Susan Wiksten Desjardins | University of California, Los Angeles (original) (raw)
Uploads
Papers by Susan Wiksten Desjardins
Nordic Journal of Comparative and International Education (NJCIES), 2019
This article reports on empirical research findings from a case study of teacher education in Fin... more This article reports on empirical research findings from a case study of teacher education in Finland and the United States. A sociological perspective was deployed for investigating how the concept of sustainability was addressed in two teacher education programs. One of the programs was located in Finland and the other in the US. The study was carried out in 2015 and 2016. Seventeen semi-structured, open-ended, audio-recorded interviews form the core of the research materials. A thematic analysis of interviews was conducted for identifying articulations related to sustainability in subject-matter specialized teacher preparation. Findings from this study contribute to research on teacher preparation. Notably, by articulating how context-specific culture and social norms contribute to local models of teacher education. Findings from this study indicate that teacher training practices in Finland have encouraged students to articulate sustainability in relation to critical thinking, whereas in the US, sustainability has been articulated in relation to social justice. The key point supported by the evidence is that sustainability was by teachers and teacher educators conceptualized as being about the popularization of knowledge about ecology and biodiversity. The kind of communication that was by teachers and teacher educators described as effective for popularizing knowledge about scientific phenomena were forms of teaching that expanded on content-specific knowledge by connecting it to ethical and civic frameworks of the societies in which students live.
CIES, 2019
Susan Wiksten teaches methods for International Development Studies at the UCLA International Ins... more Susan Wiksten teaches methods for International Development Studies at the UCLA International Institute. She holds a Ph.D. in Comparative Education from the UCLA Graduate School of Education and an M.A. in Comparative Education from Université Paris Descartes (Sorbonne). Since 2007, she has worked with administration, evaluation and research in education in Denmark, France and the U.S.
In recent work, she has coordinated a workshop at the UNESCO World Conference on Education for Sustainable Development and she has provided research assistance to the World Council of Comparative Education Societies (WCCES), the UNESCO Chair in Global Learning and Global Citizenship Education at UCLA, the UCLA International Institute and a UNESCO consultancy on gender and literacy. Her service as co-chair of the Teacher Education and the Teaching Profession SIG in CIES (2016–2018) and her contributions as speaker and organizer for the Paulo Freire Institute at UCLA reflect her dedication to supporting the promotion of participatory practices in education.
Global Commons Review, 2018
This 1000-word synthesis outlines a research paper that was presented at the annual conference of... more This 1000-word synthesis outlines a research paper that was presented at the annual conference of the UCLA UNESCO Chair for Global Learning and Global Citizenship Education at the UCLA Faculty Club in February 2018. The question to which the paper and presentation attended to were the following: "What is meant today, when policy discourses on education propose that critical literacy should be part of quality education globally?"
The Paulo Freire Institute at UCLA, in collaboration with the Instituto Paulo Freire Brasil and t... more The Paulo Freire Institute at UCLA, in collaboration with the Instituto Paulo Freire Brasil and the North South Centre of the Council of Europe, facilitated a review of practical approaches to global citizenship education and sustainable development at the UNESCO World Conference on Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) in Aichi-Nagoya, Japan, in November 2014. As an outcome of the collaborative effort of approximately one hundred participating experts from across the world, a number of generative themes were identified. Additionally, examples of practices where experiences have been gained in the use of participatory approaches in ESD and Global Citizenship Education (GCE) were collected by this consultation. In the first part of this paper, I provide a definition for a comparative political economy of education approach. The second part of the paper presents examples of practical approaches for advancing global citizenship education (GCE) and education for sustainable development (ESD). Subsequently, I provide a review of generative themes, challenges, resources and policy recommendations identified in the consultation on which this paper draws. The goal of this paper is to support the thesis that documenting diversities of existing practices and policies is a promising approach for continued work in advancing educational practices in the complementary fields of GCE and ESD.
Keywords: Socio-emotional learning, perspective-taking, international law, western tradition of ... more Keywords: Socio-emotional learning, perspective-taking, international law,
western tradition of political thought.
In this book review of "First Freire: Early Writings in Social Justice Education" (2014) a brief ... more In this book review of "First Freire: Early Writings in Social Justice Education" (2014) a brief outline is given of the structure and themes in a recent book about the scholarship and political engagement of Paulo Freire, a theorist and practitioner of adult literacy. The book by Carlos Alberto Torres, highlights the origins of Freire’s seminal work in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s in Latin America. Torres contextualizes in this book key moments of Freire's early work as well as themes relevant for his later scholarship in a theoretical, geographical and personal context. The geographical context being that of a specific historical moment in Latin America, a perspective that subsequently is expanded to cover other countries due to the political exile of the scholar. The intellectual atmosphere of a specific time-period is contextualized by relating Freire's work to discourses that he engaged and foreshadowed, drawing on Sociology, Psychology, Philosophy and Political Sciences. Torres elaborates on the Freirean theoretical framework and proposes an agenda for advancing theory, inquiry and problem posing practices in education. In addition to providing a narrative of Freire’s early work and key themes of his life-long engagement to adult literacy, the book also engages and problematizes education as a political institution.
In this conference paper, I review United Nations (UN) policy definitions of relevance for the de... more In this conference paper, I review United Nations (UN) policy definitions of relevance for the development of education for migrant youth. Drawing on UN references, I propose a migrant youth curriculum. This paper was presented at the annual conference of the California Freirean Educators (CAFE) at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) in April 2015.
