Educating for Social Justice: A Case for Teaching Civil Disobedience in Preparing Students to be Effective Activists. A Response to “Justice Citizens, Active Citizenship, and Critical Pedagogy: Reinvigorating Citizenship Education”

Heggert and Flowers (2019) offer important insights into how social media provides students with important opportunities to engage in meaningful civic engagement and political activism. They argue that students are more politically active than some recent studies would have us believe because they are utilizing social media platforms, methods not accounted for by traditional measures. They further argue that if students are to alter the foundational causes of injustice, educators should adopt a critical pedagogical framework in teaching students to use social media as a means of becoming activists. I agree with the authors’ main arguments but take issue with their suggestion that activism should be separated from notions of disobedience. On the contrary, I argue that activism that has as its fundamental goal to get at the roots of injustice must include civil disobedience. Educating for social justice, then, ought to include teaching students the history, theory, and techniques of civil disobedience

Indoctrination in education: Offering an alternative conception

Peace Education courses, as well as others that teach marginalized values and beliefs (e.g., race relations, queer studies, and feminist studies) are particularly vulnerable to the charge of indoctrination. This allegation is political rather than scholarly and it is not clear what precisely teachers of such subjects are being accused of doing or trying to do. However, the charge is powerful enough to prevent such courses from being offered at public schools and universities and to remove them when they are already part of the curriculum. To provide teachers and schools the confidence to take on these marginalized and controversial courses, we need a conception of indoctrination that meets the following purposes: (1) allows us to better understand and respond to the persistent pejorative connation of the word, (2) enables us to identify indoctrinary endeavors when they occur, and (3) guides us in developing educational programs that help avoid it. Existing conceptions of indoctrination are critically examined. It is argued that, while I.A. Snook\u27s intentional analysis is the most promising in meeting the purposes of this work as stated above, his analysis does not go far enough to encourage teachers to, not only reflect on what student outcomes they hope to achieve, but what outcomes they are likely to achieve given their efforts in class and the particular school context in which they work. Further, it is argued that none of the prior conceptions address the possibility that schools (i.e., the policies, practices, traditions, goals, curriculum, decision-making structures, etc.) as well as individual teachers may be agents of indoctrination. Cheryl Misak\u27s pragmatic conception of truth is examined for its usefulness in providing a notion of indoctrination that prompts teachers and schools to seriously consider how their educational endeavors shape the manner in which students come to hold their beliefs. It is concluded that an intentional analysis of indoctrination, defined in terms of a Misakian notion of truth-seeking inquiry, allows us to adequately respond to charges of indoctrination and know what steps to take to diminish the likelihood of engaging in indoctrination

Nonviolent Action as a Necessary Component in Educating for Democracy

Educating for democracy, seen within a liberal democratic framework, requires that students develop the requisite knowledge and skills to recognize injustice and work effectively to oppose it. Stitzlein’s notion of dissent is examined in conjunction with Kahne and Westheimer’s argument for teaching democratic capacities by actively engaging students in addressing real world problem. This paper further suggests that for active dissent to lead to real change, we must extend our notion of dissent to include the knowledge and skills to influence the balance of power. Teaching students for democracy requires teaching them theory, history, and techniques of nonviolent action so they may be aptly empowered to play a vital role in the formulation, maintenance, and alteration of the rules and policies of our society

Scrutiny Instead of Silence. A Response to Respect Differences? Challenging Common Guidelines in Social Justice Education

Sensoy and DiAngelo (2014) argue for alternative behavioral guidelines than those currently being used in many social justice courses. Their alternative is to silence or constrain privileged voices so that marginalized voices have ample space to be heard and taken seriously. This raises the concern that silencing any group of persons runs too great a risk of alienating them to the point where their mistrust of the “other” is exacerbated rather than assuaged. This response suggests that, instead of silencing or even constraining privileged voices in the classroom, we may want to move toward developing in students the attitude that all claims and assertions, especially those that society often accepts as true without question, must undergo critical scrutiny. If we can teach students that a well-informed belief is one that is continually subject to critical analysis, and we can guide them in developing and understanding that our social positionality leads us to favor certain views and perspectives over others due, in large part, to the inequity in our social structures, perhaps we can open our students’ minds to the value and worth of marginalized claims and views

Maternalism as a Viable Alternative to the Risks Imposed by Paternalism. A Response to Paternalism, Obesity, and Tolerable Levels of Risk

In his paper, Michael Merry poses an interesting and important question: How can we navigate between two often opposing interests—that of protecting the welfare of our society’s children and that of protecting their liberties by avoiding paternalism? While Merry lays out his argument with clarity and insight into the risks and harm that state paternalism incurs, his discussion of such risks and his suggestions for possible resolutions are all bound within a paternalistic framework. Taking on a maternalistic, or more specifically, a caring, perspective may allow us to understand the issue more fully—that is, as part of the larger problem of oppression, and to offer alternative solutions that enable a society to care for the health and well-being of its children while avoiding the harms that paternalism imposes

Definitions of Violence: African-American and Iraqi Refugee Adolescents\u27 Perceptions

