Search Results (31)

Throughout history, communities have struggled to build homes in places actively hostile to their presence, a challenge long faced by African descendants in the American diaspora. In cities across the U.S., including Washington, D.C., efforts have often been made to erase Black cultural identity. D.C., once a hub of Black culture, saw its urban fabric devastated during the 1968 riots following Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination. Since then, redevelopment has been slow and, more recently, marked by gentrification, which has further displaced Black communities. Amid this context, Black architects such as Michael Marshall, FAIA, and Sean Pichon, AIA, have emerged as visionary leaders. Their work exemplifies Value-Inclusive Design and aligns with Roberto Verganti’s Design-Driven Innovation by embedding cultural relevance and community needs into development projects. These architects propose an intentional approach that centers Black identity and brings culturally meaningful businesses into urban redevelopment, shifting the paradigm of design practice in D.C. This collective case study (methodology) argues that their work represents a distinct architectural style, Black Modernism, characterized by cultural preservation, community engagement, and spatial justice. This research examines two central questions: Where does Black Modernism begin, and where does it end? How does it fit within and expand beyond the broader American Modernist architectural movement? It explores the consequences of the destruction of Black communities, the lived experiences of Black architects, and how those experiences are reflected in their designs. Additionally, the research suggests that the work of Black architects aligns with heutagogical pedagogy, which views community stakeholders not just as beneficiaries, but as educators and knowledge-holders in architectural preservation. Findings reveal that Black Modernism, therefore, is not only a design style but a method of reclaiming identity, telling untold histories, and building more inclusive cities. Full article

Design studios generally concentrate on some critical concerns of urban life to overcome, and housing is one of those. Rapid development and advanced technology increase the need for and problems with housing. Such concerns should be addressed in theory, practice, and pedagogy. This study assesses the sophomores’ design output and their understanding of housing typologies based on real-world project sites to contribute to pedagogical aspects. Our study results show that students’ villa typologies generally focus on specific social groups with central themes, including health and recreation, while apartment complex designs converge on community life, urban identity, and tranquility. Based on the survey, students were part of it; they had difficulty with the scale and site-related grading problems, while most wished to work on the other typology theme. This study eventually calls attention to housing problems based on the design students’ perspectives on different residential typologies. Full article

Climate change, urbanization, and socio-economic inequality are increasing the severity of urban challenges, emphasizing the imperative for a resilient built environment. Yet, architectural education has lagged in adopting resilience principles into its central curricula. This paper critiques dominant pedagogical paradigms and identifies shortcomings in interdisciplinary collaboration, digital tool adoption, and practical problem-solving. Moving its focus from local to international best practices for resilience, the study extracts key dimensions for learning architecture and explores case studies in leading schools that reflect pioneering, resilience-centric pedagogies. The findings highlight the importance of scenario-based learning, participatory design, and the use of technologies like AI, GIS, and digital twins to strengthen resilience. The article also explores how policy reformulation, accreditation mandates, and cross-sector collaborations can enforce the institutionalization of resilience education. It demands a pedagogical shift toward climate adaptation design studios, inter/transdisciplinary methods, and technological skills. The study ends with action guidelines for teachers, policymakers, and industry professionals who want to ensure that architectural education becomes responsive to resilient urban futures. Full article

Linguistically and culturally responsive pedagogies (LCRPs) recognize students’ multilingual and cultural resources as central to inclusive and equitable learning. While such approaches are increasingly promoted in English language education (ELE), there remains limited understanding of the complexity of students’ multilingual trajectories—particularly in contexts marked by migration and linguistic diversity. This article addresses this gap by presenting findings from the Udele project, which explores the lived experiences of multilingual learners in urban Austrian middle schools. Using an embedded case study design, we draw on a rich set of qualitative methods—including observations, interviews, fieldnotes, student artifacts, and language portraits—to explore how two students navigate their linguistic repertoires, identities, and learning experiences. Our analysis reveals that students’ language-related self-positionings influence their classroom engagement and broader identity narratives. The findings demonstrate how shifts in self-perception affect participation and motivation, and how the students actively negotiate their multilingual identities within and beyond the classroom context. The complexity uncovered in their multilingual repertoires and life experiences underscores the critical need for longitudinal, multilingual research approaches to fully capture the dynamic and nuanced trajectories of language learners. These findings challenge prevailing conceptualizations of multilingualism in ELE, highlighting the importance of incorporating students’ lived linguistic experiences into pedagogical frameworks. Full article

