Editorial: Journal of Educational Administration and History Volume 55, Issue 2

Abstract

This issue presents perspectives on educational leadership and policy, ranging from schools to universities through to research methods within our field. The authors share research findings that address common themes of issues of access and equity in educational opportunities for young people; changing higher education environments; and the complexities of working and researching in education throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. In Leadership for Educational Equity for Principals in New York State: Policy Challenges and Opportunities, Ann LoBue explores the ways New York State education policy constructs the role of the school principal. LoBue examines how ‘conflicting and ambiguous expectations for principal behaviour in New York’s Every Student Succeeds Act Plan, its Culturally Responsive-Sustaining Education Framework, and its approach to principal evaluations might endanger realisation of a principal’s moral commitment to educational and social justice’. These findings raise important questions for policy and research into how principals understand their role, and how systems and policymakers might work with more clarity towards goals of equity and social justice. Margaret E. Thornton also explores questions of equity, policy, and justice in her article Segregating the “gifted” in Charlottesville: the founding of Quest, 1976–1986. Thornton’s analysis examines the implementation of gifted programmes in the United States in the 1970s, specifically presenting an important historical analysis of policymakers’ actions in providing funding ‘for gifted classrooms that segregated ‘exceptional’ children using racially and socioeconomically biased measures’. Thornton’s article is an important example of why historical analysis remains so vital for understanding contemporary issues in educational administration and leadership. Further extending on the theme of access, equity, and social justice in education, Iva Strnadová, Scott Eacott, Joanne Danker, Leanne Dowse, Brydan Lenne, and Dennis Alonzo examine Schools for Specific Purposes (SSP) in their article Leading Schools for Specific Purposes: A Relational Analysis of Provision. Their research, exploring Australian SSPs, draws on a relational analysis of the education provision of SSPs and the implications for leaders. They argue that ‘the principalship is not necessarily distinct in SSPs compared to other forms of schooling within the system. What is different is how schooling is organised and how that plays out in SSP in relation to other sites’. Their explorations extend to the identity work embedded within these SSPs for leaders, students, families, and collaborators. They conclude with a call for future research to continue to explore the complexities of equitable and inclusive education provision. Shifting into a focus on higher education, two of the articles in this issue explore the implications of policy shifts in universities. Kate Hoskins, in Unleashing the ‘undergraduate monster’? The second-order policy effects of the 1988 Education Reform Act for higher education in England, explores the 1988 Education Reform Act and the implications for the sector at the time and into the future. Drawing on interviews with professors working in universities at the time, Hoskins explores the implications of the Act for inequality of access for young people in