This paper presents a constructivist grounded theory on the decision-making process that UK home and alternative educators undertake and the related influencing factors. Twenty-one participants from a diverse range of backgrounds were interviewed between one and three times over a two-year period. Some were current home and alternative educators and others were undecided, or had changed their minds about home educating. The core process is entitled ‘Stepping out of the system?’ It was constructed from three main categories: attitudinal (...) direction, surveying the landscape and negotiating obstacles. Parents have opinions of school that developed before they began to consider how to educate their child; attitudes which are affect laden and guide the process of information gathering. The surveying the landscape stage involves both formal research and informal methods such as hearing the views of others and acting upon their own feelings. The final stage, negotiating obstacles, involves finding practical solutions to barriers they may face. The grounded theory is enriched and deepened by Reddy’s (2010) concept of emotional refuges. (shrink)

This book examines the European discussion about alternative schooling in the 20th century. It refers to a stream of concepts that are often described as New Education, Progressive Education, Education Nouvelle or Reformpädagogik, and discusses a range of different models of alternative schooling. Exploring the works of a range of continental educational philosophers, including Lietz, Blonsky, Kerschensteiner, Freinet, Decroly and Petersen, the book offers a unique insight into texts not yet translated into English. These educational models are presented (...) with regards to the biographical background of the authors; the crucial elements of their construction; the historical interconnections between schooling, society and culture; and finally their connection to today's discussions in educational sciences. The book will be highly relevant for researchers and advanced students working on the theory, history and practice of schooling, particularly those with a focus on alternative schooling and the philosophy of education. Ralf Koerrenz is Head of Chair for Historical Education and Global Education at the Friedrich Schiller University Jena, Germany. Annika Blichmann is Research Associate at the Chair for Historical Pedagogy and Global Education at the Friedrich Schiller University Jena, Germany. Sebastian Engelmann is a research associate and lecturer at the Institute for Bildung and Culture at the Friedrich Schiller University Jena, Germany. (shrink)

Drawing upon the concept of thirdspace (Soja 1996), this article extends sociocultural theorizations of space in relation to alternative educational programs: programs designed to re-engage youth who have been pushed out of mainstream schools. Snapshots of educational programs, provided by ethnographic research gathered in the United States, Australia, and Canada, foreground the contradictions inherent in these alternative spaces: on one hand, the possibilities obtained for youth through participation, and on the other, the production of these programs through displacement. (...) Alternative educational programs expose the tensions between a democratic ideal of engaging all young people in excellent and equitable public schools and a neo-liberal economic rationality that currently fuels the ?sorting machine? function of compulsory schooling. (shrink)

Alternative schools are popular interventions for marginalized students, including students with disabilities, but little research has focused on professionals in these settings. Today, close to 11,000 public alternative schools or programs are believed to exist in the United States education system (Foley & Pang, 2006) and as many as one million students are currently attending alternative learning programs in the United States (Lehr, Tan, & Ysseldyke, 2009). While public alternative schools can vary from one another in (...) many ways, they exist to serve youth marginalized in traditional public settings. In this study, we explore the ways teachers, administrators, and nurses in alternative settings collaborate to support mentally healthy school environments for marginalized student populations. Drawing on the process of rationale development ( Hawley & Crowe, 2016 ; Hawley & Jordan, 2014 ; Shaver, 1977 ; Shaver & Strong, 1982) as rooted in social studies education, we explore the perceived purposes of these professionals as they work with some of the nation's most marginalized children. Through focus groups and one-on-one interviews, the data bridge social studies themes rooted in democracy and equity with special education themes of inclusiveness. This work offers insight into the rationales of teachers and professionals engaged in critical work, and provides a platform for helping professionals undergo the rationale development process. (shrink)

Alternative Learning System (ALS) has been adopted in Philippine basic education, yet there is no academic institution in the region prepares ALS teachers in teaching life skills. ALS teachers graduated from different programs of teacher education for formal education. In response, an extension project was conceptualized and implemented to enhance the teaching capacity and effectiveness of ALS teachers. Case study was conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of the project. It explored the transfer of life skills among ALS teachers. Data (...) were collected from multiple sources. Interview and written responses, and feedbacks were analyzed using thematic narrative analysis. Other data were analyzed using document and descriptive analyses. The project had achieved its objectives and rated best by participants. These indicate that the project was implemented effectively and successfully. ALS teachers have acquired life skills and transferred them to others. Thus, the project has made a difference in the lives of these teachers. (shrink)

The book concludes by examining how we might bring such transformation about.Written by two of the leading experts in the fields of early childhood and ...