This study investigates the integration of ChatGPT in Philippine higher education institutions (HEIs) through narrative inquiry, employing Clandinin and Connelly’s three-dimensional framework (temporality, sociality, place) to explore the lived experiences of 18 participants (10 students, 8 faculty). The research identifies three global themes: (1) the need for strong ethical guidelines amid widespread but tacit “silent acceptance” of AI use, (2) faculty efforts to adapt traditional pedagogy while addressing concerns about critical thinking erosion, and (3) strategies to optimize ChatGPT’s utility without exacerbating inequities. Participant narratives reveal divergent adoption patterns: urban stakeholders leverage ChatGPT for efficiency and learning augmentation, while rural counterparts face infrastructural barriers that deepen the urban–rural divide. Students report evolving ethical engagement, from initial dependency to reflective use, whereas faculty grapple with academic integrity and assessment redesign. The findings underscore how cultural resistance, institutional policy gaps, and technological disparities shape ChatGPT’s uneven adoption, reinforcing existing educational inequalities. This study contributes to the literature on AI in education by proposing context-sensitive strategies for equitable integration, including offline AI tools for rural areas, faculty training programs, and transparent policy frameworks. By centering stakeholder narratives, the research advocates for culturally grounded AI adoption that balances innovation with pedagogical integrity, offering a model for Global South contexts facing similar challenges. Full article

Planning education has a responsibility to provide students with theoretical and practical training to address real-world issues. This study explores studio teaching as an engaged pedagogy, incorporating interdisciplinary approaches to education for sustainable development (ESD) and themes from the American Planning Association’s (APA) Future Trend reports. Focusing on two senior capstone projects at the University of Cincinnati involving 34 students, the study emphasizes the value of interdisciplinary methods and APA trend integration in fostering critical thinking and higher-order reasoning. Capstone projects show students’ active engagement with innovative planning concepts (e.g., climate migration, innovative ways of goods’ delivery, and expanding third place’s concept). Such active and innovative learning outcomes not only deepen students’ understanding of urban planning but also equip them with critical cognitive and professional skills, which are necessary as professional planners as well as forward thinkers. The experiences and findings presented can help other programs articulate the benefits of studio-based courses. The findings offer experience-based guidance for similar initiatives in planning studios globally and support the ongoing transformation of sustainability education to prepare students for complex, real-world problem-solving. Full article

Proficiency in literacy provides an essential foundation for citizens to participate fully and effectively in society. Research highlights a strong correlation between frequent reading and strong literacy outcomes for students and emphasises the benefits of a Reading for Pleasure (RfP) pedagogy on student reading motivation and attainment. As teachers are responsible for students’ literate development, the ability to teach literacy and the development of a literate identity thus form integral components of initial teacher education. There are studies revealing the important connection between teachers’ literate identities and their students’ reading engagement and literacy outcomes; however, less is known about the formation of pre-service teachers’ literate identities. This case study sought to investigate the impact of pre-service teacher engagement with Reading for Pleasure practices as they reflected on their literate identities. During the study, four student teachers in their final year of a Bachelor of Education (Primary) degree in an urban university in NSW, Australia, met weekly for six weeks to engage with Reading for Pleasure practices. Data were collected through participant observation notes, focus group discussions, and a questionnaire completed at the start and the end of the study. This study was informed with a consideration of complexity theory, and an analysis was made of participant’s reflections on RfP, as expressed through the intersecting systems within which initial teacher education is situated. Framed by the understanding that knowledge is socially constructed, this paper outlines how participants found benefit in Reading for Pleasure in forming their literate identities. Full article

Abbott Elementary, the Emmy-award winning mockumentary-style comedy television show, chronicles the day-to-day efforts of a group of teachers in a Philadelphia public elementary school who, despite the odds stacked against them, are determined to help their students succeed. With humor and heart, the show also uncovers some of the larger policy issues at play in U.S. urban public education, such as teacher shortages, school funding, and school choice. This essay describes the development of an interdisciplinary Honors seminar for undergraduate students at a large, public university in the Midwest U.S. that used episodes of Abbott Elementary as a central curricular text to support students in analyzing current policy issues in urban education. Drawing on Giroux’s concept of media as public pedagogy, this essay details how the course design employed a critical intersectional multiculturalism cultural studies approach to create opportunities for students to engage in a multiperspectival analysis, including (1) an understanding of political culture, (2) textual analysis, and (3) audience reception. Implications and recommendations are made for selecting and integrating popular culture media as curricular text in interdisciplinary coursework. Full article

