Upon my arrival in Tokyo as a visiting researcher, I anticipated a deep immersion in data. After all, ethnographic fieldwork requires attention and presence: extended periods of listening, observing, and trying to see what can at times feel like the world around you with fresh eyes. Instead, I found myself inhabiting a space that felt both intensely full and quietly isolating at the same timeā€”moving through classrooms, trains, and moments of reflection where immersion and distance seemed to coexist. What I was not prepared for was what that immersion would demand of me intellectually, relationally, and emotionally ā€” and in ways I couldnā€™t articulate.

Each week followed a rhythm. I took the train from the international researchersā€™ housing complex, almost two hours each way, to the main school where I was doing my fieldwork. These trips to and from the field were also part of my research: transition spaces between observation and note-taking, between movement and stillness. Sitting among commuters, I often found my thoughts already turning toward the day ahead ā€” what might emerge, and what might remain just beyond reach.

One moment remains particularly vivid. I was seated at the back of a classroom observing a class of students work on an inquiry task. The room hummed with activity. Students lowly voiced hypotheses and musings about their project ā€” chatting, thinking out loud, actively working.

The teacher asked a question and then paused, not withdrawing, but holding the space. It was the opposite of silence. It was active presence: a type of intentional pedagogical placement. One that left space for students to learn with and through each other, rather than run to the teacher for validation.

“Maybe it’s this partā€¦” a student murmured, leaning slightly over the triangulated desks.

There was no immediate response from the teacher. Instead, a pause settled across the group. The teacher walks away…

Students turned slightly toward one another. Quick, curious glances. Intent gazes at their worksheets and tablets. It appears they silently debated each other. Another voice came seconds later: ā€œOrā€¦ could we do it this way?ā€

I found myself waiting for a clearer intervention ā€” something more recognisable as direction or evaluation. But what unfolded was different. The teacher waited attentively, pulling back so that thinking could percolate through the students. It was then that I began to realize that what I was witnessing was not a lack of engagement, but rather a different form of it.

Understanding these moments required more than observation alone. It involved returning to classroom interactions through video, engaging in reflective conversations with teachers and STEM leaders, working through documentary materials ā€”each offering a different way into the practices I was trying to make sense of.

In addition to visits to schools, I was also engagingā€”presenting and attending lectures, seminars, workshopsā€”at Hosei University, my host university. Eventually, these inputs began to feed into the field as well: opportunities to share ideas, challenge assumptions, and collaboratively improvise on them in-the-moment. I realized the line between observer and participant is often messier than the methodological texts suggest.

The classrooms themselves were rich with activity. Students engaged in interdisciplinary inquiry, moving across ideas, discussing, negotiating, and constructing knowledge together. I was there to observe, to listen, to document. And I did so carefully. Intently. Almost relentlessly.

But ethnographic immersion does not conclude when one leaves the classroom.

Back in my apartment, I found myself still “in the field.” Fieldnotes demanded attention. Data required revisiting. Literature called for engagement. There was no natural boundary between being in the research and stepping away from it ā€” the work followed me into the quiet of the evening and the early hours of the morning.

In this sense, I was not only immersed. I was, at times, many times, submerged.

And yet, this experience carried a familiarity.

I had lived and studied in Japan before, as a postgraduate research student in a different part of the country, hundreds of miles away. I had continued working there as an educator for several years before beginning my PhD. In many ways, the language, the culture, the rhythms of institutional life were not entirely unknown to me. But familiarity did not translate into ease, unfortunately. If anything, it complicated my position. I was navigating a context I recognised, but from a role I had not previously occupied.

I was no longer a student situated within a system of learning. I was now a researcher ā€” observing, interpreting, and standing both within and slightly apart from the spaces I was studying. Classrooms that might once have felt like places of belonging now felt, at moments, like sites of careful, conscious analysis.

This duality was not always easy to hold.

At the same time there was another register ā€” more intimate and harder to name. Distance from my family back home in the UK was a low hum of dislocation. Of course, we were able to keep in touch but always at negotiated times ā€” late night or very early morning calls. Full presence was always on hold.

At one point during my time away, I also lost another member of my close family. There is a certain texture to grief at a distance. But even putting that experience aside, I kept coming back to a sense that had emerged prior to receiving that news. A quiet sense of heaviness that I couldnā€™t fully explain to myself. How much of what I was feeling was circumstantial and how much was constituted by fieldwork itself?

Was it information saturation ā€” being surrounded day in and day out by data, analysis, and sense-making?  

Was it something inherent in the ethnographic role ā€“ the researcher as observer, participant, and interpreter, navigating multiple positions simultaneously?

Or was it the solitude of working alone, even in one of the busiest, most socially connected cities in the world?

Tokyo often gets described many ways: energetic, vibrant, exciting, and never sleeps. And it certainly is. The city moves with a kind of collective momentum: trains run on time, crowds flow through spaces, and systems function with remarkable coordination. Everything runs efficiently together like clockwork. However, among all of this motion there is stillness too. A silence that comes not from lack of movement but from being by yourself amidst it all.

Methodological conversations about ethnographic research often focus on immersion. Being close to the field, spending quality time with participants, being aware of context. But less frequently do we attend to the affective dimensions of this immersion ā€” the ways in which it shapes not only what we see, but how we feel, how we think, and how we come to understand ourselves within the research process.

To be immersed is not just to watch others; it is also to discover oneself anew.

Moving through the field, I found it harder to think of myself as detached from what I was seeing. Observer and observed were not fixed positions; rather, they were emergent ā€” made and remade by presence and engagement, interpretation and introspection. In this sense, the practice of knowing and the experience of being there could not be easily separated (Bourdieu, 1990).  

This brought into sharper focus something that Donna Haraway (1988, p. 581) has argued compellingly: that what we see and understand is always shaped by where we stand. What I came to notice, and how I made sense of it, felt inseparable from how I was positioned within these spaces ā€” as a researcher, as a former insider, and as someone navigating the field from a place of both proximity and distance.

As someone working in comparative and international education, such experiences push us to think about fieldwork differently. Fieldwork is relational. Fieldwork is contextual. Fieldwork happens within educational systems and ecosystems that are cultural, institutional, and personal. In a context like Japan’s Super Science High Schools, where global STEM aspirations meet distinctly local pedagogical cultures, this matters. What I observed in those classrooms could not be adequately understood through the lens of comparison alone ā€” it required sustained presence, genuine uncertainty and curiosity, and a willingness to be unsettled by what I found.

Ruth Behar (1996) argues that ethnography is not only about understanding others ā€” it is also about how the researcher is transformed in the process. That transformation, in my experience, was not dramatic or easily defined. It was quieter than that ā€” something that accumulated through immersion, through encounter, through moments of clarity and uncertainty alike. It resides now in the way I see, question, and attend to the world, both within and beyond the field.

I doubt the person who entered this fieldwork is the same as the one who returned six months later.

So now, I find myself sitting with questions I cannot yet fully answer:

Where does the field truly begin and end?

What does it mean to be fully present in a space while also observing it?

And how do we carry what we have lived ā€” not just what we have recorded?

That experience sat somewhere between immersion and isolation ā€” and perhaps it is precisely in that in-between space that the most honest knowledge is made.

To live the field, not only as a site of data but as a space that transforms the researcher, is to accept that the knowledge we go on to produce will always carry something of that experience within it.

REFERENCES

Behar, R. (1996) The Vulnerable Observer: Anthropology That Breaks Your Heart. Boston: Beacon Press.

Bourdieu, P. (1990) The Logic of Practice. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Haraway, D. (1988) ‘Situated Knowledges: The Science Question in Feminism and the Privilege of Partial Perspective’, Feminist Studies, 14(3), pp. 575ā€“599.

Elizabeth Emelue

Elizabeth Emelue is a doctoral researcher and a Lecturer in the Department of Education at the University of Bath, specialising in interdisciplinary STEM pedagogy and leadership. Her research draws on ethnographic fieldwork in Japanese Super Science High Schools to explore how teaching and learning are lived and negotiated across contexts. Alongside her research, she teaches on undergraduate and postgraduate MA TESOL programmes, supporting future educators in developing reflective and contextually responsive approaches to teaching.

I still recall being that girl.

A girl who was constantly reminded about what she could or could not become. A girl whose goals were often decided through societal expectations lenses, where education was encouraged, but only to a certain limit. A girl who learnt  early on said that classrooms are not just spaces of learning, they are environments where identities are shaped, voices are either developed or silenced, and futures are imagined or restricted.

Today, as an educator and education researcher, I often find myself looking back to that memory not as a source of discomfort, but as a compass. It reminds me why I select this path, and more significantly, why my work continues to center questions of equity, voice, and justice.

From Lived Experience to Research Lens

My journey into education research did not start with theory, it began with experiences which I encountered throughout my life. Years later, when I came across academic concepts such as, policy analysis, equity in education and critical pedagogy, I noticed that these were not just abstract ideas. In fact they deeply resonated to the lived realities of students like myself.

As a teacher with over two decades of experience, I have worked in classrooms where students bring with them diverse backgrounds, ambitions, and struggles. Yet, I have also observed how systems,  curricula, policies and  assessment structures often fail to identify or respond to this diversity.

This is where research became purposeful for me. It provided not just a way to understand these challenges, but a way to question them.

Classrooms as Sites of Inequality and Possibility

One of the most unique powerful realizations in my journey has been that classrooms are basically political spaces. Options about what to teach, how to teach, and whose knowledge is valued are never neutral but political in nature.

In my current research work, particularly in areas related to policy and classroom practices, I have engaged with questions such as:

• How do education policies knitted into classroom realities?
• In what ways do structural challenges such as resource limitations, climate conditions or socio-economic factors affect student learning?
• How can teachers handle these hurdles while still nurturing meaningful learning experiences?