Nordic Journal of Comparative and International Education (NJCIES), 2019
This article reports on empirical research findings from a case study of teacher education in Fin... more This article reports on empirical research findings from a case study of teacher education in Finland and the United States. A sociological perspective was deployed for investigating how the concept of sustainability was addressed in two teacher education programs. One of the programs was located in Finland and the other in the US. The study was carried out in 2015 and 2016. Seventeen semi-structured, open-ended, audio-recorded interviews form the core of the research materials. A thematic analysis of interviews was conducted for identifying articulations related to sustainability in subject-matter specialized teacher preparation. Findings from this study contribute to research on teacher preparation. Notably, by articulating how context-specific culture and social norms contribute to local models of teacher education. Findings from this study indicate that teacher training practices in Finland have encouraged students to articulate sustainability in relation to critical thinking, whereas in the US, sustainability has been articulated in relation to social justice. The key point supported by the evidence is that sustainability was by teachers and teacher educators conceptualized as being about the popularization of knowledge about ecology and biodiversity. The kind of communication that was by teachers and teacher educators described as effective for popularizing knowledge about scientific phenomena were forms of teaching that expanded on content-specific knowledge by connecting it to ethical and civic frameworks of the societies in which students live.
CIES, 2019
Susan Wiksten teaches methods for International Development Studies at the UCLA International Ins... more Susan Wiksten teaches methods for International Development Studies at the UCLA International Institute. She holds a Ph.D. in Comparative Education from the UCLA Graduate School of Education and an M.A. in Comparative Education from Université Paris Descartes (Sorbonne). Since 2007, she has worked with administration, evaluation and research in education in Denmark, France and the U.S.
In recent work, she has coordinated a workshop at the UNESCO World Conference on Education for Sustainable Development and she has provided research assistance to the World Council of Comparative Education Societies (WCCES), the UNESCO Chair in Global Learning and Global Citizenship Education at UCLA, the UCLA International Institute and a UNESCO consultancy on gender and literacy. Her service as co-chair of the Teacher Education and the Teaching Profession SIG in CIES (2016–2018) and her contributions as speaker and organizer for the Paulo Freire Institute at UCLA reflect her dedication to supporting the promotion of participatory practices in education.
Global Commons Review, 2018
This 1000-word synthesis outlines a research paper that was presented at the annual conference of... more This 1000-word synthesis outlines a research paper that was presented at the annual conference of the UCLA UNESCO Chair for Global Learning and Global Citizenship Education at the UCLA Faculty Club in February 2018. The question to which the paper and presentation attended to were the following: "What is meant today, when policy discourses on education propose that critical literacy should be part of quality education globally?"
The Paulo Freire Institute at UCLA, in collaboration with the Instituto Paulo Freire Brasil and t... more The Paulo Freire Institute at UCLA, in collaboration with the Instituto Paulo Freire Brasil and the North South Centre of the Council of Europe, facilitated a review of practical approaches to global citizenship education and sustainable development at the UNESCO World Conference on Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) in Aichi-Nagoya, Japan, in November 2014. As an outcome of the collaborative effort of approximately one hundred participating experts from across the world, a number of generative themes were identified. Additionally, examples of practices where experiences have been gained in the use of participatory approaches in ESD and Global Citizenship Education (GCE) were collected by this consultation. In the first part of this paper, I provide a definition for a comparative political economy of education approach. The second part of the paper presents examples of practical approaches for advancing global citizenship education (GCE) and education for sustainable development (ESD). Subsequently, I provide a review of generative themes, challenges, resources and policy recommendations identified in the consultation on which this paper draws. The goal of this paper is to support the thesis that documenting diversities of existing practices and policies is a promising approach for continued work in advancing educational practices in the complementary fields of GCE and ESD.
Keywords: Socio-emotional learning, perspective-taking, international law, western tradition of ... more Keywords: Socio-emotional learning, perspective-taking, international law,
western tradition of political thought.
In this book review of "First Freire: Early Writings in Social Justice Education" (2014) a brief ... more In this book review of "First Freire: Early Writings in Social Justice Education" (2014) a brief outline is given of the structure and themes in a recent book about the scholarship and political engagement of Paulo Freire, a theorist and practitioner of adult literacy. The book by Carlos Alberto Torres, highlights the origins of Freire’s seminal work in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s in Latin America. Torres contextualizes in this book key moments of Freire's early work as well as themes relevant for his later scholarship in a theoretical, geographical and personal context. The geographical context being that of a specific historical moment in Latin America, a perspective that subsequently is expanded to cover other countries due to the political exile of the scholar. The intellectual atmosphere of a specific time-period is contextualized by relating Freire's work to discourses that he engaged and foreshadowed, drawing on Sociology, Psychology, Philosophy and Political Sciences. Torres elaborates on the Freirean theoretical framework and proposes an agenda for advancing theory, inquiry and problem posing practices in education. In addition to providing a narrative of Freire’s early work and key themes of his life-long engagement to adult literacy, the book also engages and problematizes education as a political institution.
In this conference paper, I review United Nations (UN) policy definitions of relevance for the de... more In this conference paper, I review United Nations (UN) policy definitions of relevance for the development of education for migrant youth. Drawing on UN references, I propose a migrant youth curriculum. This paper was presented at the annual conference of the California Freirean Educators (CAFE) at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) in April 2015.