Successful urban school design includes green space to counterpoint the built form in cities, where parks and reserves are well frequented. Further integration of landscape and buildings is an aspect of urban development that could improve how architecture is experienced by the wider community. Above all, evidence shows that it enhances the health and wellbeing of inhabitants. By providing green space in buildings, nature can be accessed more directly by its occupants and allow connection with nature to occur more easily. Integrating nature with architecture can improve a building’s self-regulation, energy consumption, and overall performance. Architecture that integrates nature can have a distinctive appearance and character. The co-existence of bricks and mortar with plants and vegetation is one example of integration, whereas the use of natural materials such as timber as part of the building fabric can create distinctive architecture. It is this individuality that can provide a sense of identity to local communities. Access to the outdoors in urban settings is a critical requirement for successful urban school design. This paper focuses on the architectural practise of designing biophilic schools and illustrates how optimising playground opportunities can provide the highly sought-after connection between architecture and nature. Connecting classrooms and pedagogy to the outside environment during the design phases of projects can create unique responses to a place, enhancing the learning experience in environments where architecture and nature can be informed by emerging biophilic evidence. This study strives to develop a strategy where educational clients can be convinced to actively embrace a biophilic school approach. It also seeks to convince architects to adopt a biophilic approach to school design across design studios using the emerging evidence based on biophilia and biomimicry. Full article

Over the past few decades, several analytical approaches have been developed to understand urban form and to address the complexity of human settlements as well as various socio-economic and environmental challenges. Each approach is characterized by specific disciplinary and geographical trends, often emerging from distinct schools of thought within urban morphology. Typically, these approaches are associated with specific research centers or individual researchers and have frequently been applied in isolation, with some exceptions. The teaching of urban morphology in higher education institutions across Europe faces the challenge of training future graduates to effectively address contemporary urban issues from often isolated perspectives rooted in the aforementioned schools of thought, either reflecting specific national educational trends or adopting a globalized approach that overlooks local specificities. Furthermore, the relationship between professional practice in urban and planning fields and higher education institutions is a notable concern. While the importance of broad knowledge and multidisciplinary skills for urban professionals is recognized, the connection between academia, research and practice is minimal. The increasing demand for evidence-based approaches in urban design highlights the need for solutions grounded in sound knowledge. To address the relationship between academic research and its integration into professional practice, innovation in teaching practices is crucial, aligning academia with the evolving needs of planning, architecture, and urban design professions. This involves focusing on developing learners’ fundamental and transversal skills and providing tools, methods, and research findings applicable in professional settings. This paper is based on two research projects that sought to bridge the gaps between different morphological approaches in teaching and between academic research and practical application. The projects, Emerging Perspectives on Urban Morphology (EPUM) and the Knowledge Alliance for Evidence-Based Urban Practices (KAEBUP), brought together partners from various South and Central European countries to address these gaps. EPUM focused on integrating different morphological approaches within the context of teaching, while KAEBUP aimed to connect theoretical knowledge with practical actions concerning the built environment. The situative pedagogical perspective, rooted in communities of practice and supported by a blended learning approach, is central to this endeavor. This perspective provides a collaborative framework for educators, students, and professionals in urban morphology to co-create knowledge through integrated learning, teaching, and research activities. Full article

The present study engages early childhood teachers and educators in practitioner research as they respond to children’s concerns about justice and equity in playground accessibility and explore ideas for inclusive and sustainable playspaces. Conducted in a community-based early childhood setting in a low socioeconomic urban area in NSW, Australia, the research engaged six teachers and educators as active researchers alongside 26 children aged three to six years. Utilising a critical pedagogy framework, the present study explored how children identified and expressed concerns about the lack of playground accessibility and sustainability. Through reflective practice and engagement with Universal Design principles, children, teachers, and educators collaboratively developed ideas and recommendations for inclusive and sustainable playspaces. Findings highlight the children’s capacity for critical awareness of and advocacy for equity and justice, as well as the transformative potential of practitioner research in fostering inclusive, equitable, and sustainable pedagogy. The present study underscores the value of practitioner research with a child-led focus, drawing on critical pedagogy to create inclusive and sustainable playspaces. Full article