For instance, in our recent work on classrooms under heat stress, we identify how rising temperatures impact not just attendance, but also learnerā€™s engagement and teacher effectiveness. What was visible was not just a narrative of environmental challenge, but a deeper story about systemic neglect and the resilience of educators working within constrained conditions.

The Emotional Labour of Teaching and Research

Reflection, for me, is not just an academic exercise, it is an emotional one.

Several times in my life I felt teaching like an act of resistance. When enhancing learners’ engagement in complex situations alone pedagogical skills are not sufficient, emotional strength is also required. When being a researcher means moving with uncomfortable truths about inequality and injustice.

At the same time, there are moments of profound hope. A learner who starts to question, to think critically, to see themselves as capable; these moments act as reassurance to  why this work matters.

As researchers, we often discussed data and results. But behind the scene every dataset are human perspectives. Narratives of struggle, ambitions, and transformation. Identifying this has basically shaped how I approach my work not just as a researcher, but as a human being.

Bridging Research and Practice

One of the ongoing challenges in education is the huge gap between research and practice. Mostly, research remains grounded to academic journals, disconnected from the realities of classrooms.

Through my engagement in teacher training and platforms like Virtual Baithak (a non-profit organization working for women empowerment), I have been working to bridge this gap. By developing spaces for debate, sharing experiences, and encouraging educators to see themselves as researchers, we can start to democratize knowledge production.

I strongly believe that teachers are not just implementers of policy, they are knowledge creators. Their reflections, insights, and innovations are critical to shaping more responsive and equitable education systems.

Why Reflection Matters

In an accelerated education system driven by outcomes and performance metrics, reflection is often ignored. Yet, it is through reflection that we make sense of our experiences, question our assumptions, and imagine new possibilities.

For me, reflection serves multiple purposes:

• It helps me remain rooted in my values.
• It permits me to critically evaluate my own practices.
• It promotes space for continuous learning and growth.

More importantly, reflection is a political action. It challenges the traditional setups. It asks uncomfortable questions. It refuses to accept inequality as inevitable.

Looking Ahead: Education as Transformation

As I pursue my journey as an educator and researcher, I remain committed to a vision of education that is transformative rather than transactional.

This means:

• Valuing voices from different backgrounds and experiences.
• Questioning policies that support inequality.
• Creating classrooms where every student becomes visible, heard, and valued.

It also means identifying that change does not happen immediately. It is gradual, complex, and often challenging. But it is possible.

I often return to that young girl I once was not with regret, but with resolution. Resolution to make sure that classrooms today are different. That they offer not limitations, but possibilities.

A Call to Fellow Educators and Researchers

If there is one point I have learned, it is this: your experiences matter.

Whether you are a teacher, a researcher, or both your reflections have the power to shape understanding, influence policy, and inspire change.

So I invite you to pause. To reflect. To write.

Because in sharing our stories, we do more than document experiences, we contribute to a collective vision of education that is more just, more inclusive, and more humane.

Portfolio link:

Kashfia Latafat

Kashfia Latafat is an experienced educator, researcher, and social justice advocate with over 20 years of teaching in prestigious institutions. Currently a research scholar at Aga Khan Universityā€™s Institute for Educational Development, she specializes in policy education and qualitative research, with a strong focus on equity, classroom practices, and teacher development. Kashfia actively contributes to academic and public discourse through research publications, blogs, and conference presentations, including her participation in HPAIR 2025 at Harvard University. She is founder of Virtual Baithak, a platform promoting womenā€™s empowerment through storytelling, training, and community engagement. Passionate about transforming education, she works closely with teachers to foster reflective practice, critical thinking, and inclusive learning environments.

When I first moved from the U.S. to the U.K., I was struck by the persistence of what Hirsch (2018) called ā€œThe Questionā€: Where are you from? These four words often left me feeling like something was wrong with my presence. Whether the individuals asking me were being friendly, curious, or perhaps thought that I didn’t belong had nothing to do with the way the question left me feeling. Over time, I have learned how to answer this question with a lot more ease, while recognizing that belonging is policed within spaces, including academic and educational ones, especially against the backdrop of institutional whiteness (Ahmed, 2007). My own journey from Lahore, New York City, Palo Alto to London has taught me that this unease and vulnerability, often seen as a barrier, is a bridge that connects me to others. 

This awareness has been central to my research. As Campbell-Stephens (2021) reminds us, leading and researching for equity and inclusion requires deep self-awareness. For me, this has meant sustained reflection on my ethnicity, my privileges, my biases, and the way these intersect in different educational and academic spaces.  As hooks (1994), drawing on Jane Ellen Wilson, reflects, finding one’s voice is not about fitting into pre-existing niches but about collectively making spaces where voices can stand clear of background noise. While my background inevitably shapes my work, I continue to work reflexively to ensure that my personal experiences do not determine or limit the way I think. 

South Asian heritage teachers in London primary schools are the storytellers in my research. It deliberately moves away from deficit framings and instead centres teachers as agentic professionals who navigate ethnicity, motherhood, religion, ambition, and institutional whiteness with creativity and care. Through sustained engagements with teachers, schools, and institutional processes, the study traces my own transition from being new to the U.K. education system to developing a grounded understanding of its structures, cultures, and everyday realities. 

Through this process, I came to recognize both the specificity of racialized and minoritized experiences and the universality of many challenges teachers face, such as workload intensification, emotional labor, accountability pressures, and the tension between personal values and institutional demands. While ethnicity, heritage, and whiteness profoundly shaped how these were experienced, the research revealed shared vulnerabilities and collective struggles that cut across differences. This recognition deepened my empathy for the profession globally. During research and as I write I try to attend carefully to language and remain alert to how knowledge is produced. Critical consciousness, as Howse et al. (2019) argue, is never finished; it requires constant work.

It was with this positionality and set of commitments that I attended the UKFIET conference in September 2025. It was my first time attending UKFIET. I arrived expecting familiar rhythms: panels, presentations, conversations about education, practice, and policy. I anticipated intellectual stimulation and opportunities for networking, and I did experience these. 

From the opening keynote of Assistant Professor Kamal Junina at Al-Aqsa University, which foregrounded the importance of online resources, mentorship, and sustained solidarity for students in Gaza, to the ĢĒŠÄ“«Ć½ plenary on anti-racism and reparative futures, where Professor Arathi Sriprakash challenged us to confront intergenerational injustice and move beyond abstraction, the conference created space for urgent, necessary, and some awkward conversations. The closing plenary by Judith Herbertson left us with a hopeful yet realistic sense of possibility, acknowledging both the constraints and the transformative potential of education.

What I did not anticipate, however, was how different the conference would feel- emotionally, relationally, and politically. (To be clear I am no expert at attending conferences and before UKFIET had only attended a handful of conferences and workshops at this scale). While questions of equity, inclusion, and representation were foregrounded. I found myself unexpectedly out of place. As a teacher, as a woman, and as a researcher who pays attention to language, I experienced a tension between the words we were using and our actions, particularly against the backdrop of the Examination Halls of Oxford.

This is not a tension unfamiliar to me. Studying at a university with a complex history of maintaining white hegemony, I am acutely aware of the irony of critiquing institutional whiteness while occupying spaces made accessible to me through institutional affiliation. As Schwoerer et al. (2018) note, participation in elite spaces can mean participating in what we critique. 

During the conference I found myself distancing myself, not from the remarkable work being highlighted by individuals and organizations represented there, but from some of the language used to frame global educational challenges. Positioning the Global South primarily as the site of need and the Global North as the savior sat uneasily with me, particularly as a researcher working with South Asian heritage teachers in London. The problems that teachers were facing in Nepal, Nigeria and Peru were not that different from what teachers in London encounter. The range and extent might have been varied based on the context, but these were all issues that teachers had raised, issues I have experienced. 

Language matters. How we frame problems matters. Inclusion and equity are important guiding principles for me, and I remain attentive to how even well-intentioned discourse can reproduce othering. 

I am certain that I, too, will look back at my own writing and presentations and recognize the language I would choose differently. This work is never finished, and I remain open to learning and critique. 

My presentation at UKFIET was received generously, yet as I left the conference, I found myself briefly convincing myself that perhaps this space was not meant for someone like me, that it was for a different kind of researcher, and I was comfortable accepting that in September.

It was only in December, in conversation with several of the teachers that participated in my study, that this thinking was disrupted. As we discussed findings, policy, and the current educational climate, they reminded me why these spaces matter. Their message was clear: research matters most when it translates 

into action. Visibility matters but so does accountability. And I, too, am accountable. What good is my research if it does not feed back into the worlds it emerges from? What good is my attention to language and framing if I’m not applying it?

As I reflect on UKFIET and my evolving identity as an early career researcher, I am left with sharper questions and not a clear conclusion.

How can we, as ECRs, inhabit academic spaces in ways that remain accountable to the communities we research with, while still allowing ourselves to grow, belong, and be seen? How do we ensure that our attention to language translates into action, and that our presence in elite spaces does not distance us from the worlds our work emerges from?

Perhaps the answer lies not in certainty, but in sustained reflexivity and in continuing to ask who we are in relation to others, whose voices are centred, how they are centred, and what kinds of rooms we are helping to build. As TƔƭwĆ² (2022) reminds us, ā€œwe build the kind of rooms in which we can sit together, rather than merely seeking to navigate more gracefully the rooms history has built for usā€ (p. 84).

For me, UKFIET was not simply another conference. It was a moment of becoming and a reminder that research, especially as an ECR, is never neutral. It is personal, political, political, and collective, and it asks not only what we know, but who we are becoming in the process.

References 

Ahmed, S.  (2007). A phenomenology of whiteness. Feminist theory, 8(2), 149ā€“168.  

Campbell-Stephens, R. M. (2021). Educational leadership and the global majority: Decolonising narratives. Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

ā€‹ā€‹Hirsch, A. (2018). Brit(ish): On race, identity and belonging. J. Cape.

hooks, B. (1994). Teaching to transgress: Education as the practice of freedom. Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group.

