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Researchers and k-12 practitioners have been struggling with inequity and diversity issues for the past four decades. These struggles have produced multiple philosophies, theoretical perspectives and educational approaches—each with strengths and limitations. The various approaches to addressing diversity indirectly and implicitly address, but have not managed, the systemic changes necessary for education to be socially just. Ideally, all diversity approaches should result in academic achievement and social change—the goals of social justice education. Past research has mainly focused on crisis intervention strategies or on meeting individually-based needs rather than on systemic practices and strategies at the school or district level. Toward this end, the purpose of this study was to explore how social justice goals are manifested in one school. The specific objectives were as follows: 1. Explore how the different members of the school community describe or define social justice. 2. Examine what current programs the participants believe support social justice-related goals. 3. Investigate current practices the participants believe to be socially just. This qualitative case study used interviews, document review and observations of administrators and teachers at the research site (Middle School). This study was designed to be exploratory in nature. Through the syntheses of the literature, I developed a tri-focal lens framework for social justice education which I use as an analytic tool. From the analysis, I offer a description of Middle School’s efforts to implement social justice goals. The findings of this study indicate that implementing social justice education theory in real contexts is a highly complex and evolutionary process, but not impossible. The purpose of this study never intended to establish a privileged binary of theory over practice, but rather I set out to explore the complexity of the intersections—the convergences and divergences of theory and practice. And, as is usually the case when moving between theory and practice, the study reveals the necessary trade offs and unintended consequences of well-intended decisions.

This dissertation investigates how social justice is considered as local governments in the United States develop and implement climate adaptation plans and is composed of an introduction (Chapter 1), three stand-alone manuscripts (Chapters 2-4), and a conclusion (Chapter 5). The introduction gives a brief overview of climate adaptation planning, the intersection of social justice and climate adaptation, and existing research about how social justice is considered as communities prepare for climate change. To conceptualize social justice throughout this dissertation, we adopt the three-dimensional theory that includes recognitional, distributional, and procedural justice. Both Chapter 2 and Chapter 3 focus on adaptation planning through a review of 101 climate adaptation, climate action, and climate resilience plans published between 2010-2021 by US municipalities. In Chapter 2, we used data from this review to understand generally how recognitional, distributional, and procedural justice were considered within these documents. In Chapter 3, we used the same data and demographic data for each community to understand trends over time and other patterns in how each type of justice was considered through a series of regressions. Chapter 4 serves as a follow-up to the adaptation plan review to understand how local governments are considering justice as they move forward and implement adaptation initiatives. We interviewed the plan leads from 25 communities that published a recent climate plan that we reviewed and asked them how their local government has considered social justice as they've implemented adaptation projects, what factors have enabled these considerations, and what challenges they've encountered. The results of these studies show that social justice is increasingly addressed in more recent climate plans, but recognitional and distributional justice are often considered more than procedural justice. Most communities we spoke with are still in the early phases of implementing these plans, and largely centered on how these municipalities have engaged marginalized individuals, with most aspiring towards empowerment but informing or consulting with residents. Our findings revealed that many opportunities remain to advance justice further, especially in how municipalities can meaningfully engage and empower marginalized residents in adaptation initiatives. The conclusion summarizes how social justice is considered in adaptation planning and implementation, as well as what gaps remain. Within this section, I reflect on my experiences as a Ph.D. student at Virginia Tech and my future goals within academia. / Doctor of Philosophy / As local governments prepare for climate change, they are grappling with how to ensure everyone is equipped to adapt, including their most vulnerable residents. Even with increased attention on social justice in climate adaptation efforts, it is unclear how municipalities plan to achieve this. Climate adaptation plans are one resource US municipalities can employ to address justice as they tackle climate change. While research has increasingly focused on climate adaptation planning, there's been little follow-up to suggest communities are moving from planning to implementation. The research included in this dissertation investigates how social justice is considered in climate adaptation, climate action, and climate resilience plans published between 2010-2021 by US municipalities and how justice is addressed when these plans are being implemented. The study considers social justice through the three-dimensional theory of recognitional, distributional, and procedural justice. The results show that social justice is increasingly addressed in more recent climate plans, but recognitional and distributional justice are often considered more than procedural justice. Most municipalities were still in the early phases of implementing these plans, so our discussions with government employees largely centered on how they have engaged marginalized individuals in initiating programs, with most aspiring towards empowerment but informing or consulting with residents. Many opportunities remain to advance justice further, especially in how municipalities can meaningfully engage and empower marginalized residents in adaptation initiatives.

This study sought to understand the impact of a leader’s social justice orientation on their praxis of social justice. The study also sought to discover the successes and challenges associated with enacting social justice. Nine Catholic secondary school leaders in the California Archdiocese participated in the study. Semi-structured interviews and document analysis were used to understand how social justice orientation affects social justice praxis. The data analysis indicates that the social justice outcomes of a school site are greatly impacted by the school leader’s justice-orientation. Findings revealed that justice-orientation is dependent on two factors: the self-efficacy of the leader and the social justice impact of the leader’s actions. These two factors determine a leader’s position on the justice orientation continuum. The implications of these findings are discussed.