The knowledge driven, network society that is founded upon technology, demands from students to become independent, confident and motivated life-long, self-directed learners that can transfer their knowledge, skills and values. In order to deliver this type of graduates from a diverse and unequal student pool, effective education must be provided. Educators are encouraged to focus education on student-centeredness and to use technology effectively. Alternative assessment methods that are technology driven could enable both educators and students to become more effective (...) in this environment. This article advocates the use of alternative assessment methods by using technology driven assessment tools for possible replacement of traditional, paper based and ‘one size fits all’ assessment methods within theology. The SECTIONS framework was used to evaluate ten alternative assessment tools that are in accord with the development within society. (shrink)

Journal of Philosophy of Education, EarlyView.

This paper explores the epistemological affordances of Islamic ethics as alternative knowledge within intercultural education. Despite the calls for epistemological plurality in intercultural education that centre epistemologies of the South, educators may find it hard to reaffirm their situated knowledges and practices because they may have been overwhelmed by the wide endorsements of the mainstream literature. Drawing on in-depth interviews with 25 EFL teachers, this study aims to (a) unpack educators’ perspectives around the adoption of alternative knowledges anchored (...) in local epistemologies and sensibilities, (b) foreground educators’ epistemic positioning around alternative knowledges and how they are perceived as sites for cognitive and pedagogical renewal to account for local particularities and conditions and (c) examine inter-epistemic tensions within educators’ reasoning in terms of how they navigate (in)congruencies between the mainstream and Islamic philosophy at the conceptual, pedagogical and practical levels. Findings reveal that educators acknowledge the legitimacy of Islamic ethics and their epistemological/pedagogical significance in intercultural education. However, some factors may problematize educators’ attempts at making use of Islamic ethics including the additional burden of reflecting alternative knowledges while attending to contextual factors (class size, the course’s orientation, exams, time constraints, etc.) and the lack of sufficient training in intercultural education. (shrink)

This paper confronts Zagzebski’s exemplarism with the intertwined debates over the conditions of exemplarity and the unity-disunity of the virtues, to show the advantages of a pluralistic exemplar-based approach to moral education (PEBAME). PEBAME is based on a prima facie disunitarist perspective in moral theory, which amounts to admitting both exemplarity in all respects and single-virtue exemplarity. First, we account for the advantages of PEBAME, and we show how two figures in recent Italian history (Giorgio Perlasca and Gino Bartali) satisfy (...) Blum’s definitions of ‘moral hero’ and ‘moral saint’ (1988). Then, we offer a comparative analysis of the effectiveness of heroes and saints with respect to character education, according to four criteria derived from PEBAME: admirability, virtuousness, transparency, and imitability. Finally, we conclude that both unitarist and disunitarist exemplars are fundamental to character education; this is because of the hero's superiority to the saint with respect to imitability, a fundamental feature of the exemplar for character education. (shrink)

_Humanizing Education_ offers historic examples of humanizing educational spaces, practices, and movements that embody a spirit of hope and change. From Dayton, Ohio, to Barcelona, Spain, this collection of essays from the _Harvard Educational Review_ carries readers to places where people have first imagined—and then organized—their own educational responses to dehumanizing practices and conditions. Contributors include Montse Sánchez Aroca, William Ayers, Kathy Boudin, Fernando Cardenal, Jeffrey M. R. Duncan-Andrade, Marco Garrido, Jay Gillen, Maxine Greene, Kathe Jervis, Nancy Uhlar Murray, Valerie (...) Miller, Wendy Ormiston, Ana Y. Ramos-Zayas, Vanessa Siddle Walker, Arthur E. Thomas, and Travis Wright. (shrink)

The history of education, as it has been conceived and taught in the United States (and in the West generally), has focused almost entirely on the ways in which our own educational tradition emerged, developed, and changed over the course of the centuries. Although understandable, this means that the many other ways that societies have sought to meet the same challenges have been ignored. This book seeks to redress this oversight by providing a brief yet comprehensive review of a small (...) number of other, non-Western approaches to educational thought and practice. Understanding the ways that other peoples have tried to educate their children--as well as what counted for them as "education"--may help us to think more clearly about some of our own assumptions and values. It should also help us to become more open to alternative viewpoints about important educational matters. (shrink)

This article proposes to break with the idealized approach of alternation. Far from political injunctions, organizational, strategic, managerial and bureaucratic after all, we propose a different reading of the alternating student in terms of pedagogy. By locating our thinking in a conception of pedagogy as expressed in teachers claiming the principles and values of the New Education, we invite you to exceed the formatted design of alternating considering it as a reflection on the relationship between education and culture.