Howse, M., Emejulu, A., & Sobande, F. (2019). Creating a Space Within the German Academy. In To Exist is to Resist (pp. 195-). Pluto Press.

Schwoerer, L., Grosfoguel, R., & Cupples, J. (2019). Can the Masterā€™s Tools Dismantle the Masterā€™s Lodge?: Negotiating postcoloniality in the neoliberal university. In Unsettling Eurocentrism in the Westernized University (1st edn, pp. 56ā€“72). Routledge.

TƔƭwĆ², O. O. (2022). Elite capture: How the powerful took over identity politics (and everything else). Haymarket books.

Sakina Jafri

Sakina Jafri is a doctoral student at the Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge and a member of the Cambridge Network for Disability and Education Research (CaNDER) and Curriculum, Pedagogy, and Professional Learning (CPPL). Grounded in her own practice as an educator, Sakinaā€™s work is driven by a commitment to social justice , inclusive education, the amplification of global majority voices, and the advancement of teacher education.

Welcome to the ĢĒŠÄ“«Ć½ Student Platformā€™s Black History Month 2025 series.

This yearā€™s UK theme, ā€œStanding Firm in Power and Pride,ā€ invites us to honour resilience and celebrate the contributions of Black communities. But it also challenges us to look deeper: what does it really mean to ā€œstand firmā€ today?

The reflections weā€™ll share over the coming weeks move beyond celebration alone. They interrogate questions of identity, representation, and power in academic, political, and personal life. As Dr Sharon Walker (University of Bristol) asked in conversation with us: Must value always be proven through contributions recognised by dominant versions of the world? For how long must Black communities keep proving their contribution?

This series does not attempt to provide definitive answers. Instead, it offers space for reflection, provocation, and dialogue. Over the coming weeks, we will be showcasing this diverse set of voices. We encourage you to read, reflect, and join the conversation.

A Legacy of Debate: The Stark Contrast in Commemoration

Roy Leighton MPhil (Cantab), FRSA

On the 23rd July 2002, the United States Postal Service (USPS) launched a stamp commemorating the life and work of American writer and civil rights activist James Baldwin. It was valued at 37 centsā€”a standard, finite denomination of its time.

However, on the 9th September 2025, the USPS launched a stamp celebrating American conservative William F. Buckley Jr. This Buckley stamp is a ā€˜Forever Stampā€™, ensuring it will always retain its first-class mailing value. This difference in issueā€”a fixed-value tribute to a crucial Black literary and political voice, set against an ever-appreciating monument to a white conservative figureā€”provides a stark lens through which to view the legacy politics of America.

In promoting the stamps, the USPS rightly highlighted the importance of engaging in dialogue and debate across the political spectrum.

For the past five years, Iā€™ve been working with peace educators, artists, and academics in the UK and the USA on a new ā€˜Theatre of Peaceā€™ production. The production is inspired by, and commemorates, arguably the most famous debate in the history of the Cambridge Union. The motion for the debate on 18 February 1965 was: ā€œHas the American dream been at the expense of the American Negro?ā€ The speakers for and against the motion were James Baldwin and William F. Buckley Jr., respectively.

My co-author, Craig Green, writer, and New York attorney, and I trained in physical theatre in Japan in 1987. I had originally trained at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, and the shift from traditional Western actor training to the embodied, relational, intuitive, and transrational approach of Eastern theatre was life-changing. Since then, weā€™ve dedicated ourselves to creating spaces for honest, open, and intelligent dialogue.

Our new play, ā€˜The Missing Peace,ā€™ uses our ā€˜Theatre of Peaceā€™ methodologyā€”inspired by Augusto Boal and David Diamond, and built on my ā€˜Knowledge, Power and Politicsā€™ research from Cambridgeā€”to explore the issues Baldwin and Buckley debated: the nature of knowledge, systems of reality, and the politics of oppression. We use their historic engagement to highlight the necessity of robust argument, critical thinking, and heart-to-heart dialogue to find shared understanding.

While the USPS has rightly honoured both men with individual stamps, it has profoundly missed an opportunity to highlight their shared dialogue and its own contribution to the politics of unequal remembrance.

With the current and growing divide in the United States being expressed in increasing polarisation and violence, launching a ā€˜Forever Stampā€™ solely for Buckley is a potentially politically inflammatory move. May I suggest a compromise and correction?

If the USPS wants to celebrate the importance of debate and honour the robust challenge embodied by Baldwin and Buckley, it should promote the two stamps together and make the Baldwin stamp another ā€˜Forever Stampā€™. Granting them equal, enduring status would correct the implicit inequality of the original issues. It could become a powerful force for peace, love, and understanding in a time of conflict and violence in the history of the United States.

* Image: Used with the permission of the United States Postal ServiceĀ®. All rights reserved.

An ode to the Black Woman

Alexandra Brown, University of Bristol

Touching lives in different ways: Rethinking intersectionality, alliance, and solidarity

Using Our Game: A Reflection on Solidarity

Naming Racism as Activism: A Personal Reflection for Black History Month

Mercy O Martins, University of Bath

Reflections on Blackness: A Conversation for Black History Month

Pritha Dahal

As part of our Black History Month celebrations, we were honoured to host an enriching conversation featuring Dr Sharon Walker, Alexandra Brown, Mercy Martins, and Yusuf Olaniyan, facilitated by Kate Matzopoulos.

Blackness is too often perceived as a singular, monolithic identity. This authentic and deeply thoughtful discussion illuminated instead the rich diversity of voices, standpoints, and lived experiences within Black communitiesā€”and how these shape individual and collective understandings of Blackness, belonging, and the meaning of Black History Month.

We hope you find this conversation as inspiring and thought-provoking as we did, and that it encourages ongoing reflection and dialogue within and beyond our community.

As a PhD student who has spent long months engrossed in literature and theoretical frameworks, stepping out ā€˜into the fieldā€™ feels like embarking on a journey of discovery. Having received the ĢĒŠÄ“«Ć½ Student Fieldwork Grant and recently concluded my fieldwork, I can confidently say that fieldwork is perhaps the most transformative part of the research process. It unfolds you. It pushes theory into the realm of the tangible. It brings abstraction to life. As you encounter fragments of knowledge with evidence scattered everywhere and engage in illuminating conversations with people, you begin piecing together ā€˜truthsā€™.

It was during my MA at Loyola University Chicago that I remember reading Anna Tsingā€™s The Mushroom at the End of the World,which left a lasting impression on the intricacies of fieldwork, and more recently, I encountered her Friction. Her work, often surfacing in conversations with my friend and fellow researcher Aizuddin Anuar, has deeply shaped how I think about research. Tsingā€™s concept of friction resonates with me. The messiness, the generative encounters that occur when different worlds meet. And nowhere is that more present than in fieldwork.

That sense of friction became acutely real when I returned to Malaysia for fieldwork just weeks after losing my father in late February. I had to fly home suddenly to say goodbye. The grief had already been mounting. My niece had passed away just as I was beginning the PhD in 2023, my aunt the following year, and then, in the middle of 2024, my brother died suddenly. It was only right to return, and it was only possible with the support of the ĢĒŠÄ“«Ć½ Student Fieldwork Grant. After a brief visit home for my fatherā€™s funeral, I flew back to the UK for my upgrade viva in early March, and then finally made my way back to Malaysia again. This time with quiet sadness, but also with a heightened sensitivity. In many ways, grief made the fieldwork feel spiritual. It was not only a journey into schools and communities, but also an inward journey – one into myself, as a researcher.

As I travelled across Malaysia, from the urban centre engaging with elites in the Ministry of Education and nonprofit organisations, to rural teachers working with students on the ground, I often asked myself – how do we hold the fragments of the field, conversations, contradictions, observations, and weave them into something coherent, something meaningful? Over dinner one evening, my colleague RonĆ© McFarlane, now in the writing-up stage, asked: ā€œHow do I make it all coherent?ā€ That question lingered. It reminded me again of Tsing – that fieldwork and writing are not about extracting neat truths, but about making: negotiating meaning, finding patterns in friction, and fabricating coherence. Fabricating here is not in the sense of lying or faking, but in the sense of assembling. In fieldwork, as an education researcher, you are not passively absorbing data. We are fabricating knowledge: we interpret gestures, stitch together narratives, and co-construct meanings with others. The field is not a warehouse of facts; itā€™s a site of ongoing fabrication shaped by relationships, contexts, and histories.

So, for those who are preparing to go into the field: what if we did not treat fieldwork as a search for clarity, but as a process of composing? Of crafting stories and insights from the tensions and encounters that resist easy explanations? What if fieldwork were not just about finding data, but about becoming, through the very act of navigating its frictions?

This is the lens through which I approached my own fieldwork. Not just to gather information, but to understand how stories are told, how roles are shaped, and how futures are imagined. My research focuses on how global education agendas, particularly those tied to technology and efficiency, are shaping the professional identities of teachers in Malaysia. To explore this, I used a range of approaches rooted in dialogue, imagination, and reflection.

I conducted interviews with what we often call ā€˜elitesā€™ā€”policymakers, ministry officials, and other actors shaping the global agenda. These conversations helped surface the official narratives, logics, and ambitions underpinning Malaysiaā€™s push towards adopting these global agendas in its local education system. But I also wanted to understand how these agendas are lived, interpreted, and negotiated in classrooms, so I turned to teachers.

Alongside traditional interviews with teachers, I designed and facilitated a series of futures-based workshops with two teacher communities. This method, inspired by LauttamƤkiā€™s futures workshop model and adapted through speculative and critical design literature, became a space where teachers could play, reflect, and imagine. At the heart of this method was a custom-designed set of ā€œfutures cardsā€, which categorised scenarios as possible, plausible, probable, desirable, and undesirable.