This article explores the perceptions of urban African-American and Iraqi refugee adolescents regarding community violence, school violence, family violence and dating/intimate partner violence. A subset of participants from a larger study on violence and trauma was selected to participate in the current study. Using a card-sort exercise, participants identified situations as violent or not violent. Iraqi youth identified noticeably more behaviors as violence than African-American youth. Few significant gender differences emerged. Findings of important cultural differences provide implications for violence prevention programming

Phosphorus Forms in Sediments of a River-Dominated Estuary

Estuaries are biologically productive transition zones between land and sea that play a vital role in transforming, recycling, and sequestering nutrients and organic matter, thus influencing nutrient loading to coastal systems. Yet, the processes involved in phosphorus (P) transformation and cycling among inorganic and organic P forms are poorly known in estuaries. To better understand the potential for P transformation and sequestration, we identified P forms and estimated their contributions to total P in intertidal wetland sediments of a river-dominated estuary (Columbia River, Oregon, USA) using solution 31P nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (P-NMR). Inorganic P forms dominated sediment P extracts throughout the estuary, with orthophosphate accounting for 71–84% of total extracted P. However, biologically-derived inorganic and organic P forms were also detected. Polyphosphates were found in sediment extracts throughout the estuary, contributing as much as 10% of extracted P. Similar to other wetlands, orthophosphate monoesters and diesters made approximately equal contributions (~ 20%) to total extracted P. However, monoesters (e.g., phytate) were more abundant in sedimentary environments characterized by low organic matter content, while diesters (e.g., DNA) were more abundant in sedimentary environments with high organic matter, regardless of salinity. Collectively, the data show strong evidence for P transformation in sediments of a large, river-dominated estuary, which influences its transport to the coastal Pacific Ocean via the expansive Columbia River plume

Factors Affecting Early Services for Children Who Are Hard of Hearing

To describe factors affecting early intervention (EI) for children who are hard of hearing, we analyzed (a) service setting(s) and the relationship of setting to families' frequency of participation, and (b) provider preparation, caseload composition, and experience in relation to comfort with skills that support spoken language for children who are deaf and hard of hearing (CDHH)

Sleep duration partially accounts for race differences in diurnal cortisol dynamics

Objective: Emerging research demonstrates race differences in diurnal cortisol slope, an indicator of hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical (HPA)-axis functioning associated with morbidity and mortality, with African Americans showing flatter diurnal slopes than their White counterparts. Sleep characteristics are associated with both race and with HPA-axis functioning. The present report examines whether sleep duration may account for race differences in cortisol dynamics. Method: Participants were 424 employed African American and White adults (mean age = 42.8 years, 84.2% White, 53.6% female) with no cardiovascular disease (Adult Health and Behavior Project—Phase 2 [AHAB-II] cohort, University of Pittsburgh). Cortisol slope was calculated using 4 salivary cortisol readings, averaged over each of 4 days. Demographic (age, sex), psychosocial (socioeconomic status [SES], affect, discrimination), and health behaviors (smoking, alcohol use, physical activity) variables were used as covariates, and sleep (self-report and accelerometry) was also assessed. Results: African Americans had flatter slopes than Whites (F(1, 411) = 10.45, B = .02, p = .001) in models adjusting for demographic, psychosocial, and health behavior covariates. Shorter actigraphy-assessed total sleep time was a second significant predictor of flatter cortisol slopes (F(1, 411) = 25.27, B = −.0002, p \u3c .0001). Total sleep time partially accounted for the relationship between race and diurnal slope [confidence interval = .05 (lower = .014, upper .04)]. Conclusions: African Americans have flatter diurnal cortisol slopes than their White counterparts, an effect that may be partially attributable to race differences in nightly sleep duration. Sleep parameters should be considered in further research on race and cortisol. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2017 APA, all rights reserved

Sleep duration partially accounts for race differences in diurnal cortisol dynamics

Objective: Emerging research demonstrates race differences in diurnal cortisol slope, an indicator of hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical (HPA)-axis functioning associated with morbidity and mortality, with African Americans showing flatter diurnal slopes than their White counterparts. Sleep characteristics are associated with both race and with HPA-axis functioning. The present report examines whether sleep duration may account for race differences in cortisol dynamics. Method: Participants were 424 employed African American and White adults (mean age = 42.8 years, 84.2% White, 53.6% female) with no cardiovascular disease (Adult Health and Behavior Project—Phase 2 [AHAB-II] cohort, University of Pittsburgh). Cortisol slope was calculated using 4 salivary cortisol readings, averaged over each of 4 days. Demographic (age, sex), psychosocial (socioeconomic status [SES], affect, discrimination), and health behaviors (smoking, alcohol use, physical activity) variables were used as covariates, and sleep (self-report and accelerometry) was also assessed. Results: African Americans had flatter slopes than Whites (F(1, 411) = 10.45, B = .02, p = .001) in models adjusting for demographic, psychosocial, and health behavior covariates. Shorter actigraphy-assessed total sleep time was a second significant predictor of flatter cortisol slopes (F(1, 411) = 25.27, B = −.0002, p \u3c .0001). Total sleep time partially accounted for the relationship between race and diurnal slope [confidence interval = .05 (lower = .014, upper .04)]. Conclusions: African Americans have flatter diurnal cortisol slopes than their White counterparts, an effect that may be partially attributable to race differences in nightly sleep duration. Sleep parameters should be considered in further research on race and cortisol. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2017 APA, all rights reserved