Threading systemic change for language equity in schools

Abstract

We identify contributions in this special issue in terms of two essential ways of threading systemic change for language equity in schools: theories/concepts from school governance down to classroom practice, and values/morals from practical realities in classrooms up. We characterize ‘language equity’ as a sense of belonging and meaningful participation in academic activity for linguistically-minoritized students, and show how threading concepts and values for systemic change requires concerted collaborations with educators as well as interdisciplinary frameworks and research methods. Further collaborations are needed to explicate moral commitments for language equity, to align concepts and values, and to examine coherence in school policies and classroom practices.

Keywords:

• Language equity
• systemic change
• school improvement
• moral commitment

Acknowledgement

We thank Dr. Richard Osguthorpe for his feedback in framing the moral work required for systemic school change.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.