Existentialist ethics tell us that we as individuals cannot be truly liberated until all are. This means that we must pursue a more just world for all. Interestingly enough, as we look at the evidences of the ways in which cultural violence have been used historically and today as a means to withhold power from the people, we find that participating in the arts grants a great deal of power to the people. Thus, accessibility to participating in artistic acts or the creative process become fundamental to activism for social justice. This work lays out five fundamental aspects of the creative process that help us move towards liberation—confrontation of ideas, vulnerability, choice making, truth or world building, and authentic identity formation. In order to realize the full potential of positive impact the creative process can have in the realm of social justice, however, we must reframe our understanding of artists and the creative process in our society. This is a call to action both to artists and audience to recognize and wield the power of the arts to liberate all within our society. / Doctor of Philosophy / We have all heard the disparaging stereotypes surrounding the arts--the arts aren't a viable career choice, they aren't important, they're just meant for hobbies, or they're for folks who aren't smart enough to do something "useful" with their lives. If you have been a practicing artist for any number of years you have surely been offered payment in "exposure" at least half a dozen times by now. And yet, creating art is perhaps one of the most powerful and political acts we may undertake as humans. With each creative act we make claim to our own identities and have the opportunity to support the unique identities of others. In a world plagued by injustice perhaps artists are just the heroes we need. In this work I outline the connection between the artistic act and liberation. It is a call to action both to artists and audience to recognize the great potential that artists have to shape the world for better or worse. It asks you, the reader, to support social justice by supporting accessibility to confrontational, vulnerable, and deliberate artistic acts both by others and yourself.

This dissertation explores the concept and development of metacognitive social justice through three manuscripts. The first manuscript defines metacognitive social justice through an extensive literature review from prominent social justice scholars and theorists to find common themes that either explicitly or subtly permeate social justice content. Drawing from theory and empirical data, the first manuscript provides a foundation of this cognitive process that is relatable to all social justice scholarship, defining cognitive common ground. The themes found across the literature can be distilled to four metacognitive attributes found in "social justice thinking": (1) self-awareness through consciousness-raising, (2) value in the narratives of others, (3) awareness of unseen forces, and (4) questioning historical origins or intents. The second manuscript is a qualitative analysis of the perception of self- proclaimed social justice thinkers, exploring how they define 'social justice thinking' and the role it plays in their daily choices and decision-making. Through thoroughly coded and analyzed transcripts of one-on-one, semi-structured interviews, this manuscript explores three other emergent themes of action, discomfort and community, as a well as the need for developing social justice thinkers, and highlights significant connections to the attributes in the first manuscript. The third manuscript is a detailed description of the development of the metacognitive social justice survey for college undergraduates, a psychometric instrument designed to measure the metacognitive social justice attributes in individuals described in the theoretical manuscript. The instrument was found to be increasing in quantitative validity through two exploratory factor analyzes (EFA) with still room for improvement. Drawing on the questions developed so far, a final version of this psychometric instrument will provide a snapshot of what metacognitive social justice attributes are found in undergraduate classes and potentially to what extent. This is the first edition of the instrument, with the idea that the instrument should be ever evolving, becoming more accurate and valid, and carefully reworded for different audiences beyond college undergraduates. / Ph. D.

The purpose of this thesis is to take the individual on a journey about what it is like to be engaged in radical anti-systemic activism in the 21st Century.  Along this journey the reader will learn about the experiences of what it was like to join the Occupy movement"an anti-systemic movement that began in 2011"through an empirical analysis of learning about and practicing the anarchist(ic) characteristics of the movement"horizontal, non-hegemonic, affinity and consensus-based ways-of-being as a part of your everyday lifeworld.  This journey is not only informed by my own personal experience joining the Occupy movement, but it is also informed by my simultaneous experience of maintaining the role of a radical activist-scholar throughout the process.  Accordingly, I will explore how this impacted my lifeworld both within and outside of academia, which informed the very framework, analysis, and outcomes produced in this thesis.  This project was thus also designed to inform social science research"particularly that on social movements"by reflecting on both social roles experienced in this journey in order to cohesively make sense of the paradoxes created by engaging in discourses about, within, and for the Occupy movement.  Of most importance, from an empirical and ontological experience as an Occupier and activist-scholar, this project will help to raise key questions about the frameworks to seek social justice utilized by contemporary anti-systemic social movements in the 21st Century"social movements that are now spreading around the globe. / Master of Science

published_or_final_version / Public Administration / Master / Master of Social Sciences

The purpose of this study was to examine preservice teachers' beliefs and experiences in learning about teaching mathematics for social justice during a one-semester mathematics methods course at a large university in the Southwest. The study examined their beliefs on three levels: a) their beliefs about issues of equity, diversity, and social justice in general; b) their beliefs about how issues of equity, diversity, and social justice relate to teaching (i.e., if and how the preservice teachers perceive themselves as critical educators); and c) their beliefs about teaching mathematics for social justice. This study also analyzed the preservice teachers' experiences as they learned about and then discussed lessons and projects that could be used for teaching mathematics for social justice. The purpose of analyzing their experiences was to document what the pre-service teachers identified as positive and negative influences on their learning to teach mathematics for social justice.

Thesis (MEd in Curriculum Leadership) -- University of South Australia, 1992