Education and Social Justice (by Distance Learning)

The module will introduce you to a range of processes used for investigating, and producing new knowledge about, ‘education’. The module focusses on developing an understanding of the deeply contextualised ways in which educational investigation is carried out and the contingency of the knowledge claims produced; locating educational investigation within the development of the research field and contemporary literature; formulating research questions that can illuminate research agendas; selecting and justifying appropriate methodological approaches; and designing particular projects based on the selected methodology that can satisfactorily address the research questions. The module will explore those issues with reference to a range of examples taken from published literature.

The module will provide you with the grounding needed to become an autonomous researcher: enabling you to take advantage of your existing expertise as a practitioner to provide a starting point for thinking about educational ‘problems’ that merit further investigation; enabling you to read existing research materials critically; and enabling you to formulate projects to develop your own knowledge and communicate that knowledge to others.

The module will explore key issues and theories in social justice and education. We will start by considering what social justice means and how it serves different educational ideologies and explore some key theories with which to analyse these through a social justice lens. Key differences between different theories of social justice will be explored, and their implications for education examined. We will also explore how different theoretical lenses can provide new ways of viewing aspects of educational systems, and use these lenses to examine multiple perspectives. The ways in which social justice issues currently arise within different education settings will be explored, and we will consider how education can challenge and/or reinforce inequalities. We will also begin to think about issues associated with researching social justice and how theory can help focus analysis of substantive issues. We reflect on whether social justice is simply a topic of research or whether it requires particular approaches and commitments on the part of the researcher. Alongside this, we will think through academic writing practices and get to understand the expectations of the course.

Indicative topics include:

• What is meant by social justice?

• Theories of social justice.

• Promoting social justice through and in education

• Contemporary social justice issues in education

The aims of the module are to provide students with an opportunity to undertake an extended piece of self-directed research in a field of their choice, related to their particular scheme of study. The module provides experience in conducting research (a skill of relevance to further postgraduate activity as well as in varied professional settings); to provide experience of the management of project design, methodology, development and implementation; and to further develop students’ ability to communicate complex ideas and concepts.

The module will enable students to develop a critical understanding of research as a form of academic practice, working together with a supervisor to conduct an exploratory project and write a research report focused on a topic of personal and/or professional relevance to the student. One key aim of this module is that the experience helps prepare students for undertaking their later Research Dissertation. Formulating the small-scale research project will therefore involve students in discussions with allocated supervisors about research interests and ongoing trajectory and how undertaking this project can support the development within the programme. Examples of suitable independent study projects might involve small-scale data gathering, including the designing or testing of research instruments.

Crucially, students agree a study plan early in the module with their assigned supervisor, and then work with the supervisor to refine the scope of the study, formulate appropriate research questions, design and implement a methodological approach, and formulate the research report. Students are encouraged to use materials covered during the previous module and reflect on those throughout this process.

Students will develop knowledge of how to understand the different roles, types and purposes of educational research; how to define the scope of a research project and find existing literature based on that scope; how to evaluate and synthesise research evidence; and how to write a research report that takes into account particular audiences (such as researchers working within a specialist field, research generalists, or practitioners).The module will comprise a short initial orientation period and an online discussion space. However, most of the period of the module will involve students working on projects under bilateral supervision.

The module will develop the knowledge and skills needed to gather, synthesise and report upon a range of evidence to further understanding of topics of relevance and professional practices, and communicate that understanding to others.

This module will consider a range of social justice issues within education relating to (but not limited to) gender, class, 'race’ and ethnicity, age, sexuality, disability, language, geography, religion, and their intersections. This will involve developing an understanding of how advantage and disadvantage are structured through policy, practice and experiences; how students from different groups experience inclusion and exclusion; how educational institutions may generate, reinforce or reproduce social inequalities; and how educational inequalities may be challenged. Education will be considered as both an issue of social justice and as a practice for social justice.

This module will provide you with the opportunity to interrogate social justice issues within society and explore how these play out through the education system, developing and enhancing your knowledge and understanding of inequalities. It will engage you in analysis of complex processes of inclusion and exclusion and equip you with the tools to critically evaluate educational structures, policy and practices to both examine and challenge inequalities.

The module will take a unique and novel approach to exploring education that can be brought into relationship with both social justice, culture and technology. It would consider how an educational ‘policy’ or ‘theory’ is applied and interpreted in the contexts where it is used. For example, in schools, this can be inspection (e.g. in the UK by Ofsted), assessment practices, specific strategies and policies (e.g. in the UK the Prevent policy), digital and online practices, etc. At university, these will be university policies. If you prefer to explore theories, then you can consider any critical theory of your choice, such as postcolonial, race, pedagogic or feminist theories, and many more. These two foci (educational policy and theory) will be explored by considering how they “translate”/manifest into educational practice. Considering the materiality and multimodality of educational practice will enable us to examine how policy or theory are enacted, mediated and reshaped at the intersection of people, things and environments; how people and environmental aspects contest or apply policy and theory but also how they comply with incentive structures to thereby reproduce particular aspects of educational systems. A specific strength of the module is in considering how to obtain public and policy makers’ feedback by creative methods.