TEESNet 2022: Re-Imagining Teacher Education

This year TEESNet will take place in person on Wednesday 28 September 2022 at our pre-COVID 19 venue on the Liverpool Hope University Campus

Audrey Bryan is an Associate Professor of Sociology in the School of Human Development at Dublin City University’s Institute of Education (DCU IoE). She has published nationally and internationally in the areas of climate change education, gender and sexuality studies, racism and anti-racism and global citizenship education. Her current work explores the role of emotion and difficult knowledge in teaching for social justice. She is currently finalising a manuscript entitled Affective Pedagogies, Emotion and Social Justice which explores the question of what educationally and socially transformative possibilities exist when emotion, affect and feeling are taken seriously as a focus of educational research and practice.

Namrata Sharma is on the faculty at the State University of New York, USA, and an expert with the United Nations Harmony with Nature Knowledge Network. She is an international education consultant and has served on the Boards of several professional organisations. She holds a PhD from IOE, University College London (UCL), UK. She has authored several books, research papers, and articles linking the work of global thinkers including Gandhi and Makiguchi with global citizenship education. Dr. Sharma has specialist interests in Global Citizenship Education, and International and Comparative Education. In her ongoing research work she is engaged in drawing meaningful linkages between teaching the UNESCO-led initiatives of Global Citizenship Education and Education for Sustainable Development.

Details of other presentations, workshops and provocations coming shortly!

Education, in its various forms, holds transformative potential. However, concerns persist that it reinforces and perpetuates the conditions for exclusion, injustice and unsustainable lifestyles. There is growing realization that education, as it takes place currently, is inadequate to the global crises we face. Fuelled by a growing sense of urgency, these arguments call for education itself to be transformed to meet with the challenges of shaping peaceful, just and sustainable futures. They emphasise themes of interconnectivities, interdependencies and the holistic approach advocated by United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 4.7. They also highlight the need to build capacities of educators to facilitate transformative learning and support collective responses to global challenges anchored in ecological, social and economic justice[2].

The 13th annual TEESNet conference responds to the urgency of these calls and seeks to re-imagine teacher education by inviting research papers, examples of practice and creative contributions which relate to one or more of the following themes:

Interconnectivities and interdependencies - what kind of educational approaches can:

• promote understanding of interdependencies at a range of scales between individuals, groups and other species
• support connectedness between educational purpose, policy and curriculum choices, drawing on internationally agreed frameworks such as the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals

Intersections between ecological, racial and social justice - how can teacher educators ensure connections are made between global challenges which respond ethically to: 

• the legacies of colonialism, imperialism and ongoing harm to Black, Brown and Minority Ethnic communities*, and those in the Global South
• the need for unlearning of bias, prejudice and exceptionalism towards other people and the planet

Interdisciplinary learning - what possibilities exist for learning which:

• is grounded in real life contexts, the concerns of young people and their communities
• challenges the ‘subjectification’ of knowledge and promotes the kind of critical, creative and systems thinking required to fundamentally shift our relationship with the planet and each other

Cooperation and solidarity - what kind of pedagogical approaches are needed to:

• foster participation, collaboration and problem-orientated approaches across groups and divides, including intercultural and intergenerational
• support young people and teachers to participate in public debate on alternative futures and build capacities for transforming the world together

TEESNet activity deliberately cuts across sectors, including educators and students in universities, schools, and NGOs/CSOs, as well as researchers, policy makers, and those engaged in all forms of education.

For any questions about participating in the conference please email Andrea Bullivant at [email protected] or Fizza Hasan at [email protected]

----------------------------------------------------------------

Host or Publisher Liverpool World Centre