This paper aspires to show the often-obscured structure of alternatives in education. Alternative education is generally understood as an umbrella term for educational thought and practice for and in schools differing from an assumed ‘mainstream’, where ‘alternative’ is often taken to mean ‘better’. In many cases, ‘mainstream’ serves as an empty signifier that can be substituted by various forms of criticism. Just as progressive education is supposed to remedy all the ills of traditional education, alternative education is (...) often positioned as a safe place to retreat to, away from the mainstream. I argue that this leads to a dichotomous structure. The mainstream, however, is not an empirical reality, for example, a specific form of curriculum, differentiation of different types of schooling, or anything else. ‘Mainstream’ serves as a generic critical reference point. My argument is developed through a series of historical discussions around alternative education explored through the lens of contemporary analysis of the category. I then offer a more systematic account of the terminology in order to establish a perspective from which to assess the flaws and problems of alternative education alongside its potential virtues and benefits. (shrink)

This study aims to critique the concept of active learning in childhood education based on Hegelian Bildung. We have defined childhood education from the perspective of Hegel’s Bildung in The Phenomenology of Spirit. We describe childhood education as a ‘primary Bildung’ having the aim of ‘entering into the conceptual world’. This aim indicates that children can and are required to express their experiences in conceptual language. Finally, we critique the conceptual components of active learning from the Hegelian point of view (...) and suggest three alternative components: ‘child-educator interaction’, ‘understanding historical knowledge’, and ‘addressing concrete-abstract affairs.’ We suggest that the concept of active learning needs to be replaced by ‘Communicative-Interactive Learning (CIL)’. CIL takes both objectivity and subjectivity into account during the process of knowledge formation in education. (shrink)

This study aims to critique the concept of active learning in childhood education based on Hegelian Bildung. We have defined childhood education from the perspective of Hegel’s Bildung in The Phenomenology of Spirit. We describe childhood education as a ‘primary Bildung’ having the aim of ‘entering into the conceptual world’. This aim indicates that children can and are required to express their experiences in conceptual language. Finally, we critique the conceptual components of active learning from the Hegelian point of view (...) and suggest three alternative components: ‘child-educator interaction’, ‘understanding historical knowledge’, and ‘addressing concrete-abstract affairs.’ We suggest that the concept of active learning needs to be replaced by ‘Communicative-Interactive Learning (CIL)’. CIL takes both objectivity and subjectivity into account during the process of knowledge formation in education. (shrink)

This article examines trigger warnings, particularly the call for trigger warnings on university campuses, and from a Levinasian and Kantian ethical perspective, and addresses the question: When, if ever, are trigger warnings helpful to student's learning? The nursing curriculum is developed with key stakeholders and regulatory bodies to ensure graduate nurses are competent to deliver a high standard of care to patients and clients. Practical teaching practice and published research has uncovered an increasing use of ‘Trigger Warnings’ before a topic (...) is discussed, or used as warnings on core module texts. It is appreciated that some students have personal experience of psychological or physical trauma. However, apart from identifying these students through Mitigating Circumstances committees, or when the student feels confident to share this information with a personal tutor, this information remains strictly confidential. There is the potential for covert skills such as critical analysis and skilful discussion not being attained by the student. With the assistance of Kants moral theory, an argument will develop that the insidious use of Trigger warnings and the embargo of recommended reading, requires critical discussion with the public. This would involve the rationale and pedagogical justification for the use of texts, and the necessity within nursing education to address challenging clinical topics. To support students with PTSD this may involve the research discussed on personal educational needs analysis. (shrink)

By drawing on the work of Ivan Illich, John Holt, and Jacques Ellul, one can see that alternatives to the modern concept of education are desirable and practical. The homeschooling movement enables teachers, parents, and children to step outside the concept of education and discover how it is possible to teach and learn in various ways throughout their lives, not just through organized learning in conventional schools. By using homeschooling as the lens to view the concept of producing "good citizens" (...) (the stated purpose for compulsory schooling), new possibilities for achieving lifelong learning can be seen. This analysis also suggests how technology can become a means to achieve various personal ends, rather than just an expansion of educational techniques to use on people. (shrink)

