Democratizing Knowledge of Teaching and Learning through Student Leadership Projects

Routledge. Available from: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. 530 Walnut Street Suite 850, Philadelphia, PA 19106. Tel: 800-354-1420; Tel: 215-625-8900; Fax: 215-207-0050; Web site: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals

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Student Leadership; Student Projects; Democracy; Public Schools; Action Research; Participatory Research; Teacher Researchers; Participative Decision Making; Elementary School Students; Middle School Students; Faculty Development; Professional Identity; Elementary School Teachers; Middle School Teachers; Partnerships in Education; Graduate Study; Fellowships; Knowledge Management; Authors; Workshops; Student Empowerment; Teacher Empowerment; Inquiry; Authentic Learning; School Community Relationship; Business; College Faculty

10.1080/09650792.2019.1617762

0965-0792

The central focus of this multilayered educational action research project was three-fold: (1) to provide opportunities for public school student leadership activities grounded in participatory and youth participatory action research; (2) to support a group of teacher-researchers in practicing and innovating in participatory action research frameworks; (3) to practice linking an educational action research project in a local region to the larger movement for democratizing education knowledge production and dissemination. Project participants included 11 teacher-researchers, a staff-developer, a consultant, a university-based faculty member, and students in K-8 schools in the Lehigh Valley region of Eastern Pennsylvania USA. To move from a traditional top-down administrative and curricular decision- making model to a distributed and more democratic model of leadership, the team argues that (1) children must be permitted to play a leading role in their own learning, leading, and researching; (2) teacher offers significant advantages over traditional in-service based professional development models; and (3) in an era of increased deskilling and deprofessionalization, teachers must have the opportunity to reclaim their profession as they conduct research, create new knowledge, and share their findings publicly.

As Provided

2019

EJ1217858