麻豆淫院

Anti-racist education is not a discrete initiative nor a policy statement. It is a sustained professional, institutional and moral commitment. At the University of Glasgow, participating in the programme helped us consider what this means for initial teacher education (ITE) and for the school university partnerships through which future teachers learn.

This blog post focuses on what we learned with Glasgow school leaders as we begin embedding anti-racist practice within our reaccredited (Primary) (MEduc). It argues that partnership is central to preparing future teachers for anti-racist practice.

One of the most valuable aspects of the programme was learning in partnership with school leaders across Glasgow. Their insight grounded the work in the realities of school communities: leading change, building relationships and moving from intention to sustained action. For teacher education, this matters because student teachers learn across university and school contexts, where values, language and responses to racism shape professional identity.

This need for coherence between university-based teacher education and school-based practice is particularly important in Scotland, where teacher education increasingly recognises the need for race-cognisant practice. Kennedy et al. trace a , including , the and the . However, they also caution that evidence of systemic impact remains limited. Learning with school leaders, therefore, can help translate policy ambition into locally meaningful action.

The National Anti-Racism Framework for ITE in Scotland offers a clear challenge. Anti-racist pedagogy is not simply about adding more diverse content to a course. It is about how we teach, whose knowledge is centred, how students are supported and how confidently racism is named and addressed. Kishimoto’s work on anti-racist pedagogy argues that this begins with educators’ self-reflection and extends into teaching and institutional practice (Kishimoto, 2018). Dialogue with school leaders reinforced for us that this reflection cannot be confined to university sessions: it must connect to mentoring, professional conversations and school cultures.

‘Anti-racist pedagogy is … about how we teach, whose knowledge is centred, how students are supported and how confidently racism is named and addressed.’

created an opportunity to consider how anti-racist practice can be embedded across programme design, placement and student support. Rather than positioning anti-racism as an additional topic, we have made it part of the programme’s foundations, which focus on inclusion, flourishing and social justice. The challenge is to ensure that these commitments are not only visible in programme documentation, but experienced through the student teacher journey.

A key priority is racial literacy. Student teachers need the language and critical understanding to discuss anti-racism with care. Twine’s concept of racial literacy includes understanding racism as historical and contemporary, race as socially constructed, the operation of Whiteness and the everyday nature of racial microaggressions (Twine, 2004). For teacher education, this means creating opportunities for students to explore identity, positionality, power and professional responsibility.

The National Framework also offers the of minority ethnic teachers’ professional identity construction: acknowledgement, affirmation, agency and activism. This helps us consider how racially minoritised teachers and student teachers might be supported to construct positive professional identities. It also raises important questions for ITE providers: how do we create spaces where racially minoritised students are heard and supported, without placing the burden of anti-racist education upon them?

Anti-racist work can create discomfort. It asks individuals and institutions to examine assumptions that may have gone unchallenged. Some may worry about saying the wrong thing; others about how to translate commitment into action. These tensions are part of the work, but they also point to the need for professional learning spaces where people can engage honestly, critically and constructively.

Placement is another crucial area. Student teachers’ experiences in schools are central to their development, and racist incidents or racialised assumptions must not be treated as peripheral concerns. Stronger partnerships between universities and schools are needed so that students know how to report concerns, mentors know how to respond and anti-racist practice is understood as part of .

This work is both urgent and possible. Action plans from school leaders across Glasgow showed how anti-racist leadership can be enacted through professional learning, curriculum review, pupil voice, community engagement, staff learning, policy and culture. They also reinforced that no single institution could do this work alone.

For us, the next phase is partnership-focused: learning with school leaders; connecting programme and placement expectations; supporting mentors and teacher educators; and creating opportunities for student voice and agency. Anti-racist teacher education requires leadership, time, collaboration, accountability and humility. Through sustained partnership, anti-racist practice can become part of teacher education’s core purpose.

, senior lecturer in modern languages teacher education, and , lecturer in teacher education, launch the MEduc (Undergraduate Primary ITE) Anti-Racist Action Plan to partners, school leaders, colleagues from across the , and representatives at the Leading Anti-Racism action planning conference day, held in the Gilbert Scott Building at the University of Glasgow. (Image by Jo Gallagher)

References

Kishimoto, K. (2018). Anti-racist pedagogy: From faculty’s self-reflection to organizing within and beyond the classroom. Race Ethnicity and Education, 21(4), 540–554.

Twine, F. W. (2004). A white side of black Britain: The concept of racial literacy. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 27(6), 878–907.