After a decade of educational reforms, The Challenge to Care in Schools is even more relevant now than when it was first published. In her new Introduction, Nel Noddings revisits her seminal book and places care as central to current debates on standardization, accountability, privatization, and the continuous struggle between traditional and progressive methods of education. Rather then forcing one side to yield to the other, this book advocates an alternative, "responsive system" that will allow the best ideas to (...) flourish. In the Second Edition, Noddings once again envisions a school system built on the idea that different people have different strengths, and that these strengths should be cultivated in an environment of caring, not of competition. She suggests that if we make the responsiveness characteristic of caring more basic than accountability, we can accommodate both traditional and progressive preferences in one school system to the benefit of all... especially the children. Chapters address the practical and theoretical questions involved in organizing traditional and nontraditional areas of study around themes of care. Introductory chapters focus on caring in general and on the problems of liberal education, while the final chapter offers sound advice for implementing a caring curriculum in our schools. (shrink)

Supervision is widely acknowledged as influencing the quality of postgraduate theses, and thus, by implication, of postgraduates. Despite this, the literature on conducting research offers little guidance in respect of managing the supervision relationship. This paper opens a window onto the relationship - and particularly the power relationship - between a particular supervisor of postgraduate research, Howard, and his Master's student, Ray. It draws on research that explores how contemporary influences in the university domain intersect with individual agency and with (...) power relations to produce knowledge on two levels: the thesis as an extrinsic product of processes of education, and the person as an intrinsic product of processes of learning.Selections of Michel Foucault's insights are used to explore the notion of power and how it operates through rules of discourse to construct knowledge and identity. Accordingly, the research describes and tracks the functioning of two discourses pivotal to Howard and Ray's experience of supervision: anarchic educational leadership discourse, and humanistic discourse. The research on which the paper is based is constructivist, and as such it is underpinned by the assumption, or rather belief, that the discursive construction of reality is mediated by individual agency. In order to analyse how power operates between individuals, and between them and their broader educational contexts, a conceptual tool capable of accommodating manifest strategic processes - identified along a positional continuum as ‘push',' allow' and ‘pull' - was devised.The case study yields several thematic correlations in interpersonal and institutional power. These are: the significance of supervisor-student matching; links between expectations, abilities, the way participants negotiate power, and the quality of professional and pastoral care they experience; the impact of personal affinity on supervision; and the influence of ontology on thesis-as-product and person-as-product. (shrink)

This book offers concrete and specific suggestions for improving teacher education programs.

Supervision is widely acknowledged as influencing the quality of postgraduate theses, and thus, by implication, of postgraduates. Despite this, the literature on conducting research offers little guidance in respect of managing the supervision relationship. This paper opens a window onto the relationship – and particularly the power relationship – between a particular supervisor of postgraduate research, Howard, and his Master’s student, Ray. It draws on research that explores how contemporary influences in the university domain intersect with individual agency and with (...) power relations to produce knowledge on two levels: the thesis as an extrinsic product of processes of education, and the person as an intrinsic product of processes of learning.Selections of Michel Foucault’s insights are used to explore the notion of power and how it operates through rules of discourse to construct knowledge and identity. Accordingly, the research describes and tracks the functioning of two discourses pivotal to Howard and Ray’s experience of supervision: anarchic educational leadership discourse, and humanistic discourse. The research on which the paper is based is constructivist, and as such it is underpinned by the assumption, or rather belief, that the discursive construction of reality is mediated by individual agency. In order to analyse how power operates between individuals, and between them and their broader educational contexts, a conceptual tool capable of accommodating manifest strategic processes – identified along a positional continuum as ‘push’,’ allow’ and ‘pull’ – was devised.The case study yields several thematic correlations in interpersonal and institutional power. These are: the significance of supervisor-student matching; links between expectations, abilities, the way participants negotiate power, and the quality of professional and pastoral care they experience; the impact of personal affinity on supervision; and the influence of ontology on thesis-as-product and person-as-product. (shrink)