Academics often comment that their teaching affects their research, but how this manifests is often implicit. In this essay, I explicitly explore the artistic, scholarly, and curatorial research instantiated by an undergraduate class titled “Transgender Studies meets Art History,” which I taught during the fall of 2022. Alongside personal anecdotes—both personal and connected to the class—and a critical reflection on my pedagogy, I discuss the artwork and public programming connected to a curatorial project, “Forever Becoming: Decolonization, Materiality, and Trans* Subjectivity, I organized at UrbanGlass, New York City in 2023. The first part of the article I examine how “trans” can be applied to thinking about syllabus construction and re-thinking canon formation for a class focused on transgender studies’ relationship to art history. In the second half, I theorize trans joy as a felt vibration between/across multiplicity and singularity, belonging and unbelonging, and world-making and world-unmaking. Overall, I consider trans as a lived experience and its utility as a conceptual tool. As a coda, I consider the precarity of teaching this course in the current political climate of the United States. Full article

Ninth grade on-track is predictive of high school graduation, more than race, socio-economic status, and prior achievement combined. Although initiatives characterized by an intense focus on the ninth-grade year are being increasingly implemented, research has not fully documented and tested mechanisms linked to improved outcomes. Using survey and transcript-level data and causal mediation analysis, this study tests the effects of students attending high teacher efficacy (self and collective—TSE and CTE) schools on ninth grade on-track in an urban school district in a northeast state in the United States. It further examines the extent to which ambitious instructional practices, defined as culturally relevant and transformative pedagogy, mediate the effects of TSE on ninth grade on-track and how levels of supportive school culture moderate these relationships. The findings indicate that urban ninth-graders attending schools with high TSE and CTE are more likely to be on track at the end of ninth grade. Additionally, the direct effect of students attending a school with high TSE was mediated by the level of ambitious instruction. We discuss implications for teacher education (TE) and professional development. Full article

This study investigates the impact of two years of emergency distance schooling on achieving Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4—equitable quality education, both globally and in Kazakhstan. The study used a qualitative research design. Individual semi-structured interviews were conducted with 30 teachers and 30 parents, while focus group discussions (FGDs) were utilised to gather the perspective of 28 students. The conceptual framework developed puts effective pedagogy at the heart of quality distance education, nested within four supportive factors—digital infrastructure; policy guidelines about pedagogy; curriculum and assessments; professional development in digital pedagogy; and the home environment. The study found that distance schooling in Kazakhstan has undermined progress on SDG 4 and worsened inequalities in access to quality education despite the distribution of digital devices to disadvantaged children and teachers. While mainstream public school teachers transitioned to distance school without any systematic preparation, provision of digital resources or clear policy guidelines, schoolteachers at elite public institutions received meticulous guidance and support. Despite later receiving professional development in digital pedagogy and access to digital resources and platforms, public school teachers in rural and deprived urban areas still faced challenges due to fragmented internet connectivity. This limited interactive and communicative pedagogy, particularly in rural and public schools, and hindered teachers’ ability to assess the impact of their teaching on student outcomes. Policy initiatives failed to mitigate disadvantages in the home environment for low-income families, parents with limited education and working parents, especially mothers, who primarily supported homeschooling. Recommendations are offered for adapting education provision and envisioning more robust education quality to achieve SDG 4 and address historical inequities in a post-pandemic world. Full article

This article first describes two high-impact, foundational examples in Asian American Studies over three decades that successfully established and sustained inclusive and equitable educational environments at an urban, public, and federally designated Asian American and Native American Pacific Islander Institution (AANAPISI) research university. Secondly, the article introduces the purpose, process, and product of a fresh programmatic example of cross-generational, community-centered storytelling initiated during the contemporary dual-pandemic period of COVID-19 and anti-Asian hate. Through these examples, we argue that AANAPISIs with longstanding Asian American Studies curricular and pedagogical commitments to transformative educational praxis can offer especially valuable insights for U.S. higher education precisely because the purposeful, strategic attention to developing equitable, inclusive learning environments is so well-developed. Within our own context, we specifically highlight the impacts and importance of developing long-term ecologies to support culturally sustaining curricula and storytelling co-production processes led by core faculty with students and alumni. These examples are particularly salient for under-resourced, predominantly commuter institutions where student engagement with faculty and peers in classroom environments is so vital. Full article