Teaching for Educational Equity

Teachers and school leaders are confronted by various issues pertaining to social justice every day. This volume will help school leaders to handle these issues ethically, and is intended to be used by administrators for the professional development of teachers, teacher leaders, and aspiring principals. This volume includes cases pertaining to race, class, gender, sexual orientation, discrimination and harassment, culturally responsive pedagogy, intersectionality, et cetera.

Plucked out of the news, from our own memories, or current lives, the cases contained in this volume represent the lived experiences of real students, teachers, and administrators. Each case requires the reader to look beyond the facts, by providing guidance on current research and policy guidelines. Each case provides the reader with additional information that will assist them in making informed decisions. Additionally, each case provides facilitators with guiding questions to assist them in their pedagogy and for subsequent class discussion. We struggle with issues of social justice, as we invite you to do, and with how to create and maintain equitable environments for all of our students in all of our schools.

Jennifer L. Martin, Ph.D., is an assistant professor of education at the University of Mount Union. Prior to working in higher education, Dr. Martin worked in public education for 17 years, 15 of those as the department chair of English at an urban alternative high school in metropolitan Detroit. She is the editor of the two-volume series Women as Leaders in Education: Succeeding DespiteInequity, Discrimination, and Other Challenges (Praeger, 2011) and has numerous publications on bullying and harassment, educational equity, and issues of social justice. She is currently studying the development of culturally responsive leadership practices.

Jane A. Beese, Ed.D, is an associate professor at Youngstown State University. Her areas of interest are equity in curricular and program design, economics of education, program and policy determinants of student learning, and the relationship between student/school resources and student outcomes. She has conducted more than 35 external evaluations in the area of educational programming. Dr. Beese teaches organizational leadership, communication and collaboration, and instructional leadership, where she employs the use of case study methodology in the classroom.