Professor Bob Lingard: ”Schooling the future: Beyond a binary of an ethics of probabilities and an ethics of possibilities”

Thursday November 17, 2022 at 10.15-11.45 (UTC + 2)

Professor Emeritus Bob Lingard

Dr Bob Lingard is a Professorial Fellow in The Institute for Learning Sciences and Teacher Education at Australian Catholic University and also an Emeritus Professor at The University of Queensland. He also held the Andrew Bell Chair in Education at the University of Edinburgh (2006-2008) and was Research Professor at Sheffield University (2003-2006). He is a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences in Australia and also a Fellow of the UK Academy of Social Sciences. He was President of the Australian Association for Research in Education and is also a life member of that Association. He researches and publishes in the sociology of education and education policy. His most recent books include, Globalisation and Education(Routledge, 2021), Digital Disruption in Teaching and Testing(Routledge, 2021), Global-National Networks in Education Policy: Primary Education, Social Enterprises and ‘Teach for Bangladesh’ (Bloomsbury, 2022), and Globalizing Educational Accountabilities (Routledge, 2016). . He has just submitted a book ms co-authored with Aspa Baroutsis to Routledge, entitled, Exploring education policy through newspapers and social media, which will appear in 2023.

”Schooling the future: Beyond a binary of an ethics of probabilities and an ethics of possibilities”

This talk will consider the contemporary contexts of schooling and education policies, situating these in the changing imbrications of global, national and local relations. The implications of these dynamic changes for the future of schooling in terms of goals, curriculum, pedagogy and assessment will be analysed. Here the presentation will work with and beyond the tensions between what Appadurai (2013) has called ‘an ethics of probability’ and an ‘ethics of possibility’. In terms of considering how to school the future, it will be argued that we need to go beyond these tensions, pluralise both, and work them together, work across them, in a knowing and productive way. This argument will also be situated against a critical analysis of the datafication and digitalisation of the governance of school systems and of classrooms, of the work of edu-businesses and edtech companies, and the joint playing out of a disciplinary society and an emergent society of control. How can we create an equitable, inclusive schooling system in a democratic way, given the changes society is undergoing and the challenges we face in terms of the climate crisis, reactionary right-wing ethno-nationalisms, individualisms and the seeming vulnerabilities of democracies?

This lecture is part of the lecture series FuturEducation II Reimagining the Future of Education is an open international lecture series meant for everyone interested in deepening their knowledge about the future trajectories of education, reimagining the future of education and wanting to understand some of the most crucial questions of changing education governance that are shaping education, knowledge formations and questions related to inequalities within and beyond education.

The lecture series provides a conceptual and more comprehensive understanding of expected and alternative future trajectories of education governance with eminent and internationally recognized speakers and provides essential knowledge for all stakeholders in the field of education. FuturEducation II is chaired by Professors Kristiina Brunila (AGORA) and Janne Varjo (KUPOLI) and coordinated by PhD researcher Kirsi Yliniva (kirsi.yliniva@helsinki.fi).

More information for the series can be found here: https://blogs.helsinki.fi/futureducation/