Traditional definitions of literacy, often limited to reading and writing, overlook the complexity of literacy practices across cultures and contexts. This paper argues that literacy is not a technical skill but a socially situated practice that varies in meaning and function depending on cultural, political, and historical factors. Drawing on…

Education theory has been exhibiting a renewed rejection of education's instrumentality to political and economic influences against a policy trend that implicitly considers education a mere pragmatic tool. This paper suggests an ontological investigation that goes beyond normatively supporting or rejecting the instrumentality of education. It…

Whilst research has always been political and politicized, an emerging theme in the area of research ethics and integrity (REI) is the increased politicization of REI itself in areas of scientific and/or political controversy such as climate change, gender dysphoria treatment, the management of pandemics and women's reproductive rights. One aspect…

Two movies appeared at the same time in the summer of 2023, Oppenheimer and Barbie. Although they seem to be quite different, they were joined together in the public eye, being referred to as "Barbieheimer". They were also notable for being very popular, although neither is a typical "summer movie". Each is focused on a serious…

Schools are crying out for a robust policy agenda that takes lessons from prior efforts, aligns with what is known about how to improve schools, and keeps partisan controversies out of the classroom. Real education reform progress is possible if the focus is on strengthening public education's capability to deliver what families and communities…

Because higher education's governance is easily co-opted by faculty and administrators, because of long-running campaigns of subversion by political radicals, and because academia is especially prone to the natural process of groupthink, it has become an institution that favors dogmatic orthodoxy over truth-seeking. It does not have to stay that…

In this paper, we deploy the concept of "aporia" to consider the ways in which enactments of policy become 'stuck' as policy "flows" between national and sub-national education systems. We illustrate the overlapping political, governmental and bureaucratic spheres of influence that mediate how national school reform agendas are…

This article proposes the Kingdon-Khan Model (KKM) as an extension of John Kingdon's Multiple Streams Model (MSM) of agenda setting. While the MSM is comprehensively used to explain how issues reach policymakers' agendas, it underrepresents the influence of media, public opinion, and social movements on agenda setting. To address this limitation,…

In large aspects of contemporary career discourse, the importance of the "agile career" is asserted, although the speed of change has not been explicitly considered in relation to this concept. The political dimensions of the agile career via the lens of "speed" are explored in this theoretical paper. Particular attention is…

In this polylog to the special issue on "The rise of Chinese language education policies in the oil-rich Arabian Gulf: New players, discourses and linguistic markets," three researchers with different personal and professional connections to the three languages 'at play' in the region -- English, Chinese, and Arabic -- offer their…

In this paper, we discuss the process of reviewing and evaluating course design on an initial teacher education programme in a higher education institution in England. We demonstrate how critical evaluation of practice informed new understanding, strategies and approaches in teacher education and development. In England, policy forbids the…

Previous literature informed by biopolitical theory has shown how global education for sustainable development differentiates between populations by assigning different roles, responsibilities, and lifestyles to rich and poor. Taking these arguments as a point of departure, this paper first identifies three different 'problems' pertaining to…

Translanguaging remains a timely and important topic in bi/multilingual education. The most recent turn in translanguaging scholarship involves attention to translanguaging "in context" in response to critiques of translanguaging as a universally empowering educational practice. In this paper, seven early career translanguaging scholars…

This paper grapples with methodological issues related to ongoing debates on positionality and reflexivity by drawing on the author's experience of conducting research in a culturally familiar field. The paper is based on in-depth qualitative research that examined the lived realities of unemployed young people residing in the township of Daveyton…

In 2023, charter school advocates continued to make legislative gains in statehouses across the country. These gains were made in red, blue, and purple states, oftentimes in ways that showed bipartisan support for charter schools remains firmly in place. In looking at the results of this year's legislative sessions across the country, four…