School of Education, NUI Galway: Research Seminar Series (RSS) 2014-2015

School of Education, NUI Galway: Research Seminar Series (RSS) 2014-2015

Diversity in Initial Teacher Education and Teaching

Diversity in Initial Teacher Education, and in Teaching, featuring two presentations:

The Cultural Diversification of the Teaching Profession: How Effective is it?

Prof. Ninetta Santoro, Strathclyde University,Glasgow,Scotland

http://www.strath.ac.uk/humanities/courses/education/staff/santoroninettaprofessor/

Diversity in Initial Teacher Education (DITE) in Ireland: A Rationale and Initial Analysis.

Dr. Elaine Keane, Dr. Manuela Heinz, and Dr. Conor Foley, School of Education, NUI Galway

http://www.nuigalway.ie/education/research/dite/dite.html

The event will be officially opened by Prof. Chris Curtin, Vice-President for Innovation and Performance,NUI Galway and seminar attendees will be welcomed by Dr. Mary Fleming, Head, School of Education.

1. The Cultural Diversification of the Teaching Profession: How Effective Is It?

Teaching and educating for social justice features strongly in how many teachers envision the purpose oftheir work. However, despite the best of teacher intentions, some culturally diverse groups of pupils aredisadvantaged by, and within schooling systems that fail to address their needs. Black students, immigrantsand refugees are often marginalised by ineffective education practices and thus, denied access to the socialand material resources that facilitate their full participation in society. One way of addressing this problem inmany places in the world has been to diversify the teaching profession so that it is more representative of thecultural makeup of the student population. Such a strategy is based on assumptions that teachers who are ofethnic and racial minority are well placed to act as role models for minority students, will understandstudents’ cultural practices and beliefs and how they shape them as learners, and will contribute diversecultural perspectives to school curricula. Drawing on research I have conducted over a 10 year period, as wellas the work of key scholars in the field, I suggest that the diversification of the profession is potentiallycounterproductive unless teachers drawn from the dominant cultural ‘mainstream’ work in partnership withtheir culturally and ethnically diverse colleagues to address practices that sustain inequality and injusticewithin education. This requires all teachers to be culturally responsive and critically aware practitioners. Iconclude by arguing the need for a critical teacher education, that is, teacher education that developsteachers’ critical awareness about how relations of power and historical and socio-political discoursesconstruct ‘difference’, education, teachers and teaching.

2. Diversity in Initial Teacher Education (DITE) in Ireland: A Rationale and Initial Analysis

The DITE team will present on their national Irish Research Council-funded research project, Diversity inInitial Teacher Education (DITE) in Ireland, which explores the socio-demographic profile, diversityexperiences and career motivations of both applicants and entrants to initial teacher education programmesin Ireland. In our presentation, we examine the rationale for and design of the project, along with initialfindings from the first implementation of the online questionnaire. In addition, we consider the secondimplementation of the questionnaire, and outline our next steps in the project.

RSVP to caroline.casey@nuigalway.ie by Monday, 13th October 2014