These cards werenā€™t just props; in actuality, they were provocations. Teachers used them to build timelines, imagine dystopias and utopias, and reflect on the pathways that might lead to each. In one phase, they created a ā€œTimeline of Disasterā€ and a ā€œTimeline of Desireā€, sketching key events that could shape those imagined futures. In another, they debated what kinds of futures they wanted, which ones were tolerable, and which must be avoided at all costs.

What emerged from these workshops was more than data. There was laughter, frustration, moments of silence. There were expressions of fatigue and resistance. Some teachers articulated, for the first time, a discomfort with how digital tools were being imposed upon them, not as helpful supports, but as mandates tied to performance and compliance. Many began to question the subtle forms of ā€œnudgingā€ they had previously accepted without pause. In other words, the workshop became a space not just for speaking, but for thinking differently.

This, I now realise, is the kind of fabrication I mentioned earlier – not in the sense of inventing something false, but in the creative, careful work of piecing together fragments of lived experience, institutional discourse, and speculative futures. It is a process of negotiating what it means to teach, care, and act with agency in a world increasingly shaped by technological imperatives. As I reflect on this fieldwork journey, marked by grief, friction, and moments of deep connection, I am reminded that research is not a path to certainty, but an ongoing negotiation with the worldā€™s complexity. The field does not give us answers. Rather, it invites us to listen, to imagine, and to assemble meaning in ways that are necessarily incomplete.

In the words of Anna Tsing:

ā€œPrecarity is the condition of being vulnerable to others. Unpredictable encounters transform us; we are not in control, even of ourselves. To listen is to become vulnerable.ā€ ā€” Anna Tsing, The Mushroom at the End of the World

It is in this spirit of vulnerability, of listening, making, and becoming that I continue to think with my fieldwork. Perhaps this is what it truly means to do research: to stay with the friction and let it change us.

References:

Tsing, A.L., 2015. The mushroom at the end of the world: On the possibility of life in capitalist ruins. In The Mushroom at the End of the World. Princeton University Press.

Pravindharan Balakrishnan

Pravindharan Balakrishnan is a PhD student in the School of Education, Communication and Society at Kingā€™s College London. He is researching on the intersection of the increasingly complex architecture of global governance of education and the professional work of teachers. Previously, Pravin obtained a Masterā€™s degree in education policy from the Loyola University Chicago under the prestigious Fulbright scholarship. Prior to that, Pravin worked as a secondary school teacher in Malaysia for close to a decade. This experience informed his interest in the flow of global education policies to the local level.

Transnational higher education (TNE) is often analysed through the lenses of global strategy, institutional partnership, or international policy alignment. These macro-level perspectives provide valuable insights into how cross-border education is structured and governed. Yet alongside these structural considerations, it is equally important to attend to the lived, everyday experiences of students living and learning within transnational campuses. What does it mean to be a student in a space shaped by multiple educational systems? How do individuals navigate and make sense of their educational journeys amid the competing demands of national curricula, global metrics, and cultural expectations?

This blog post explores how students construct meaning, express identity, and demonstrate agency in their everyday lives. Rather than starting with institutional frameworks or policy debates, I begin with small stories ā€” conversations and music in campus, study desks in library, a comment made in passing about improve CVs or a moment from everyday life that holds unexpected significance. These micro-level narratives illuminate how global education is lived in local, deeply personal, and often contradictory ways.

Listening to the Everyday

Walking through the campus of a transnational university, I was struck by the layers of language and culture coexisting in a single space. I heard conversations in mother tongue, fluent English, and lively blends of both. Jazz music played from a cafĆ© nearby. Along the paths, bilingual signs marked buildings and directions. Some students passed by carrying English-language textbooks, while others laughed together with bags of local snacks in hand. In the library, shelves were filled with English written books, and studentsā€™ desks were scattered with bilingual notes. These everyday scenes ā€” often overlooked ā€” reflect what Hall (1996) describes as the “production of identity”: a continuous negotiation of selfhood within and across multiple cultural frames. These scenes are not simply descriptive ā€” they signal how students actively negotiate their identities.

For many students, transnational education is not only about acquiring credentials or improving employability but also about crafting a sense of self in a space where cultures intersect and sometimes clash. Their decisions ā€” what to display, what to mix, what to omit ā€” offer insight into how they navigate their educational and social environments. These everyday acts of meaning-making are rarely captured by formal metrics, yet they are central to understanding what international education actually feels like for those living it.

Structures, Metrics, and the Performative Self

These personal stories unfold within larger systems increasingly dominated by audit culture ā€” a world of KPIs, employability statistics, and performance dashboards. In such environments, students often internalise the logic of measurement, constructing what Ball (2003) describes as ā€œthe performative selfā€ ā€” a version of identity shaped by metrics, rankings, and the imperative to be constantly improving and visible. One student noted that she selected her university not solely for academic reasons, but because ā€œit will look good on my CV.ā€ Another described choosing her major based less on passion than on recommendations from parents and future career. Such decisions reflect both strategic awareness and the constraints of the global education market; they reflect the hyper-instrumentalised climate in which students must pre-emptively optimise for a labour market governed by visibility, metrics, and efficiency.

Yet even within this highly regulated environment, students exhibit forms of agency. They join student-led societies, launch creative side projects, or document their lives on social media, often blending personal aspirations with strategic goals. In doing so, they practice what de Certeau (1984) famously called ā€œtacticsā€ ā€” everyday acts of resistance and re-signification that transform imposed structures into personalised, meaningful experiences.

Crossing Borders, Crafting Belonging

In many transnational education (TNE) settings, students cross not only national borders but also emotional, cultural, and symbolic ones. While institutional narratives often frame global mobility as a straightforward opportunity for growth, student voices reveal more layered and ambivalent realities. Several described feeling ā€œin-betweenā€ ā€” not fully anchored in their home culture, yet not entirely embraced by the imagined ā€œWestā€ that their institution represents. Many students acknowledged that international branch campuses differ from their parent institutions. While they did not hold naive expectations of complete equivalence, they also recognised meaningful similarities in academic norms, campus routines, and institutional values. This awareness reflects a pragmatic understanding of transnational education ā€” one that balances realism with appreciation. For some, the value of TNE lies not in seamless integration, but in navigating the dissonance with maturity, adaptability, and openness. One student, for instance, expressed appreciation for the institutional support that enabled him to study for a year at a partner university in Australia ā€” an experience that expanded his academic horizon while reinforcing his transnational identity. Indeed, most students at international branch campuses will complete their entire degrees without ever physically crossing borders ā€” adding further complexity to the notion of ā€˜global mobility.

These experiences resonate with notion of the ā€œstratified spaceā€ of global education (Marginson, 2014), where not all students enjoy equal access to its benefits. For many, attending a transnational institution is not a seamless glide into cosmopolitanism but a complex process of cultural translation, often accompanied by moments of confusion, adaptation, or quiet resistance. Despite these challenges, students find ways to craft belonging. Some mix local dialects with English slang, forming new hybrid expressions. Others build communities through shared interests in music, gaming, or volunteering. These actions may seem small, but they are deeply significant. They reflect studentsā€™ capacities to humanise and personalise their experience of global education, resisting the idea that they are simply interchangeable ā€œinternational learnersā€ in a borderless system.

Mobility or Relocation?

In policy discourse, mobility is often equated with opportunity ā€” but for students, the experience can be far more ambivalent. Physical relocation does not necessarily translate into intercultural competence, intellectual engagement, or emotional growth (Schartner & Young, 2020). Some students experience international study not as mobility but as dislocation ā€” a movement of bodies without the accompanying development of minds or relationships.

Student narratives often reflect this ambivalence. While many appreciate the opportunities for cross-border learning, others speak of language barriers, cultural fatigue, or uncertainty about how to interpret their hybrid academic environment. Several students described themselves as navigating between institutional expectations and personal aspirations ā€” not just translating between languages, but constantly shifting between different cultural and academic logics. Success in such environments is not always straightforward; students recognised that academic success alone doesnā€™t guarantee cultural fluency or career advancement. They recognised the need to continually demonstrate their global competence in ways that are meaningful across both local and international contexts. These accounts disrupt celebratory accounts of internationalisation and suggest a more cautious, human-scale perspective: one that considers what types of emotional, academic, and structural support are necessary for students to genuinely thrive in cross-border contexts.

Reclaiming Meaning in a Measured World

Education is not only about what works but also about what it means (Biesta, 2015). What does it mean to ā€˜succeedā€™ in global education if the meaning-making process is lost? In an era increasingly dominated by measurement, the affective and existential dimensions of learning risk being marginalised. Yet the small stories students share ā€” their frustrations, dreams, compromises, and moments of joy ā€” reveal the rich inner life of TNE.

These narratives are not simply illustrative anecdotes. They represent a form of critical knowledge: one that challenges the dominant logics of international higher education and offers alternative visions rooted in lived experience. In a time shaped by geopolitical uncertainty, digital transformation, and post-pandemic adjustment, attending to student voices is more vital than ever. Instead of viewing students as data points or institutional outcomes, their small stories tell us not only how transnational education operates on the ground, but how it feels ā€” how it is understood, adapted, and sometimes resisted by the very people it is supposed to serve. Listening to students is not optional ā€” it is essential for shaping the future of global education.

References

Ball, S. J. (2003). The teacher’s soul and the terrors of performativity. Journal of education policy, 18(2), 215-228.

Biesta, G. (2015). Good education in an age of measurement: Ethics, politics, democracy. Routledge.

de Certeau, M. (1984). The practice of everyday life (S. Rendall, Trans.). University of California Press.

Hall, S. (2011). Introduction: Who needs ā€˜identityā€™?. In Questions of cultural identity (pp. 1-17). SAGE Publications Ltd.

