According to the most recent data available from the nationally-representative Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP), as of 2011, 38.4% of children lived in households reporting at least one form of material hardship, such as food insecurity, inability to pay essential household bills, inability to access medical care due to cost, or…

This article summarizes four archetypal responses--the reactionary, conservative, pragmatist, and presentist--to the real or perceived threat to liberal learning in higher education. I advocate a balance between the conservative and the pragmatist responses. A conservative pragmatist response resists the canonical rigidity of the reactionary;…

Generation Z (Gen Z) represents something of a quintessence for the broken promises that now seem to make up the promise of higher education. But if despair indicates the dark side of generational malaise around things like civic engagement, community, and student learning, the dark humor that has emerged out of these generations points to modes…

Big Brother, newspeak, doublethink, vapourised people and thought police became worldwide famous expressions. 1984 novel portrays a nightmare society controlled by information manipulation and by suppression of both history and science. This study aimed to investigate the impact of using the 1984 dystopian novel associated with socio-scientific…

In recent decades, universities have made significant progress toward environmental sustainability and have likewise tightened their budgets and restructured economic models in the name of financial sustainability. However, institutions of higher education have failed to address issues of social sustainability and social injustice, many of which…

Having students read news articles or novels, watch television snippets, engage in class discussions, essay-writing, emailing, and drafting letters are excellent ways to broach any number of society's systemic and oppressive social maladies. Engaging in these activities in the English language arts classroom can serve as a catalyst to encourage…

This study seeks to introduce a new lens through which applied linguistics might be better conceived of. Importantly enough, this lens has already found itself in a good many disciplines, but it can hardly ever be seen in language teaching. To this end, this paper has taken a stance akin to that of Larsen-Freeman, when for the first time…

Social work has a rich tradition of engagement. Throughout its history, social work scholars have taken up questions that link knowledge production to its application in practice. Recently, other higher education fields have expressed interest in engagement. Yet, social work scholars have remained relatively silent about what they have to offer…

Background: We explored whether school-based Cogmed Working Memory Training (CWMT) may optimise both academic and psychological outcomes at school. Training of executive control skills may form a novel approach to enhancing processes that predict academic achievement, such as task-related attention, and thereby academic performance, but also has…

The words of W. E. B. Du Bois, in his widely-acclaimed work" The Souls of Black Folk," that "the problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color-line" were a visceral attempt to illuminate the plight of the "Negro" in the United States of America. With this phrase, Du Bois positioned racial valorizations…

Cultural Political Vignettes (CPVs) are hypothetical situations involving ethical or social dilemmas presented to students in the form of brief vignettes. They help students consider and discuss questions about ethics, society, and responsibility, and develop both skills (like critical thinking) and dispositions (like empathy) needed to be a…

This commentary is focused on Robert Sternberg's new Active Concerned Citizenship and Ethical Leadership (ACCEL) model. The new model is well conceived and goes far beyond existing models. It is especially attractive in that the emphasis is on ethics. Now more than ever before there is a clear need for education to support ethical reasoning and…

Building durable peace through education requires addressing the gender ideologies and hierarchies that encourage both direct physical aggression and indirect harm through marginalization and exploitation. Although formal education systems are shaped by gendered patterns of social conflict, enmity, and inequity, schools can help young people to…

This article analyses findings from a research project examining the Pear Tree Community School in Oakland, California, USA -- a small, social justice-focused school primarily serving Black, Indigenous and other students of colour in grades from kindergarten to Grade 5. Through this multi-year case study, which included observations, interviews…

This strategic plan outlines the vision for IOE's research over the next five years, which can inspire and sustain the aspirations of researchers, share the vision with partners, and fulfil the responsibilities to the wider community. As well as the vision and mission, this plan also highlights IOE's research achievements, distinctive profile and…