This text provides a brief, yet comprehensive, overview of a number of non-Western approaches to educational thought and practice. The history of education, as it has been conceived and taught in the United States (and generally in the West), has focused almost entirely on the ways in which our own educational tradition emerged, developed, and changed over the course of the centuries. Although understandable, this means the many ways that other societies have sought to meet many of the same challenges (...) have been ignored. This book seeks to redress this omission. Its premise is that gaining an understanding of the ways that other peoples educate their children--as well as what counts for them as "education"--may help us to think more clearly about some of our own assumptions and values, as well as to become more open to alternative viewpoints about important educational matters. Because it is not traditionally included in the training of educators, very few have had any real exposure to non-Western educational traditions. Thus, the audience for this book is broad and diverse. Intended as a text for both preservice and in-service teachers, each chapter includes pedagogically helpful "Questions for Discussion and Reflection" and "Recommended Further Readings." The book is equally appropriate for advanced students in graduate programs as well as faculty members. New in the Second Edition: The text has been thoroughly revised to expand and clarify points, update chapters as needed, and improve the pedagogical usefulness of the text. A section on Mayan education has been added to the chapter on the Mesoamerican educational experience. One entirely new chapter "'Familiar Strangers': The Case of the Rom" has been included. (shrink)

Widely adopted as a textbook, Issues and Alternatives in Educational Philosophy has been a classic in its field for more than a quarter of a century. As a survey of philosophic issues relevent to the educational profession, it highlights the relationship between philosophic starting points and educational outcomes - between theory and practice. -- from back cover.

There seems to be a broad agreement that curiosity is important in education. However, current research often seeks to answer the question of how best to nurture curiosity and fails to ask the normative question of why this should be done. A closer look reveals that the reasons for justifying the importance of curiosity vary, with some theorists pointing to its role in cognitive development as a starting point for learning, and others praising it as an element of democracy and (...) a child’s right to participation. Most of these approaches understand curiosity as an individual urge or desire for knowledge. In contrast, this article will examine a relational understanding of the concept by focussing on social curiosity. Instead of following a cognitive developmentalist, intellectual virtue or emancipatory approach to valuing curiosity, I will employ relational ethical theory. The argument then explores a possible analogy between social curiosity and the concept of sovereign expressions of life, as developed by the Danish philosopher and theologian K.E. Løgstrup. By drawing on his relational ethics, the article aims to expand the theoretical grounds on which curiosity can be normatively legitimised in education. With children spending longer and longer hours in educational, structured and adult-led settings, I conclude with a twofold normative claim: Social curiosity should be a part of all relations in education and its absence should lead to an ethical demand. In addition, an awareness of the actual deeds through which social curiosity is realised is also a topic that must be addressed by educators. (shrink)

Studies have shown ethics education has not systematically improved the moral reasoning of business students and professionals and, therefore, its effectiveness should be seen as deeply questionable. Business ethics education has limited effect, in part, because it rests on rationalistic traditions within normative ethics, business theory, and cognitive psychology. Emphasis is usually placed on student’s rationally thinking about issues as a way of improving their critical analysis and reasoning skills. Yet by focusing primarily on its cognitive dimension, ethics education has (...) tended to underdetermine the importance of social interaction in moral development. As an alternative to traditional business ethics education, using the work of the Russian psychologist Lev Vygotsky, I argue, that peer influence through a dialogical process is a better way to enhance and improve the moral reasoning and judgement of individuals. More specifically, small-group dialogue with peers encourages deep reflection about business dilemmas and has a direct influence on how one thinks about ethics. (shrink)

ABSTRACT My aim in this paper is to challenge the neo-Aristotelian tradition, currently dominant in contemporary theories of virtue education, by proposing the Platonic pedagogical methodology for virtue cultivation as a worthy alternative to the Aristotelian theory of education. I highlight that, in contrast to Aristotle’s limited remarks concerning virtue education, Plato conceptualizes and develops a rigorous educational theory in the Republic that considers many different facets of education – i.e. moral character education, intellectual character education, exemplarism and educational (...) corruption. Given Plato’s immense contribution to virtue education theory, I conclude that his educational program merits more attention. It can serve as inspiration both for improving existing theories of character education and for developing new ones. (shrink)

This book's aims are to determine the importance of legal philosophy in legal education and in addition to develop alternative methods for teaching law in general and the philosophy of law in particular. In this context, the individual essays in this volume discuss the alternatives and tendencies in the quest for an adequate model of teaching and learning jurisprudence. Common to all of them is a commitment to the necessary integration of theoretical and practical knowledge, of traditional case and (...) lecture methods with non-traditional models such as cinema, drama, and literature, and of the dominant legal perspective with alternative approaches utilizing information technologies such as computers and the internet. Effective teaching and learning must favor critical and strategic thinking, dialectical and dialogical inquiry or research, problem-solving, role-playing, and skill-developing over mere rote memorization of existing rules and standard answers. (shrink)

