Senators Lamar Alexander and Patty Murray and others have played and may play in education policy moving forward.

The wreckage Betsy DeVos leaves behind, Editorial Board, New York Times

Delay, dismantle, resist: DeVos leaves a legacy like no other Education Secretary, Nicole Gaudiano & Caitlin Emma, Politico