published_or_final_version / abstract / toc / Philosophy / Master / Master of Philosophy

published_or_final_version / Psychology / Master / Master of Philosophy

This study described how suburban public elementary school principals and teachers perceived the principals' social justice leadership as shifting demographic diversity increased in racial and ethnic minority students, decreased in white students, increased in child poverty, and threatened schools academic achievement status. The two Arizona high performance suburban public elementary schools (SPES) were located in two different suburban districts on opposite sides of a metropolitan city. A multiple embedded replication case study involved principals and six K-5 grade teachers at each school and included participant semi-structured interviews, school observations, and document analysis. The data showed how principals' leadership was perceived and practiced in educating students with social and educational inequalities while simultaneously trying to maintain high performance schools. Findings revealed that principals' different and similar practices were not motivated from a social justice disposition. Nevertheless, I discovered that principals' leadership practices imperceptibly included tenets of social justice. The teachers perceived that principals made concerted efforts beyond contemporary leadership practices that addressed children's inequalities owing to poverty and lack of academic preparation. The principals and teachers cared for the students and pushed for additional resources. The educators expressed being underprepared professionally for the tensions brought about by students' shifting demographics. An unexpected finding was that child poverty trumped the children's race and ethnicity as the foremost issue challenging the principals and teachers. As a result of the findings, part of my proposition supported the premise that principals would perceive the educational inequalities experienced by students. Conversely, part of the premise stating that principals' perceptions of students' educational inequalities would influence them to use social justice leadership was weakly supported because principals did not perceive or attribute their practices with teachers as driven by a belief in social justice. Two themes emerged from the analysis of patterns across cases: (1) Principals did not have a social justice consciousness driving their leadership practices, and (2) Principals' contemporary leadership practices imperceptibly combined social justice leadership tenets to influence teachers and promote equality of educational opportunity for all students.

Both in and out of the classroom, critically discussing and exploring the issues of gender, race, power, equality, and social justice can be a social and emotional minefield for educators and students alike. In politically charged times, escaping pre-formulated reactions and creating real change and empathy can seem a nearly impossible task. Some educators have turned to the visual and creative arts to provide students with emotional connectedness, visceral responses, and modes of self-expression. In this study, I examine two education programs to understand the effectiveness of social justice pedagogical methods using phenomenological research. My focus is on the educators' experiences, influences, and personal pedagogies. I plan to highlight three successful programs to better understand how complex and emotional issues can be better explored through art and visual culture and how other educators can adapt these methods to their own classrooms.

The present mixed-methods study examined adolescents’ social perspective taking in contexts of social justice as demonstrated by their awareness and interpretations of hypothetical peer interactions depicting racism and sexism. Fifty adolescents in Grades 9 and 12 participated in a semi-structured interview in which they were presented with two scenarios, involving adolescents in conflicts portraying racism and sexism. They were asked a series of questions designed to elicit their awareness and understanding of social group differences. Qualitative analyses revealed three categories of adolescents’ responses, reflecting distinct interpretations of social group differences. On average, adolescents assumed a perspective that was naïve to the disparities existing between vulnerable and less vulnerable social groups. Furthermore, it was shown that older adolescents had significantly more sophisticated social justice understandings than younger adolescents. These findings highlight the need to educate adolescents about issues of social justice and facilitate an appreciation of social group differences.

Social exclusion is the restriction of participation in one’s community; it is the denial of access to rights, services, dignity and respect. Youth who are homeless experience social exclusion on numerous fronts, as they are marginal to the social, economic and civil worlds of Canadian society. This dissertation is a qualitative, participatory project on youth homelessness that prioritizes voice by employing a “methods from the margins” approach (Kirby & McKenna, 1989). During this project I worked with youth who have experienced homelessness (ages 16-25), first in focus groups (n=13) and, then, through interviews (n=30), to explore their views on topics connected to social exclusion. The youth guided the topics that I explored, which I connected to the features of social exclusion outlined by Silver and Miller (2003). Results of this study highlight that youth who are homeless do not describe their experiences in terms of social exclusion. The results of this work question the homogeneity of experiences of the youth in the age bracket of 16-25, and review findings through three specific age categories of youth being “not yet adults,” “new adults” and “adults.” My findings indicate that youth who experience homelessness perceive themselves to be more independent and mature than youth who have not experienced homelessness, questioning dominant constructions of both “youth” and “homelessness.” Youth respondents also mentioned a number of other difficulties they experienced because of homelessness, including discrimination and limited opportunities for education and conventional employment and access to housing. This highlights the multidimensionality of social exclusion. At various points in the thesis I discuss youths’ views on rights and social citizenship, pointing to the impacts of limited rights and social safeguards in a neo-liberal state. Recommendations are made for reducing the social exclusion of youth who experience homelessness through “housing-first” approaches to addressing homelessness.