Marginson, S. (2014). Student self-formation in international education. Journal of Studies in International Education, 18(1), 6ā€“22.

Schartner, A., & Young, T. J. (2020). Intercultural Transitions in Higher Education: International Student Adjustment and Adaptation (Vol. 1). Edinburgh University Press.

Wanwei Nie

Wanwei Nie is a doctoral candidate at the IOE, UCLā€™s Faculty of Education and Society. Her research explores student experiences at transnational higher education campuses, with a particular emphasis on historical perspectives. Drawing on her extensive academic and cultural experiences in China, the UK, Australia, and the US, her research examines transnational higher education, student experiences, student mobility and historical perspectives on global education.

Transgressive education: fostering inclusion of refugee and asylum seeker students

In the last twelve years, there has been an increase in forced mobilities, and thus, in human right abuses, at a global level. Forty percent of the total forcibly displaced population are children (UNHCR, 2023), which is a concerning number. The  causes  are varied, such as conflicts, wars, natural disasters, etc., but the challenges faced by the majority of this collective remain the same.

These children, along with their families, have to endure violence, trauma, insecurity and life-threatening situations before and during these forced displacements. Not only do they leave their homes and family members behind, but they also embark on long and hazardous journeys. They struggle with difficulties related to border crossings and living in refugee camps, in which they are deprived of basic human rights that can be limited and sometimes even non-existent, such as healthcare, access to water, education, etc. (DiakĆ³w & Goforth, 2021). 

However, challenges do not disappear when refugees and asylum seekers finally arrive to their receiving countries, they materialise in different ways. They face financial strain, which limits their access to housing, health and education. Moreover, they struggle with barriers related to resettlement and the documentation procedures, which tend to be long and uncertain (Alfadhli & Drury, 2018). Furthermore, they have to deal with grief, fear of deportation and instability, while navigating a new social system in which they encounter social exclusion, discrimination and prejudice (Ballentyne & Drury, 2023).  

In the UK, this exclusion has been really present in public debate and policies, in which refugees and asylum seekers are depicted under pervasive discourses that attempt to justify the illegitimacy of their citizenship, fostering hostility and rejection from the British society (Fatoye & Fatoye, 2019). In this sense, policies regarding resettlement are focused on offering protection and guaranteeing access to rights to health, economic, accommodation and educational support for refugees (UK Government, 2021). Nevertheless, asylum seekers face greater difficulties than the refugees, since policies in the UK have been designed to limit their living conditions by restricting those rights, while being trapped in lengthy processes to grant their refugee status (Ramachandran, 2024). 

In this climate of chaos and uncertainty, education becomes central for refugee and asylum seeker children, especially after the perilous journeys and risks that they have experienced, and the structural constraints faced in their receiving countries (Dryden-Peterson & Horst, 2023). Education provides safe spaces, creates links to other services that they might need, such as psychological support, and fosters their inclusion within their wider community (Dryden-Peterson et al., 2019). In this sense, I began to be interested in studying how education in formal and non-formal settings could promote the inclusion of refugees and asylum seekers, and that is how my research started, which I will go into next. 

Transgressive spaces for refugee and asylum seekersā€™ education: schools of sanctuary and the case-study of a non-formal education classroom.   

In 2012, Liverpool was named City of Sanctuary, which entailed a series of initiatives and measures to foster the inclusion of forcibly displaced populations. As a consequence, a network of schools of sanctuary was created, which committed to build welcoming, understanding and respectful spaces for those forced into exile.

During my research stay in Liverpool in the academic year 2023/24, I had the opportunity to visit and study how schools with sanctuary status and/or those applying for it approached and fostered the inclusion of refugee and asylum seeker students (there are nuances in both terms: refugees are granted protection by official entities whereas asylum seekers have applied and are awaiting refugee status). I was able to visit the schools, observe and interview their teachers and headteachers (especially those responsible for applying and/or implementing the sanctuary status). This was extremely insightful, as teachers are fundamental in providing quality education and support for refugee students, as well as fostering their engagement and inclusion in the classroom (Rose, 2019).

In addition to that, I had the chance to experience first-hand, the specific case of a non-formal education programme developed in the city, and the only one of its kind in the UK. This programme focused on assisting in the enrolment of children who are asylum seekers in formal education. It originated as a response to shortcomings they identified in guaranteeing the asylum seeker studentsā€™ right to education. Since they tend to be overlooked in the British educational system, having to wait for longer periods of time to be able to access formal education (Ramachandran, 2024) .

This project acted in the social and educational aspect of this reality, by offering help to find a vacant space for asylum seeker children in mainstream schools as well as offering alternative education while these children had to wait to be enrolled in formal education. This non-formal educational setting is outstanding, since it aims to ease the transition of students who are asylum seekers into formal education. A task that is possible because the teachers from the project develop different strategies focused on language and emotional support as well as the hidden curriculum. In this case-study, I was able to visit this alternative classroom setting and interview the teachers and the manager of the project. This gave me a wholesome perspective of the social context in which it is embedded and its impact on inclusion.  

Both my experiences, in schools and in this non-formal classroom, reminded me of the concept of re-bordering education that was discussed in the latest ĢĒŠÄ“«Ć½ conference in 2024. And how these different educational contexts and staff are transgressing and fighting against the power imbalances and the inequities that forcibly displaced children (refugees and asylum seekers) and their families face. This made me realise that there are examples of good practices, educational approaches and pedagogies that can be enriching and compared.

Implications for education 

In my study, I identified  a lack of networking between the formal and non-formal settings. Moreover, I realised that, although the non-formal classroom was extremely successful, it had not been implemented nationally or internationally. This lack of connectivity and communication between institutions impeded them from sharing their strengths and inclusive approaches. Hence, it prevents better quality education.

This is a sign that there should be a more unified approach which implements measures and policies that can focus on the inclusion of these students. Refugee and asylum seeker children are entitled to the right to education (United Nations General Assembly,1989), a right that they should have never lost in the first place. As one of the interviewees stated, education should not be a privilege:  ā€˜We might be facilitating it right now, but I want those children to feel entitled to education, because they are. I really want them to feel empowered, that they think ā€œit belongs to me and I deserve this so I can design my own future and reach my potentialā€ā€™. (E4)

Agreeing with her, I can only conclude that we have the responsibility as educators to promote, reinforce and guarantee that students receive the best quality education possible, so they can fully develop regardless of the uncertainty of their future. 

References 

Alfadhli, K. & Drury, J. (2018). A Typology of Secondary Stressors Among Refugees of Conflict in the Middle East: The Case of Syrian Refugees in Jordan. PLOS Current Disasters.

Ballentyne, S.C. & Drury, J. (2023). Boundaries beyond borders: The impact of institutional discourse on the identities of asylum seekers. Current Research in Ecological and Social Psychology, 5. 

DiakĆ³w, D. M., & Goforth, A. N. (2021). Supporting Muslim refugee youth during displacement: Implications for international school psychologists. School Psychology International, 42(3), 238-258. 

Dryden-Peterson, S., Adelman, E., Bellino, M. J., & Chopra, V. (2019). The Purposes of Refugee Education: Policy and Practice of Including Refugees in National Education Systems. Sociology of Education, 92(4), 346-366. 

Dryden-Peterson, S. & Horst, C. (2023). Education for Refugees: Building Durable Futures?. Journal of Refugee Studies, 36(4), 587ā€“603. 

Fatoye, C.T. & Fatoye, F. (2019). The Experiences of African Asylum Seekers and Refugees in Manchester, United Kingdom. Mediterranean Journal of Clinical Psychology, 7(3).

Ramachandran, N. (2024). The Enforced Destitution of Asylum Seekers in the UK. Journal of  Human Rights and Social Work, 9, 139ā€“153. 

Rose, A. (2019). The role of teacher agency in refugee education. Australian Educational Researcher, 46, 75ā€“91. 

UK Government (2021). UK Refugee Resettlement: Policy Guidance. Home Office. 

UNHCR (2023). Global Trends: Forced Displacement in 2023. UN Refugee agency. 

United Nations General Assembly (1989). Convention on the Rights of the Child (resolution 44/25 of 20 November 1989). United Nations. 

Lucia Torres Zaragoza

Lucia Torres-Zaragoza is a PhD student with a pre-doctoral contract for university professor training at the Faculty of Education Sciences at the University of Seville, Spain. Her research interests and doctoral work focus on structural inequalities and marginalisation towards minority groups in education. Moreover, her study is attentive to inclusive educational practices that can foster inclusion and social cohesion.

Over the previous three decades, social justice in education has become increasingly relevant to debates on globalisation, capitalism, and inequalities around the world (Zajda et al 2006; Rizvi, 2009; Taylor et al, 1997). In the Latin American context, neoliberalism has become hegemonic in the last 30 years with Peru adopting this model in 1991. However, neoliberalism has affected communities in distinct ways, creating further disparities between a minority who have benefitted from this model and more than one third of the population still living in poverty and exclusion in countries like Peru. Moreover, the neoliberal model has served to marginalise the voices of rural teachers and their practices of social justice in Peru.

As teachers play a central role in educational process, the Peruvian scenario shows that rural teachersā€™ voices who are engaged in the praxis of social justice have not been sufficiently heard at the level of national debates nor have they been part of large studies.  The aim of this blog is to discuss how a group of schoolteachers in rural Peru conceptualise and practice their commitment to social justice through critical pedagogies within the constraints of the neoliberal policy landscape. This piece of writing is part of my doctoral research conducted with seven schoolteachers from Cusco and Ayacucho (two of the poorest regions in rural Peru). This blog entry will reflect on the social justice practices implemented by three of these teachers for reappraising indigenous knowledge.