Background Design thinking is a tool for generating and exploring ideas from multiple stakeholders. We used DT principles to introduce students to the ethical implications of organ transplantation. Students applied DT principles to propose solutions to maximise social justice in liver transplant allocation. Methods A 150 min interactive workshop was integrated into the longitudinal ethics curriculum. Following a group didactic on challenges of organ donation in the USA supplemented by patient stories, teams of students considered alternative solutions to optimise (...) fairness of organ distribution and ethical implications of changing the current model. Facilitators led students through DT steps of empathy, defining the team’s point of view, ideating on potential solutions, prototyping a specific idea and testing the idea through oral presentation, with questions and answers by peers and faculty. The curriculum was evaluated with presurveys and postsurveys including quantitative and open-ended items. Results 100 first year medical students participated. Before the session, 75.3% of students had no practical experience with DT. Following participation, students reported an increased understanding of the current liver transplant allocation system and an increased appreciation of shortcomings of the current organ allocation system. After the session, 73.8% of students felt that DT could be used to approach complex health system problems. Discussion Students participating in a DT workshop displayed improved knowledge and attitudes toward organ transplantation and DT. In this pilot study, DT showed promise as a student-led approach emphasising collaboration and creativity in ethics curricula in medical education. (shrink)

Nationalism is inextricably connected with the modern history of nations and nationstates, and reflects the axiological sets derived from the aspirations of young nations. However, recent political, economic and social developments at the global level have determined the resurgence of nationalism, and signs of the pheno¬menon are also visible in Europe, although the old continent has enabled principles of cross-border solidarity and cohesion through transnational constructions such as the European Union. Europeanism, European identity and identification with Europe are still fragile, (...) and rather indefinite, and at the same time challenged by new and powerful types of nationalism. The present work argues that national education emerged and developed as a natural response to the formation and affirmation of nationstates, whereas multicultural, respectively intercultural education may answer the needs of contemporary societies, which face pressure to balance complex national and transnational mutations. This paper's contribution is to focus on the European context, and it stresses the necessity of transnational agreement on terms and semantics connected with intercultural education, given its potential role in supporting equity, solidarity and social stability. (shrink)

More Urban Myths About Learning and Education: Challenging Eduquacks, Extraordinary Claims, and Alternative Facts examines common beliefs about education and learning that are not supported by scientific evidence before using research to reveal the truth about each topic. The book comprises sections on educational approaches, curriculum, educational psychology, and educational policy, concluding with a critical look at evidence-based education itself. Does playing chess improve intelligence? Should tablets and keyboards replace handwriting? Is there any truth to the 10,000-hour rule for (...) expertise? In an emerging, conversational style, authors Pedro de Bruyckere, Paul A. Kirschner, and Casper D. Hulshof tackle a set of pervasive myths, effectively separating fact from fiction in learning and education--back cover. (shrink)

This paper provides insights into the pedagogy in practice of non-mainstream education through a qualitative case study of an alternative school in the context of the Israeli school system. The school’s alternative agenda is based on being isolated from mainstream education. We explore the negotiations between the school’s pedagogy and mainstream educational standards. We point to the tensions stemming from the intersections between the school’s ideals and the external context. This issue is significant for understanding the voices that (...) affect alternative education, in relation to its aspiration for autonomous practices, and the ways in which secluded practices are permeated by mainstream influences. Our findings reveal that these negotiations centre on issues relating to learning, knowledge, and assessment. Mainstream standards pass into the alternative educational schemes, creating challenges leading not to a rejection of mainstream demands but to a need to balance between the different educational approaches. The act of balancing does not negate the significance of the alternative school. On the contrary, the ability to suspend educational isolation by interacting with the surrounding educational context enables this type of alternative education to stay in touch with its radical educational agenda. (shrink)

Studies have shown ethics education has not systematically improved the moral reasoning of business students and professionals and, therefore, its effectiveness should be seen as deeply questionable. Business ethics education has limited effect, in part, because it rests on rationalistic traditions within normative ethics, business theory, and cognitive psychology. Emphasis is usually placed on student’s rationally thinking about issues as a way of improving their critical analysis and reasoning skills. Yet by focusing primarily on its cognitive dimension, ethics education has (...) tended to underdetermine the importance of social interaction in moral development. As an alternative to traditional business ethics education, using the work of the Russian psychologist Lev Vygotsky, I argue, that peer influence through a dialogical process is a better way to enhance and improve the moral reasoning and judgement of individuals. More specifically, small-group dialogue with peers encourages deep reflection about business dilemmas and has a direct influence on how one thinks about ethics. (shrink)