This article focuses on "objective list" accounts of personal well-being and the related view that schools should aim at inducting students into a wide range of objective goods. It reviews various objective lists and notes that very many of them include knowledge, a love of beauty and close personal relationships. It then seeks to…

In this article, I critique the foremost proponents of the adequacy and equity approaches to educational equality. I identify tensions within the adequacy approach related to positionality in education, fostering a democratic elite through higher education, and its defense of private schooling. In contrast, equity theorists are vulnerable to the…

The number of refugees who have fled across international borders due to conflict and persecution is at the highest level in recorded history. The vast majority of these refugees find exile in low-income countries neighboring their countries of origin. The refugee children who are resettled to North America, Europe, and Australia arrive with…

Current trends indicate declining distinctions between "public" and "private" sectors in education. Reformers see sector barriers as unnecessary impediments to innovation, distracting attention and effort from "what works". This analysis questions whether trends in education policy are simply a natural evolution away…

Scholars typically frame the subgroup problem in education in terms of protecting religious minorities from majoritarian encroachment. This essay explores a different aspect of the subgroup problem: what happens when an antidemocratic religious minority becomes a local majority responsible for the promotion of the public good? This essay uses the…

Moral education is open to worries about indoctrination given the controversies there are about a wide range of ethical matters. I argue, however, that moral education is no more liable to being "indoctrinal" than education in history or science. I begin by proposing an account of what indoctrination involves. I then note that moral…

In a 2014 paper in "Theory and Research in Education," Howard Curzer and colleagues critique the Defining Issues Test of moral judgment development according to eight criteria that are described as difficulties any measure of educational outcomes must address. This article highlights how Curzer et al. do not consult existing empirical…

Can selecting on the basis of academic ability at secondary school level be reconciled with equality of opportunity? One common view is that although the two can be reconciled in principle, for various contingent reasons selection tends to undermine equality of opportunity in practice, for example, it tends to advantage children who have been…

This paper reveals how equal educational opportunities, equal job opportunities and equality of opportunity for welfare are related to each other, and how they are related to other demands for justice. There are several important objections to the emphasis on equal educational opportunities. Nevertheless, this paper shows that demanding equal…

Fair equality of opportunity, a principle that governs the competition for desirable jobs, can seem irrelevant in our actual world, for two reasons. First, parents have broad liberty to raise their children as they see fit, which seems to undermine the fair equality of opportunity-based commitment to eliminating the effects of social circumstances…

In this article, I argue (1) affirmative action diverts attention from more urgent needs of racial justice in education--better quality K-12 education, and better quality and more accessible public higher education; (2) the increasing wealth of students at affirmative action institutions is a sign of diminished quality of those students compared…

Although the policy and methodological legacy of "Equality of Educational Opportunity," the so-called Coleman Report published by the US Department of Education in 1966, is widely recognized, the way in which it played a role in shaping theorizing about equality of educational opportunity has been less well-explored. This article…

The ideal of equality of opportunity plays an important role in contemporary social and political discourse, and it is one of the few ideals which most people, across the political spectrum, accept. In this article, I argue that the seemingly widespread agreement about the value of equal opportunity is more apparent than real. I distinguish…

This article shows the relationship between know-how and conceptual ability with particular reference to professional education. It is argued that although concept mastery is necessary to expert performance, it is not sufficient. Starting with Geach's account of concepts, distinctions are made between concept acquisition and concept mastery. An…

Despite a significant increase in scholarly interest for homeschooling, some of its most critical aspects, such as instructional daily practices, remain grossly understudied. This essay thus seeks to fill that void by presenting empirical evidence regarding the homeschooling practices of a specific group, African Americans. Most specifically, the…