Page 18 - Educational Leadership in a Changing World

Marta Ambite et al.

ment gap between native students and students with an immigrant
background in2009–2018 pisa results, Porcuetal. (2023) show how dif-
ferences are narrowing but still present in France, Germany, the United
Kingdom, Italy and Spain.
Echoing the Salamanca Statement and Framework (unesco, 1994),
the 2017 unesco Guide for Ensuring Inclusion and Equity in Educa-
tion, defines inclusion as ‘a process that helps to overcome barriers lim-
iting the presence, participation and achievement of learners’ (p. 7) and
inclusive education as ‘the process of strengthening the capacity of the
education system to reach out to all learners’ (p. 7, emphasis added).
However, once these goals are established, responding to them as edu-
cational leaders can take multiple forms, as Thrupp (2003) identifies in
his tripartite division of writers’ reactions to education policy:

• ‘Problem-solvers’ are apolitical: it is difficult to tell whether they
know that schooling occurs in a context of neoliberal reforms and
structural inequality as they barely refer to either in their reform
processes. This type of leader would, for example, implement after-
school tutoring programmes for low-performing students without
analysing the structural barriers behind their difficulties. ¹
• ‘Overt apologists’ are supportive of contemporary policy without
critically examining its implications. An example of a reform they
may promote could be adapting teaching to prioritize success for
all in skills demanded by the labour market without questioning
whether these demands benefit or harm certain groups of stu-
dents.
• ‘Subtle apologists’ do acknowledge problems around social justice
and might critique the reform, but still fail to deeply interrogate
the causes of these problems. An example of this might be criti-
cizing the process to access tertiary education and starting initia-
tivesthathelpsomedisadvantagedstudentsenteruniversitywith-
out understanding or advocating to transform the structures that
make access difficult in the first place.
If the dominant neoliberal perspective views education primarily as
a means to develop human capital that will sustain economic growth
(Choo, 2020; Qvortrup, 2009), the necessary shift toward inclusion

¹ Although, in this sense, we could call this view ‘apolitical,’ we believe that not engaging
with politics or the social context is, in itself, a deeply political stance.

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