BERA’s recent work in supporting research focused on race and education, including the 2021 Small Grants Fund (BERA, 2022), is part of wider initiatives in school and higher education sectors to engage with decolonial and anti-racist pedagogies and curricula, critically exploring the stories and voices that are made visible and invisible in educational practices (Gandolfi, 2021; Moncrieffe et al., 2020). While the field of decolonial studies has gained prominence in mainstream Global North academia, it has been part of Indigenous and Global South scholarship for decades.
Similarly, anti-racist scholarship and practices, including critical race theory (Delgado & Stefancic, 2017) and critical whiteness studies (Leonardo, 2009), have also been an important component of social sciences and educational research in countries like the USA and South Africa for decades.
In a recent special issue of the Curriculum Journal, contributing authors from different educational contexts in England and Wales highlight the specific experiences, opportunities and challenges in bringing decolonial and anti-racist approaches to the area of teacher education. This includes in both university–school and school–school partnerships and through disciplines, school subjects, and general educational practices. This special issue begins with an invited paper on international issues surrounding decolonial and anti-racist theories and practices in (teacher) education (Le Grange, 2023), and empirical papers from England and Wales across different higher education spaces (Smith & Lander, 2023; Gabi et al., 2023), policy landscapes (Cushing, 2023), professional structures (Davis et al., 2023; Welply, 2023), networks (Glowach et al., 2023) and other spaces of professional learning (Stewart-Hall et al., 2023; Walker et al., 2023).
Authors draw on examples based in varied school subjects and disciplines and in response to wider policy documents currently influencing the teaching profession. A key feature of the special issue is the richness of partnerships and networks established by the authorial teams, which include educators from both higher education and (cross-)school settings.
