Michele S. Moses

Toward a Deeper Understanding of the Diversity Rationale

How did “diversity” come to occupy such a key position in public discourse, particularly concerning education policy? Given the widespread recognition of diversity, is there an intellectual tradition or philosophical orientation that informs its application to education? And, based on the traditions examined, what is gained and lost by focusing on the diversity rationale? This article examines the legal history of using the diversity rationale to justify affirmative action and the philosophical foundation of the ideal of diversity. This foundational analysis not only adds a new direction to the scholarship on the educational benefits of diversity but also illuminates the tensions associated with affirmative action in general and with this rationale in particular. The authors aim to influence educational practice in a direction that well serves a multi-racial/ethnic democratic society

Affirmative Action and the Creation of More Favorable Contexts of Choice

This article presents an analysis of affirmative action policy that takes into account students’ vastly different social contexts of choice. Oppressive societal structures may constrain individuals’ contexts of choice and thus limit their real choices in such a way that their nominal choices do not reflect their potential talents, abilities, and aspirations. An unfavorable context of choice may hinder students’ development of self-determination, which is a crucial underpinning of an education for justice and democracy. The aim of this article is to put forth a defense of affirmative action that is not considered within the current discourse. Because the development of a sense of self-determination is a crucial aim of a good and just education, I argue that affirmative action is necessary because of its role in combating oppressive educational structures, fostering more favorable social contexts of choice for students, and consequently, their self-determination.

Moral and Instrumental Rationales for Affirmative Action in Five National Contexts

The author’s primary aims are to clarify the differing rationales for affirmative action that have emerged in five nations—France, India, South Africa, the United States, and Brazil—and to make the case for the most compelling rationales, whether instrumentally or morally based. She examines the different social contexts surrounding the establishment and public discussion of each nation’s policy. Next, she examines four justifications for affirmative action in these nations: remediation, economics, diversity, and social justice. She offers philosophical analysis of the justifications for affirmative action in each country and synthesizes federal and state legislation, court decisions, news media sources, and research-based scholarship. She argues that the social justice rationale ought to be invoked more centrally, underscoring affirmative action’s role in fostering a democratic society.

The Testing Culture and the Persistence of High Stakes Testing Reforms

The purposes of this critical analysis are to clarify why high stakes testing reforms have become so prevalent in the United States and to explain the connection between current federal and state emphases on standardized testing reforms and educational opportunities. The article outlines the policy context for high stakes examinations, as well as the ideas of testing and accountability as major tenets of current education reform and policy. In partial explanation of the widespread acceptance and use of standardized tests in the United States, we argue that there is a pervasive testing culture, in addition to other contributing factors such as administrative utility, profit motives, and political ideology. Finally, we offer a critique of high stakes testing reforms in light of concerns about equality of educational opportunity.

The Media as Educators, Educational Research, and Autonomous Deliberation

Abstract This article explores the connections between the medias responsibility to educate the public, politically and morally contested education policy debates, and public information and deliberation. The author argues that it is crucial for education policy researchers to clarify the competing perspectives on policy disputes by providing theory and research-based information to the public. This requires researchers to understand not only the nuances of the policy issue but also how the media serve as educators and how to find ways of disseminating research to journalists and members of the public.

Multicultural Education as Fostering Individual Autonomy

This article attempts a philosophical defense of an autonomy-based approach to multicultural education. I contend that multicultural education is necessary in order for students to be able to develop personal autonomy. This, in turn, can empower students to effectively formulate their own version of the good life. The development of autonomy need not, as many critics claim, promote atomistic individualism. Rather, contemporary liberal autonomy strives for a balance between the individual and the community. In defending multicultural education, my argument relies on Joseph Razs notion of autonomy and Will Kymlickas concept of a context of choice. I conclude that through multicultural education, students can expand their contexts of choice and consequently develop individual autonomy, an essential ingredient of the good life.

Are Ballot Initiatives a Good Way to Make Education Policy? The Case of Affirmative Action

Are direct democratic ballot initiatives a just way to make education policy, especially when the policy disproportionately affects members of underrepresented groups? This is the broad question taken up in this article, related in particular to how education policy decided through the ballot initiative process affects minorities. The authors use philosophical inquiry to examine the fairness of education policy decisions being made by voters via the ballot initiative process. The primary purpose of this article is to shed light on an underexamined issue within education policy analysis, the phenomenon of education-related initiatives that focus on dismantling historic civil rights policies.

Deliberating about Affirmative Action: Linking Education Policy Research and the Media.

This article offers a qualitative content analysis of the print news media coverage of Proposal 2, an anti–affirmative action ballot initiative that passed on November 7, 2006. Our purpose was to determine what type of information on the initiative and affirmative action was available to the public. Results indicate that little substantive information to inform voters appeared in the print news. We argue that an inclusive and deliberative democracy requires education researchers to link with media sources to provide citizens with rich, research‐based information on education policy issues. Similar initiatives were debated in five states during the fall of 2008, and others are slated for the 2010 ballot, which suggests an urgent need for timely contributions from researchers and media sources alike.

Why the Affirmative Action Debate Persists The Role of Moral Disagreement

This article concerns an issue that often remains implicit within the public debate about affirmative action and related race-conscious education policies: What role do contested moral ideals play in the disagreement about affirmative action? As background, the article first outlines what a moral disagreement is and then goes on to examine the roots of the disagreement about affirmative action. A case is made for the importance of illuminating and understanding the moral disagreement about affirmative action to inform the public deliberation about related race-conscious education policies, especially given that affirmative action policies are being challenged once again in the public political arena.

Chapter 1: The Heart of the Matter: Philosophy and Educational Research:

Philosophy has long played a significant role in educational scholarship, from the thought of Plato to Jean-Jacques Rousseau to John Dewey to Nel Noddings. In this chapter, I demonstrate how philosophy continues to be a vital part of careful education scholarship. Because the primary audience is the broader educational research community, I as far as possible avoid the intricacies of philosophers’ internecine contentions in order to concentrate on characterizing the general positions taken, though I do take up this issue toward the end. I divide the discussion into examples of philosophy in educational research and philosophy as educational research. Philosophy in educational research refers to the kind of philosophical analysis that takes the practice of empirical educational research as its point of departure. It involves critical discussions of research methodology and how empirical educational research is framed. Philosophy as educational research is relatively more autonomous and more long standing, and it construes “educational research” more broadly. Philosophy as educational research refers to the kind of analysis that has been, traditionally, associated with the philosophy of education, which is, in its own turn, a subarea of philosophy that draws on the parent discipline to determine how to frame and analyze philosophical problems peculiar to education. The distinction is a matter of emphasis; the two categories obviously overlap significantly. One point that I wish to emphasize with my use of philosophy as educational research is that philosophical analysis is a genre of educational research in its own right. Because empirical work is dominant and central to educational research, especially within graduate schools of education, philosophical research is often not considered to be real research or, to qualify, is forced into a framework that it does not fit. Because philosophical work is not the same as empirical work, it is often taken to be divorced from it (e.g., National Research Council, 2002). But this is a misconception. Philosophers routinely use the findings of empirical research in developing and testing the adequacy of their theories; at the same time, empirical work makes commitments to positions on issues that are, at their core, philosophical. In this vein, I highlight a major contribution that philosophy has made to scholarship on the problem of inequality as an exemplar of the role that philosophical analysis plays within educational research.