In the spring of 2013, the "Harvard Educational Review" ("HER") published a special issue entitled "Expanding Our Vision for the Arts in Education" (Vol. 83, No. 1). Following a variety of forward-looking essays and arts learner reflections concerning the potential of the arts in education, the issue concluded with a…

In this essay, Rubén Gaztambide-Fernández reflects on the comments made in a forum convened to reflect on his article "Why the Arts Don't 'Do' Anything: Toward a New Vision for Cultural Production in Education," published in the "Harvard Educational Review" ("HER")'s special issue entitled…

In this reflective essay, Linda F. Nathan, the founding headmaster of the Boston Arts Academy and currently the executive director of Center for Arts in Education at Boston Arts Academy, shares a story about how one student, Ronald, expands his vision of self through his engagement with the arts. In presenting this reflection on Ronald's…

The author describes his job as pretty mundane. He is a low-level government bureaucrat who sends a lot of emails and works with spreadsheets. Occasionally, when he gets to do something creative, like put together a sign, pamphlet, or slideshow, he feels a sense of peace and wishes he could do it more. This past spring, the author finally decided…

The author first decided to take art classes out of curiosity, but art gradually changed her perspective on life and became a medium through which she saw herself. This hobby became a process by which she began to create an artwork of her own life. This article describes what the author has learned about her own life through art and how it has…

"Why should they stay? This is our land. We were born here!" The year is 2004. The class is at a fictional town meeting in a rural village in Cambridgeshire, England, debating whether or not a group of travelers who have pitched up in a field at the edge of the settlement should be allowed to remain. The debate is coming to a climax, and…

In this article, the authors provide a methodological critique of the current standard of value-added modeling forwarded in educational policy contexts as a means of measuring teacher effectiveness. Conventional value-added estimates of teacher quality are attempts to determine to what degree a teacher would theoretically contribute, on average,…

In this article, Heather C. Hill and Pam Grossman discuss the current focus on using teacher observation instruments as part of new teacher evaluation systems being considered and implemented by states and districts. They argue that if these teacher observation instruments are to achieve the goal of supporting teachers in improving instructional…

In recent years anti-lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) bullying has been a pervasive discussion in popular and scholarly discourse. While such a discussion has documented the negative impact of bullying on the physical, psychological, social, and emotional lives of young people, it has not had a critical and sustained analysis…

In this essay, Gary Thomas argues that education research repeatedly makes a mistake first noted by Dewey: it misunderstands our science. This misunderstanding has led to attempts to import various putatively scientific precepts into education inquiry. But in reality, he argues, those "scientific" precepts do not characterize scientific endeavor,…

In this article, Susan Moore Johnson calls for a balanced approach to improving teaching and learning, one that focuses on both teachers and the contexts in which they work. Drawing on over a decade of research on the experiences of new teachers, Johnson argues that focusing on the effectiveness of individuals while ignoring how their schools are…

In this article, John Papay argues that teacher evaluation tools should be assessed not only on their ability to measure teacher performance accurately, but also on how well they inform and support ongoing teacher development. He looks at two major approaches to teacher evaluation reform: value-added measures and standards-based evaluations. Papay…

In this article, Sioux Hall promotes using a strengths-based approach to examine the interruption of the intergenerational cycle of child abuse and explores the strategies that women who were abused by a parent as children used to raise their children without abuse. She documents the mothers' uses of strategies such as vowing to protect and…

In this essay, Jon Wergin reminds readers of the philosophical and historical foundations of the doctor of education (EdD) degree. He argues that the EdD should be based, in large part, on John Dewey's progressive ideals of democratization and Paulo Freire's concepts of emancipatory education. Drawing on theories of reflective practice,…

In this interview conducted by "Harvard Educational Review" editor Raygine DiAquoi, Fabienne Doucet of New York University and Louis Herns Marcelin of the University of Miami discuss their roles as Haitian American scholars who are participating in Haiti's reconstruction process after the earthquake of January 2010. Each professor focuses on…