Employing a social justice framework, this book provides educational leaders and practitioners with tools and strategies for grappling with the political fray of education politics. The framework offers ways to critique, challenge, and alter social, cultural, and political patterns in organizations and systems that perpetuate inequities. The authors focus on the processes through which educational politics is enacted, illustrating how inequitable power relations are embedded in our democratic systems. Readers will explore education politics at five focal points of power (micro, local/district, state, federal, and global). The text provides examples of how to “work the system” in ways that move toward greater justice and equity in schools. Book Features: Conceptualizes educational politics within a pragmatic social justice framework. - Examines the various layers of politics and how they interact. - Explains governance structures and policymaking processes, such as policy formulation and implementation. - Offers insights into how power operates and how it can be invoked to support the needs of struggling students. - Explores why certain values, needs, and ideas are heard while others are not. “A timely, thoughtful and thought-provoking contribution for educators wanting to prepare their students for participation in the politically intense and complicated American system of governance from the local level to international relations world-wide, Educational Politics for Social Justice is ideal as a classroom curriculum textbook and is unreservedly recommended for both community and academic library Contemporary Education Issues collections.” ― Midwest Book Review “This call to action for educators posits the goal of education policy and practice as a means to provide social justice and equality for marginalized populations.” ― CHOICE ?A timely, thoughtful and thought-provoking contribution for educators wanting to prepare their students for participation in the politically intense and complicated American system of governance from the local level to international relations world-wide, Educational Politics for Social Justice is ideal as a classroom curriculum textbook and is unreservedly recommended for both community and academic library Contemporary Education Issues collections.? ?Midwest Book Review ?This call to action for educators posits the goal of education policy and practice as a means to provide social justice and equality for marginalized populations.? ? CHOICE “This is a text that supports leaders as they shift the ways they engage with the political and policy process and utilize their spheres of influence to challenge and disrupt the systems that stymie transformation in a local context….(It)challenges those who want to work toward justice with critical starting points, conversation starters, and strategies for collaborative leadership. ―From the Foreword by Enrique Alemán , professor and chair, educational leadership and policy studies, The University of Texas at San Antonio “ Educational Politics for Social Justice is a welcome and updated text on a critical topic. Unlike other more-traditional texts addressing the politics of U.S. public schooling, the authors’ explicit commitments to using politics to enact policies that are socially just remains a radical and liberating proposition in a time of fraught political danger for many who attend and work in our public schools. The authors note that 'playing it safe' is the privilege for only the few and willfully ignorant. If educators are truly committed to their students, this text provides the analytic tools and consequent strategies to make public schools better for all of our students. Bravo!” ― Catherine A. Lugg , professor of education, Graduate School of Education, Rutgers University ? Educational Politics for Social Justice is a welcome and updated text on a critical topic. Unlike other more-traditional texts addressing the politics of U.S. public schooling, the authors? explicit commitments to using politics to enact policies that are socially just remains a radical and liberating proposition in a time of fraught political danger for many who attend and work in our public schools. The authors note that 'playing it safe' is the privilege for only the few and willfully ignorant. If educators are truly committed to their students, this text provides the analytic tools and consequent strategies to make public schools better for all of our students. Bravo!? ? Catherine A. Lugg , professor of education, Graduate School of Education, Rutgers University Catherine Marshall is the R. Wendell Eaves Distinguished Professor Emerita of Educational Leadership and Policy at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Cynthia Gerstl-Pepin is professor and dean of the College of Education at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Mark Johnson has been a classroom teacher, school administrator, and policy analyst and is current