How to practice social justice in education? The value of critical pedagogies

Critical pedagogies emerged from Paulo Freireā€™s work in north-eastern Brazil during the 1960s. Freire points out that the injustices within education are not methodological or pedagogical, but rather political (Freire, 1970; Jones & Torres, 2010).  Within this scenario, critical pedagogies are related to the understanding of the relationship between power and knowledge (McLaren, 2002). Schools are seen not only as spaces of instruction or socialization, but also as a cultural and political spaces which activates empowerment and the self-transformation of students. In this sense, schools are spaces of both domination and liberation (McLaren, 2002). Through Freirean concepts such as dialogue, problem-posing, critical consciousness and epistemological curiosity, critical pedagogies seek human liberation beyond the educational field. Within critical pedagogies, teachers have a central role in challenging oppressive educational systems. For Giroux, educators must be ā€œtransformative intellectualsā€ rather than be reduced to the role of technicians engaged in formalistic tasks (Giroux, 2013). In this sense, Giroux (2013) points out that teachers should combine the mutually interdependent roles of critical educators and active citizens.

Within the Peruvian context, my doctoral research used a narrative approach to investigate the social justice practices of seven rural teachers. This blog entry will include the voices of Amaru (Cusco), Kuntur (Ayacucho) and Urpi (Ayacucho).

Revalorising indigenous knowledge through critical pedagogies from rural Peru

Rural teachers are promoting social justice in education through conversations with wise elders within their communities and the promotion of Quechua language. About the conversations with wise elders, Amaru seeks the collaboration of the broader community through walks and engagement with wise elders (ā€œYachaqā€). The ā€œYachaqā€ is an experienced and respected person within Andean communities (Estermann, 2006). ā€œYachaqsā€ share their experiences and provide the knowledge to empower teachers, students and the community. Kuntur refers that the knowledge from wise elders is spreading among the members of the community to both preserve and revalue the indigenous practices beyond the constraints of formal curricula at schools. Kuntur shares: ā€œwe say that the community is involved with the school, we have a relationship with ā€œYachaqsā€: they teach how to cook or embroider. But weaving is not just like that, it has its moments, the sticks must be baptised, you have to have a whole wisdom, the hands also know, not only the brain, but your heart also knows. We invite the Yachaqs, the wise ones, what we are doing with the children, then we invite the farmer, who knows how to cultivate the land, when to sow, look at the halo of the sun and the moon, those people who know should be called.ā€ Through these conversations Kuntur is raising awareness of the value of indigenous knowledge. From Kunturā€™s testimony, the role of wise elders as bearers of knowledge on how to cook, weave or cultivate the land is highly valued.

Urpi is working with storytelling. Within traditional societies, storytelling is an important process in which customs and values are taught and shared (Shank, 2006). Urpi has encouraged their children to talk to their parents and grandparents about Quechua language and their culture. Urpi shares: ā€œwe collected all the stories, the children used their tablets, they recorded their parents and grandparents narrating the stories to them. I made them listen to how their parents narrated so that they (the children) could narrate as well. Then I told them: now you are going to write it down. Then they narrated, wrote and read in Quechuaā€. Urpi conceives this process as creative while they are preserving their cultural ties. Additionally, she organised workshops with parents and grandparents in the community through dialogues to contribute to the communal calendar. The inclusion of ā€œYachaqsā€ as storytellers stimulated the use of Quechua language while preserving their cultural elements (Espinal-Meza, 2024).  Thus, storytelling is a powerful pedagogical tool not only to make children aware of their culture and social world but also as a mean by which social change is enacted (Coulter, 2007).

To sum up, these three teachers are bringing valuable practices for reappraising indigenous knowledge in classroom and beyond. Unlike individualism and market-oriented values of neoliberal policies, these teachers are promoting critical pedagogies among their students.

Conclusion

Neoliberalism in education has silenced the critical voices from historically excluded populations such as rural teachers in Peru. However, a social justice perspective in education is being practised by a group of teachers in Cusco and Ayacucho. Through the promotion of Freirean concepts such as critical consciousness, dialogue and epistemological curiosity a group of rural teachers is making their voices heard. The inclusion of wise elders and the revalorisation of Quechua language are part of social justice practices for reappraising indigenous knowledge. Finally, this  group of teachers are moving beyond technical roles to be transformative intellectuals (Giroux, 2013) in a context still dominated by neoliberal mandates.

References

Coulter, C., Michael, C., & Poynor, L. (2007). Storytelling as Pedagogy: An Unexpected Outcome of Narrative Inquiry. Curriculum Inquiry, 37(2), 103ā€“122.

Espinal-Meza, S. (2024) Critical pedagogies in neoliberal times: teachersā€™ voices of resistance from rural Peru. NORRAG Special Issue 10: Education for Societal Transformation: Alternatives for a Just Future.

Estermann, J. (2006). Filosofƭa Andina. Sabidurƭa indƭgena para un mundo nuevo. Instituto Superior EcumƩnico Andino de Teologƭa.

Freire, P (1970) Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York, Continuum

Giroux, H.A. (2013). Critical Pedagogy in Dark Times. Praxis Educativa, 17, 27-38.

Jones, L & Torres C.A. (2010) Struggles for memory and social-justice education in Latin America In: Development in Practice, Vol. 20, No. 4/5, Achieving Education for All through Public-Private Partnerships?, pp. 567-578

McLaren, P. (2002). Critical pedagogy: A look at the major concepts. In Antonia Darder et al. (Eds.), The critical pedagogy reader (pp. 69-96). New York and London: Routlege/Falmer

Rizvi, F. (2009). International perspectives on social justice in education. In: Ayers, W. et al. Handbook of social justice in education. Routledge.

Taylor, S., Rizvi, F., Lingard, B., & Henry, M. (1997). Education Policy and the Politics of Change. London: Routledge

Zajda J., Majhanovich S., Rust V. (2006) Education and Social Justice: Issues of Liberty and Equality in the Global Culture. In: Zajda J., Majhanovich S., Rust V. (eds) Education and Social Justice. Springer, Dordrecht

Silvia Espinal Meza

Silvia Espinal-Meza is a Peruvian sociologist with 15 years of experience in the fields of social sciences and critical education in Peru and the UK. Silvia is currently a PhD candidate in Education at the University of Bristol. Silviaā€™s research is rooted in critical approaches for amplifying the voices of historically marginalised populations in the Global South. Her doctoral research focuses on the narratives of social justice through critical pedagogies from the voices of seven rural teachers in Peru.

The aim of the event was to explain generative dialogue as a method for supporting academic writing. The presenters, Mercy and Shona, wanted also to create a space for participating students to try it for themselves. We co-presented the session and planned it so that dialogue was a central part of it.

MERCY: Hi. I am Mercy, a second-year PhD student in the Department of Education at the University of Bath. My research explores how language practices in schools can be reimagined in Nigeria through an anti-colonial theoretical lens. I am deeply passionate about decolonial work. As co-chair of the Decolonising Education Collective (DEC), one aim is to bridge gaps between theory and practice in decolonising work.

SHONA: Like you, Mercy, I am part of the staff-student collective that makes up DEC and, along with my educational research, also see decolonisation as praxis. Finding alternatives is a crucial part of effecting social change.

MERCY: Like writing differently. The chapter submission that this workshop is centred around was my first publication of my PhD ā€”written when I was just three months in. Having the opportunity to co-author it with my supervisor and write in a way that felt like a conversationā€”where the message is not just read but truly heardā€”made it an exceptional and formative experience.

SHONA: I totally agree with you that writing together was an excellent experience. As one of your supervisors, it helped me get to know you in a way that ordinary conversations during supervision does not. I was also keen to spread the method of generative dialogue and so, when we were invited to this event, wanted it to be interactive. Below we outline a brief account of how generative dialogue developed, how we demonstrated it in the seminar, and some of the outcomes of the session.

Generative dialogue methodology in theory and in practice

Dialogue for generating knowledge is not a new idea. Socrates used it as a pedagogical tool with his students, acutely targeting questions to probe their understanding and make visible areas of confusion or conflation. While Socratic teaching methods are common practice in classrooms internationally, the published academic text rarely shows the dialogues behind the finished article. However, dialogue can be an epistemically-just method of presenting different knowledges as equally valued, avoiding the hierarchies of knowledge that academia re/produces[1]. Shonaā€™s co-edited book used dialogue to connect silos of knowledge between academics and practitioners in Global Citizenship Education[2]. Chapter authors responded to provocations and presented the knowledge they generated as unfolding play scripts, in the format Mercy and I used above. Generative dialogue also structured a chapter co-written by Mercy and Shona for The International Research Handbook on Anti-Colonial Education. We felt that the method demonstrated that dialogues could support epistemic equality, in this case between PhD student and supervisor. The workshop for ĢĒŠÄ“«Ć½ student members on 19 March 2025 was a way to share the method using a structure to reflect the method used in our chapter.

Our chapter identified four main parts in the accepted abstract and made them into provocations to guide dialogue (see Figure One). Then we sat down together in person and talked in response to each provocation in turn. We recorded the dialogue on Teams, producing a rough transcript which we then tidied up and used as the chapter draft. One joy of writing this way is that text comes ā€˜aliveā€™: it jumps off the page, communicating with an urgency that reaches the audience more as a listener than a reader and contrasts with traditional academic writing. Added to this, the to-and-fro of dialogue evokes the Socratic method, provoking dialoguers to think in-depth and identify areas of consonance and dissonance, each allowed to stand, avoiding the false construction of a consensus so common in academic writing. The next section explains the workshop.

The workshop – generative dialogue as decolonial praxis

The seminar was structured so participants could first understand generative dialogue and how we used dialogue in our chapter and then try it themselves, with ample space for dialoguing and reflection. The first half of the session introduced the provenance of generative dialogue in more detail than we gave above and demonstrated the method we used for our chapter. Participants then had the opportunity to try it for themselves in breakout rooms, returning for collective reflection. We guided the first part with slides that showed the abstract and the four provocations that came from it. An example is shown at Figure Two, where a sentence in our abstract is in bold and, in yellow, the third provocation we developed from it.

