Social Context Reform A Pedagogy of Equity and Opportunity

Currently, both the status quo of public education and the "No Excuses" Reform policies are identical. The reform offers a popular and compelling narrative based on the meritocracy and rugged individualism myths that are supposed to define American idealism. This volume will refute this ideology by proposing Social Context Reform, a term coined by Paul Thomas which argues for educational change within a larger plan to reform social inequity—such as access to health care, food, higher employment, better wages and job security. Since the accountability era in the early 1980s, policy, public discourse, media coverage, and scholarly works have focused primarily on reforming schools themselves. Here, the evidence that school-only reform does not work is combined with a bold argument to expand the discourse and policy surrounding education reform to include how social, school, and classroom reform must work in unison to achieve goals of democracy, equity, and opportunity both in and through public education. This volume will include a wide variety of essays from leading critical scholars addressing the complex elements of social context reform, all of which address the need to re-conceptualize accountability and to seek equity and opportunity in social and education reform.

Introduction: Social Context Reform: A Pedagogy of Equity and Opportunity Brad Porfilio, Julie Gorlewski, Paul R. Carr, and P.L. Thomas, Editors Part 1: Social Reform for Equity and Opportunity 1. Defying Meritocracy: The Case of the Working-Class College Student Allison L. Hurst 2. Reforming the Schooling of Neoliberal, Perpetual Zombie Desire William Reynolds 3. The Pseudo Accountability of Education Reform: Injustice by (False) Proxy Randy Hoover 4. Teacher Education and Resistance within the Neoliberal Regime: Making the Necessary Possible Barbara Madeloni and Kysa Nygreen Part 2: School-based Reform for Equity and Opportunity 5. Changing the Colonial Context to Address School Underperformance in Nunavut Paul Berger 6. An Injury to All? The Haphazard Nature of Academic Freedom in America’s Public Schools Robert L. Dahlgren, Nancy C. Patterson and Christopher J. Frey 7. Educating, Not Criminalizing, Youth of Color: Challenging Neoliberal Agendas and Penal Populism Mary Christiankis and Richard Mora Part 3: Classroom-based Reform for Equity and Opportunity 8. Pedagogies of Equity and Opportunity: Critical Literacy, Not Standards P. L. Thomas 9. YouTube University: How an Educational Foundations Professor Uses Critical Media in His Classroom Nicholas D. Hartlep 10. Developing a User-Friendly, Community-Based Higher Education Rebecca Collins-Nelsen and Randy Nelsen 11. Transcending the Standard: One Teacher’s Effort to Explore the World Beyond the Curriculum Chris Leahy Conclusion: Learning and Teaching in Scarcity P. L. Thomas

P. L. Thomas is Associate Professor of Education at Furman University, USA. He taught high school English in South Carolina before moving to teacher education. He is currently a column editor for English Journal (National Council of Teachers of English) and author of Ignoring Poverty in the U.S. (IAP). Follow his work at http://radicalscholarship.wordpress.com/ and @plthomasEdD. Brad J. Porfilio is Associate Professor of Education at Lewis University, USA. Recent publications include The Phenomenon of Obama and the Agenda for Education: Can Hope Audaciously Trump Neoliberalism?, which received the American Educational Studies 2012 Critics’ Choice Award. Julie Gorlewski is Assistant Professor of Education at the State University of New York at New Paltz, USA, and co-editor of English Journal. Publications include Power, Resistance, and Literacy: Writing for Social Justice (2011), Making it Real: Case Stories for Secondary Teachers (2012) and Theory into Practice: Case Stories for School Leaders (2012). Paul R. Carr is Professor in the Department of Education at the Université du Québec en Outaouais, Canada.