Research and Praxis on Challenging Anti-immigration Discourses in School and Community Contexts

Recently, harsh immigration policies have made the lives of the new immigrant Diaspora in the Southeastern United States extremely challenging. Disturbed by the impact of these sociopolitical changes on students, their families, and their teachers, as multicultural educators, we have turned for help to recent research and praxis from the U.S. and Europe that overtly challenges anti-immigration discourse. We examine two theoretical perspectives that can support educators in talking back and acting against anti-immigration discourses and practices in schools and communities. We provide cases of our own work in the southeastern United States to test the value of these theories.Recientemente, las políticas migratorias punitivas han hecho muy difícil la vida de la nueva diáspora de inmigrantes en el sureste de Estados Unidos. Preocupadas por el impacto de estos cambios sociopolíticos en los estudiantes, sus familias, sus maestros, como educadoras multiculturales hemos buscado apoyarnos en las prácticas e investigaciones recientes en Estados Unidos y Europa que desafian abiertamente los discursos antiinmigrantes. Examinamos dos perspectivas teóricas que pueden ayudar a los docentes a responder y actuar en contra de los discursos y prácticas antiimigrantes en las escuelas y las comunidades. Utilizamos casos de nuestro propio trabajo en el sureste de los Estados Unidos para probar el valor de estas teorías

Teacher, Researcher, and Accountability Discourses: Creating Space for Democratic Science Teaching Practices in Middle Schools

This study explores the role of competing discourses that shape current practices in U.S. schools and how professional development efforts can support teachers and researchers in finding ways to reinsert more democratic processes into their collaborative work. We examine the case of one research and professional development project with the goal of supporting middle school science and ESOL teachers in fostering more meaningful science learning for all their students but especially their English language learners. Using Gee’s notion of big-D discourses and Fairclough’s notion of interdiscursivity, we trace how the Discourse of accountability, the Discourse of science teaching, and the Discourse of education research, each constructed by different stakeholders for different purposes, may become interdiscursive and hybridized through interaction over time. Excerpts from interviews and conversations with participants during the various components of our project highlight both the challenges and the possibilities of teachers retaining or regaining agency in their classrooms within and against the structures of the accountability Discourse. At the same time, we explore how our researcher Discourse also became hybridized in order to better work with a system where an undemocratic accountability Discourse continues to be dominant

Why conservation biology can benefit from sensory ecology

Global expansion of human activities is associated with the introduction of novel stimuli, such as anthropogenic noise, artificial lights and chemical agents. Progress in documenting the ecological effects of sensory pollutants is weakened by sparse knowledge of the mechanisms underlying these effects. This severely limits our capacity to devise mitigation measures. Here, we integrate knowledge of animal sensory ecology, physiology and life history to articulate three perceptual mechanisms—masking, distracting and misleading—that clearly explain how and why anthropogenic sensory pollutants impact organisms. We then link these three mechanisms to ecological consequences and discuss their implications for conservation. We argue that this framework can reveal the presence of ‘sensory danger zones’, hotspots of conservation concern where sensory pollutants overlap in space and time with an organism’s activity, and foster development of strategic interventions to mitigate the impact of sensory pollutants. Future research that applies this framework will provide critical insight to preserve the natural sensory world

Diversity and equity in science education: research, policy, and practice

Provides a comprehensive, state-of-the-field analysis of current trends in the research, policy, and practice of science education. It offers valuable insights into why gaps in science achievement among racial, ethnic, cultural, linguistic, and socioeconomic groups persist, and points toward practical means of narrowing or eliminating these gaps. Lee and Buxton examine instructional practices, science-curriculum materials, assessment, teacher education, school organization, and home-school connections

Place-based science teaching and learning : 40 activities for K-8 classrooms

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