Darbo tikslas – atskleisti jaunimo (iki 29 metų amžiaus) poreikius, siekiant integruotis į darbo rinką bei atskleisti kliūtis, trukdančias jų užimtumui. Darbo uždaviniai: išnagrinėti socialinio teisingumą; pateikti socialinės nelygybės sampratos teorinę interpretaciją; išanalizuoti jaunimo galimybes į socialinį teisingumą integruojantis į darbo rinką; atlikti sociologinį tyrimą, leidžiantį išsiaiškinti atskleisti jaunimo (iki 29 metų amžiaus) poreikius, siekiant integruotis į darbo rinką bei atskleisti kliūtis, trukdančias jų užimtumui. Tyrimo dalykas: jaunimo požiūris į nelygybę ir socialinį teisingumą integruojantis į darbo rinką. Darbo metodai: mokslinės, statistinės, publicistinės literatūros analizė; kokybinis tyrimas (interviu): dvi informantų grupės: 5 – studentai (akademinis jaunimas) ir 5 darbdaviai (įmonės vadovai). Tyrimu nustatyta, kad pagrindiniai reikalavimai, kuriuos darbdaviai kelia jauniems specialistams yra kvalifikacija, išsilavinimas bei pareigingumas. Darbuotojo, atitinkančio darbo keliamus reikalavimus, pasirinkimas yra svarbi sėkmingo darbo prielaida. Svarbu ir tai, kad naujai priimtas tinkamas žmogus dirbtų pakankamai ilgai. Darbuotojų keitimas įmonei gana brangiai kainuoja. Naujas darbuotojas pasiekia reikiamą darbo našumą, praeina maždaug metai, o kol pasiekia meistriškumą – gerokai ilgiau. Pažymėtina, kad jaunimas stodamas į aukštąsias mokyklas nepasveria, ar pasirinkta specialybė bus paklausi. Dažnas jaunas žmogus, įgijęs išsilavinimą universitete... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / The aim of the Master‘s thesis is to disclose the needs of young people (up to their late-twenties) seeking integration into the labour market as well as to reveal the obstacles hindering them from being employed.The objectives – to analyse the issue of social justice; to present a theoretical interpretation of the concept of social inequality; to look into young people‘s opportunities for social justice in terms of integration into the labour market; to carry out a sociological survey which enables to clarify and reveal the needs of the youth (up to their late-twenties) in order to integrate themselves into the labour market and, in addition to this, to investigate the obstacles interfering with the process of employment of young people.The subject of research: the attitude of young people towards inequality and social justice while integrating themselves into the labour market. Methods of the Master‘s thesis: the analysis of academic and statistical literature as well as publications of social and political journalism; qualitative research (interviews); two groups of informants: five students (academic youth) and five employers (company executives). The research has established that the main requirements posed by employers for young specialists include qualifications, education and a sense of duty.The choice of an employee meeting the job requirements is an important prerequisite for successful work performance. It is also vital that a... [to full text]

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Starting with the Jewish concept of Tikkun Olam and framed by Critical Theory, this paper investigates business faculty perspectives of social justice in Israel and Canada. Eight purposefully-selected participants were interviewed. Their narratives form the basis of this qualitative study. The research participants revealed that there were ideological and structural forces present in the business programmes investigated that appeared to prevent social justice motives from being realized in the culture of business schools. The participants suggested that the hegemonic forces driving business programs were: profit-driven business ideologies, the particular character of MBA programs, and business programs’ quantitative research bias. These forces were found to be affecting the way in which the participants made-meaning of social justice, and the way in which they could teach and research within their respective business schools. The results of this study illuminate the types of cultural and asymmetrical relations that are affecting business pedagogical constructs and the future for social justice within them. This is important as how university faculty make meaning of social justice within business paradigms will not only shape how curricula and ideological changes evolve in business schools, they will have a significant impact on how and what students learn (Fernandez & Stiehl, 1995). The paper concludes with recommendations for Critical Communication and Critical Management Education to be employed within business schools as a process-oriented approach to social justice based on critical dialogue and communication: thus pursuing a Tikkun Olam in business pedagogy. / Thesis (Master, Education) -- Queen's University, 2009-05-26 14:50:22.335

In recent times the need for educational research dedicated to engineering education has been recognised. This PhD project is a contribution to the development of engineering education scholarship and the growing body of engineering education research. In this project it was recognised that problem solving is a central activity to engineering. However, it was also recognised that the conditions for doing engineering are changing, especially in light of pressing issues of poverty and environmental sustainability that humanity currently faces, and as a consequence, engineering education needs to emphasise problem definition to a greater extent. One mechanism for achieving this, which has been adopted by some engineering educators in recent years, is through courses that explicitly relate engineering to social justice. However, creating this relationship requires critical interdisciplinary thinking that is alien to most engineering students. In this dissertation it is suggested that for engineering students, and more generally, engineers, looking at their practice and profession through a social justice lens might be seen as a threshold that needs to be crossed. By studying the variation present among students in three different courses at three different North American universities, the intention was to understand how students approach and internalise social justice as a perspective on engineering and/or develop their abilities to think critically. A conceptual model to frame the study was developed by combining elements of threshold concept theory and the educational research methodology, phenomenographic variation theory. All three of the courses studied operated on a similar basic pedagogical model, however, the courses were framed differently, with social justice in the foreground or in the background with the focus on, in one case, ethics and in the other, sustainability. All courses studied appeared to be successful in encouraging engineering students to engage in critical thinking and a similar general trend in the development of students’ conceptions of social justice was observed in each of the three courses. However, it does appear that if one is interested in developing an articulated understanding of social justice, with respect to engineering, that an explicit focus on social justice is preferable. / Thesis (Ph.D, Chemical Engineering) -- Queen's University, 2010-04-07 13:12:29.207