Once we had given examples of the four guiding provocations, we returned to the first ā€“ What consequences did your education have on you and your community? ā€“ and showed participants an excerpt from the transcription of our recorded dialogue. Then we contrasted it with the text of the accepted chapter. We pointed out some differences, such as the insertion of citations for the publication. When we were talking, we just used authorsā€™ names or their concepts. We then read aloud a section of the dialogue from the accepted chapter to demonstrate how realistic it was ā€“ it sounded just like a conversation. The equal credence given to ā€˜speakersā€™ in generative dialogue is the element that works against epistemic hierarchy and serves as decolonial praxis.

Everyone had a go!

After our demonstration, we gave the participants a chance to try generative dialogues around three topics that students might have in common, with the option to make their own topic. The prepared topics were:

• How has your writing changed as a student during your studies?
• What areas of academic writing are you confident and less confident in?
• What has influenced your writing ā€“ academic or otherwise?

Participants worked in breakout rooms for 30 minutes before coming back together to share their examples in group discussion and reflect on the experience and the method.

Participant reflections of generative dialogue

In the shared discussion, participants spoke about the multiple uses of the method in academic writing and in undertaking a doctorate more broadly. It was fascinating to hear how the different groups expanded ways to apply the method.

For example, a first-year PhD student felt that dialogue was a good way to begin academic writing, as it offers more freedom to express oneself rather than being confined by strict academic conventionsā€”a kind of soft landing. For another student, dialogue served to clarify internal questioning about how to position themselves or decide how to proceed with their writingā€”should they use a particular theory or method? What might be the advantages or drawbacks? If they structure their argument in one way, what are they highlighting? And what would an alternative structure mean? In this sense, dialogue becomes a valuable tool for learning through questioning. Interestingly, for one student, the dialogue could be between them and themselvesā€”a thought-provoking perspective.

Others discussed how dialogue could be used as a methodology and incorporated into the thesis, as it enables honest explanation and justificationā€”a different way of approaching methodology. Another group spoke about dialogue in relation to the pedagogy of dissonance, where it can be used to reflect on decisions and choices, particularly in connection with internal dialogue and questioningā€“strengthening and clarifying justifications.

The outcomes

The dialogues that emerged from the breakout rooms gave students space to reflect on how they might incorporate dialogue into their own researchā€”and they truly embraced the opportunity.

• Anne: Dialogue opened my mind to endless possibilities and fresh thinking.
• Hodges: Dialogue is a light-hearted approach to academic writing.
• Lizzy: Dialogue demystifies academic writing.
• Wanwei and Min: Dialogue allows for learning to take place through questioning.
• AS and Kayonazz: Dialogue is a way to bring our positionality into our work and allows us to express internal dialogues.
• Sheriya and Thomas: Dialogue allows us to value difference through the multiplicity of thoughts that it provides ā€“ a pedagogy of difference.

These reflections continued to evolve, eventually blossoming into broader questions: How might generative dialogue find a valued place in scientific research? and What potential does this method hold for making knowledge more accessible, particularly through the use of inclusive language that generative dialogue fosters?

The seminar introduced an alternative approach to the learned conventions of academic writing that is instilled during doctoral study. While it is arguably important to be able to write conventionally, it is perpetuating, unquestioningly, traditions of epistemic inequity. Generative dialogue is one way to do differently, in a liberatory way, in the hope that uncontested practices reproducing knowledge hierarchies can begin to be openly seen as part of the colonial apparatus of Eurocentred coloniality.

Where could generative dialogue take you?

We wanted to leave you with this provocation, to ask if you can think of some way of using this method in your own academic work. If so, we would love to hear from you!

[1] McIntosh, S. & Wilder, R. (2022). Towards epistemically-just research: a methodologies framework. Cultural Studies Ć³ Critical Methodologies, 23(3), 235-245.

[2] Kang, S.L. and McIntosh, S. eds., 2022. Enacting equitable global citizenship education in schools: lessons from dialogue between research and practice. Taylor & Francis.

Mercy Onyemaechi Martins

I am a De/Anti-colonial researcher interested in Language practices in Nigerian secondary schools. My work revolves around social justice issues, culture and identity, systemic coloniality, language in education, and resistance and agency as Anti-colonial praxis.

Shona McIntosh

Dr Shona McIntosh is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Education at the University of Bath. Her research interests focus on methodologies for epistemic justice as applied to research into educative practices in compulsory schooling, particularly on global citizenship education and climate education, in England and internationally. Working with decolonial theories primarily from scholars in South America and Africa, Shona has critiqued traditional research methodologies that emerged during European colonization, and proposes delinking from them to move towards epistemically-just knowledge creation. This approach drives her research and collaboration with others. Shona also teaches decolonisation at Masterā€™s and doctoral level, is an active member of Decolonise Education Collective (DEC) in the Department of Education. She is an anchor member of DECkNO, a University-wide research and practice collective, co-lead of the Research and Writing strand and is co-editor of the working paper series Multiversum. ORCid: 0000-0002-9223-3949

The space between evidence-based policy and social critique can feel like walking a tightrope. For 17 years, I navigated this delicate balance at , learning firsthand how professional boundaries shape what we can say and how we can say it. The , and I am concerned that the period that feels like the downfall for many has not ended. However, I exited the car in 2019 to pursue a long-delayed dream. I have been pursuing , the same field I got my masterā€™s in 2002. Transitioning from policy practice to critical policy scholarship has been a generative, complex, and challenging journey that embodies a constant reflection of lived experiences through new ways of thinking. I think of this transitional space as , borrowing from Islam,a liminal space of reflection devoid of judgment.

This liminal space has led me to question how policy analystsā€™ agency to address the ideological and political pillars of policy intersects with the normative framework of an increasingly prevalent evidence-based policy realm. Drawing on theories about policy analysis and intellectuals’ role in society, I examine how professional boundaries shape our work as policy analysts. I argue that evidence-based policy analysis operates within the boundaries of professional norms, including what constitutes ā€˜legitimate evidence.ā€™ Border protection agents (representing both state and dominant ideologies) often reject narratives they view as transgressing these boundaries. Furthermore, depending on the local political context, these agents may seek retribution for border crossings. Let me illustrate this through a personal experience.

December 2016 offered a vivid illustration of these boundaries. (Program for International Student Assessment) 2015 results showed TĆ¼rkiye’s learning achievement had dropped to 2003 levels, but the context was telling. Under a state of emergency following a failed coup attempt by a clandestine network within state institutions, with political rights and civil liberties curtailed, these disappointing results could not generate meaningful public debate about education policy.

In this context, I was . What began as a ‘safe’ discussion of the economic implications of educational shortcomings gradually moved into contested territory. I ventured beyond these boundaries, questioning the decades-long operational mindset of the education bureaucracy. I criticized the ideological nature of education legislation and the lack of critical thinking in pedagogy and curriculum. Beyond evidence-based diagnosis and solutions, I called for a genuine, transparent, and pluralistic debate about our collective approach to education. These critical reflections emerged from years of engagement with TĆ¼rkiyeā€™s education landscape and diverse stakeholders. I aimed to provoke dialogue, not prescribe solutions. I believed then, as now, in the power of public deliberation over using education as a tool for indoctrination. For a change in TĆ¼rkiyeā€™s education realm, I thought we should acknowledge the politics within policy, the elephant in the room, and deal with it openly rather than ignoring it.

The backlash for crossing these boundaries came swiftly and from multiple directions. A senior ministry official embargoed all communication and collaboration with our institution pending his approval, claiming we “intended to erode the nation’s trust in and the reputation of the state.” While the ministry welcomed critiques “based on scientific data and research,” it was a pity we failed those standards. Academic circles joined, with fellow scholars sarcastically questioning my “scientific” approach. These personal encounters with border crossings and their consequences illuminate the relationship between two distinct approaches: evidence-based policy that treats education as a technocratic issue and critical inquiry that questions its political, social, and cultural foundations. The boundaries between these approaches shift with time and context – becoming more or less permeable as freedoms in TĆ¼rkiye expanded and contracted or as regimes elsewhere showed varying tolerance for critique. Yet regardless of these temporal and spatial variations, the professional norms of evidence-based policy and the policy analyst tend to reinforce these divisions.

Throughout my experiences, I also witnessed evidence-based policy’s effectiveness in building bridges with policymakers and diverse constituencies. While valuable for driving change, it needs to be situated within broader social transformation, maintaining a productive tension between empirical evidence and political reality. My perspective underscores the fundamental tension between the promise and limits of evidence-based policy in driving social change, a challenge that is both and . The who developed and popularised randomised controlled trials exemplifies the high-status acknowledgment of evidence-based policy, troublingly positioned as a panacea of empirical solution to complex social, cultural, and political challenges and as an alternative to the messy work of system-wide change through policy. Policy processes remain inherently bureaucratic, political, and frustrating, while social change continues to be slow and challenging. Our future educators and policy analysts deserve to understand these complexities.

How can we foster this understanding? Graduate programmes could balance technical training with a critical understanding of how evidence operates in a world of competing values and ideologies. Learning how to undertake a cost-benefit analysis of free school lunch should come with questioning why we need such empirical data to do a policy that could be fundamentally moral, value-driven, and right-based.  Working in this liminal space – questioning both evidence and its absence, may help us develop more nuanced and ethical approaches to policy.

Batuhan Aydagul

Batuhan AydagĆ¼l is an educational practitioner, policy analyst, and scholar with twenty-five years of experience across schools, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and governmental agencies in different geographies. Batuhan holds a B.A. in Business from Marmara University in Turkey and an M.A. in International Education Administration and Policy Analysis from Stanford University in the USA. Since 2019, Batuhan has pursued his doctorate in Educational Policy Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the USA. His research interests involve critical policy analysis of K-12 and higher education policies focusing on the interplay between state and educational institutions.

Before his doctorate, Batuhan was the director of the Education Reform Initiative (ERI), a Turkish non-governmental think-and-do-tank in education. Batuhan takes pride in being part of a team that established a reputable and trustworthy education policy institution in a highly politicized and polarized country. After ten years with the ERI, he took over the position of director from the founding director, Prof. ƜstĆ¼n ErgĆ¼der, in July 2013 and served until August 2019.

An internationally recognized voice in Turkish education, Batuhan is trusted by national and international media (BBC, FT, NYT, The Economist) for his non-partisan, objective, and evidence-based views. He has a long track record of public speaking on education, including talks invited by high school students, which he considers especially valuable. Academically, Batuhan has frequently participated in the Comparative International Education Society conferences and was invited to the Center of Middle East Studies at Harvard University to deliver the Directorā€™s Seminar.

Batuhan AydagĆ¼l is a recipient of a ā€œDistinguished Service Awardā€ from the Liberia Ministry of National Education and was awarded the Patricia Blunt Koldyke Fellowship for Social Entrepreneurship in 2012 by the Chicago Council of Global Affairs for his contributions to public education in Turkey. Batuhan serves on the Board of the Mother-Child Education Foundation (AƇEV). Previously, he served on the Board of the DarĆ¼ÅŸÅŸafaka Association, ENKA Schools, and Teacher Training Academy Foundation in Turkey, as well as the Network of Education Policy Centers, a regional network headquartered in Croatia. He has been a fellow of the Royal Society of the Arts since February 2017.

In July 2024, theĢĒŠÄ“«Ć½ ECR Conference was held over two days, July 20 and 21, 2024 with the theme ā€˜Global Crises, Continuities, and Change: Imagining Educational Responses in an (Un)certain Worldā€™. The conference included brilliant presentations, conversations, stories and posters from practitioners and ECRs across the world. It also included a keynote address by our very own Tejendra Pherali, former Chair of ĢĒŠÄ“«Ć½ and Professor of Education, Conflict and Peace at IOE, University College London, a workshop on storytelling by Joanna Wheeler and a fabulous roundtable!

We look forward to having you join us this year as we honour and celebrate Arif Naveed, a past ĢĒŠÄ“«Ć½ Student Representative who sadly passed away.

ECR Day

In September, the ECR Day was held on Monday 2nd September as part of the ĢĒŠÄ“«Ć½ 2024 conference. The activities for the day were in three parts. First, we hosted the COMPARE workshop followed by a roundtable session with academics and Student/ECR and finally, a combined speed mentoring and social. This event was organised by the ECR Day Sub-committee, Prof. Namrata Rao (ĢĒŠÄ“«Ć½ Vice Chair), Kike Ladipo (ĢĒŠÄ“«Ć½ Student Representative) and Vanessa Ozawa, Doctoral Researcher, Nazarbayev University, Kazakhstan.

We celebrated Black History Month 2024!

The ĢĒŠÄ“«Ć½ Student Committee organised an online event in October 2024 to celebrate Black History Month. The theme was ā€˜Black Futures in Education’.

The Keynote speaker Dr Victoria Showunmi, Associate Professor, University College London, UCL Institute of Education gave a thought-provoking presentation as a black woman in HE. Also, Abodunrin, PhD Researcher, University of Glasgow and Saffron Powell, PhD Researcher, Kings College London discussed their research and ways to better connect with their communities.

It was indeed an incredible opportunity to come together, learn, network, and celebrate Black History Month.

Finally, students and ECRs provided us with phenomenal blog articles through the year as part of our monthly Student/ECR Blog Series. Look out for the 2025 Student/ECR Blog Series and Join us as we relaunch our Podcast series.

We look forward to another interesting year.

Wishing you all the best for 2025!

Kike Ladipo

Student Representative

Kikelomo Ladipo

Kike Ladipo is a PhD Researcher in the School of Education, University of Leicester where her research focuses on the impact of student voice on quality in higher education. She is also an Educational Researcher at the Oxford Centre for Academic Enhancement and Development (OCAED), Oxford Brookes University.

Imagine a childhood where the school day extends long past the final bell, filled with relentless academic demands. Welcome to Lebanon, where I grew up navigating an educational landscape renowned for its difficulty and where instruction at schools is primarily in French and English, while Arabic, the native language, is taught as a separate subject.

I cannot forget the exam periods, when my parents used to hire after-school private tutors to help me get good marks in core subjects like English, French, math, and sciences. This additional support came at a significant cost, adding to the already substantial annual school fees that my parents paid. At that time, my parents and I accepted this as a normal part of the educational process and as I pursued my degree in teacher education, I found myself immersed in this system, providing tutoring services myself in the afternoons and some weekends. It was an unending educational merry-go-round, mornings spent studying at university, and afternoons devoted to tutoring sessions at my house.

Looking back, I never questioned this whirlwind of learning, nor did I consider the toll it might take on studentsā€™ joy and wellbeing. It never crossed my mind. I was simply riding the wave, following the norms of the time, and enhancing my income without pause for reflection. Little did I know that the practice of after-school private tutoring, so embedded in my routine, would become the focus of my research years later. Transitioning from student to schoolteacher, I experienced both sides of this educational dynamic. Like many of my university colleagues, I took up tutoring as a side job without questioning its prevalence. Only after securing my first teaching position at a high fee-paying private school did I begin to grasp the bigger picture. I was struck by the parentsā€™ dedication, perhaps even desperation, to secure every possible advantage for their children. From dawn to dusk, these children were trapped in an unrelenting cycle of ā€œlearning modeā€ balancing school, after-school private tutoring, and extracurricular activities.

This made me question: What is the true purpose of school if additional tutoring is essential? Are parents pushing their children too hard and why do they have to pay twice, straining both themselves and their children to the limit? These questions lingered until Lebanonā€™s recent crises cast a stark light on the issue. The combination of political instability, a refugee crisis, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the 2019 economic and banking collapse plunged many families into poverty (Al Khalili, 2023). High unemployment, restricted bank withdrawals, hyperinflation, and currency depreciation severely eroded parentsā€™ ability to afford tuition fees. Despite these hardships, the shadow education sector an academic term for the private tutoring industry (Bray & Hajar, 2023), began to boom once again, especially with the unprecedented exodus toward free state education but with a higher cost this time.

My latest research about school choice in Lebanon uncovers a stark reality. It reveals that private tutoring is no longer reserved for private schools or those parents who appear able to afford it. For many students, particularly those shifting to free state schools because of the compounded severe crises, private tutoring has become extraordinarily essential for advancing to the next grade. This necessity is driven by Lebanonā€™s high-stakes exam-based educational system and the common practice of grade repetition starting in grade four, a significant concern for families as state schools lack the academic support available in private schools.

The findings of my study reveal a striking inequality in the Lebanese society between the different socioeconomic groups. Prestigious fee-paying private schools provide complimentary remedial tutoring in addition to after school private tutoring sessions, enabling parents to invest more in enhancing their childrenā€™s academic capital. In contrast, underfunded state schools leave parents struggling to secure private tutors merely to help their children keep pace. This has further deepened the inequalities in education. State schools, burdened with poor infrastructure and unpaid teachers, fail to provide quality education that parents seek. Consequently, the struggling families turn to private tutoring as a temporary solution, often stretching their financial resources to the breaking point and straining their relationships with their children.

The impact of private tutoring has become profound, affecting both children and their parents. Children face burnout, with minimal time for play or social interactions during the day, while parents, motivated by the hope of securing a brighter future for their children, find themselves trapped in an exhausting cycle of work. They endure immense hardship, metaphorically melting like candles in front of their children under the relentless strain.

From a research perspective, this issue extends beyond Lebanonā€™s borders. Across the Middle East and East Asia, shadow education is exerting significant influence over formal schooling systems. It reflects a deeper, systemic problem that is the perceived decline in state education quality and the extraordinary financial measures parents take to provide their children with better education. In Lebanon, the compounding crises have rendered state education more essential than ever, as many parents face severe financial difficulties. Yet, for those who can afford it, private tutoring remains a vital lifeline, a temporary fix to a deeper, more pervasive problem.

As an educator and researcher, I am constantly grappling with the question: How can we build an education system that truly supports all students without driving them to exhaustion and when will the time come when all students regardless of their financial and social background can go to the same school and get the same quality education without needing after school private tutors from very early stages as what has happened in Lebanon?

Maybe there is hope, particularly given the unprecedented demand and exodus for state education due to the compounded crises. As more families turn to state schooling, policy makers should focus on better national education policies aimed at strengthening state education and improving the salary of schoolteachers. These improvements are essential at this critical juncture in the modern history of Lebanon and the intervention has become a must as scholastic achievement is increasingly determined by the financial resources of the parents rather than the academic abilities of students, thereby further deepening education inequalities in Lebanon.

References:

Al Khalili, T. (2023). Parents and School Choice in Lebanon [PhD dissertation, University of Exeter].

Bray, M., & Hajar, A. (2023). Shadow education in the Middle East: Private supplementary tutoring and its policy implication. Routledge.

Tamara Al Khalili

Tamara is a passionate educator and researcher with expertise in educational policy and TESOL. She holds a PhD in Education from the University of Exeter, complemented by multiple masterā€™s degrees in education-related fields. Her PhD research project explores the intricate relationships between educational policies, societal inequalities, and the role of education in perpetuating social disparities. Tamaraā€™s diverse teaching experience across schools and higher education institutions spans multiple countries, including the UK, the Arab Gulf, and the Middle East. This international exposure has shaped her teaching philosophy, which is deeply rooted in the principle of lifelong learning. Tamara is currently a postdoctoral research associate at the University of Exeter. Her research interests focus on educational inequality and inclusive education. Beyond teaching and research, Tamara is committed to fostering collaboration and driving academic progress.