Mapping Equity and Quality in Mathematics Education

Concerns about quality mathematics education are often posed in terms of the types of mathematics that are worthwhile and valuable for both the student and society in general, and about how to best support students so that they can develop this mathematics. Concerns about equity are about who is excluded from the opportunity to develop quality mathematics within our current practices and systems, and about how to remove social barriers that systematically disadvantage those students. This collection of chapters summarises our learning about the achievement of both equity and quality agendas in mathematics education and to move forward the debate on their importance for the field.

The issues of equity and quality have been central to international debates on mathematics in research, policy, curriculum and teaching. This book covers a wide variety of topics in the research and practice of mathematics education, demonstrating how equity and quality are inherently political terms whose political bedrock is obscured by them being taken for granted.

Mapping Equity and Quality in Mathematics Education is broken into four parts. Section 1 addresses the constructs of equity and quality from a variety of theoretical perspectives and outlines new directions to approach the question, “What are equity and quality?” Section 2 discusses the complexities in which the discourses of equity and quality move in constant construction and recontextualisation from societal trends to the constitution of subjectivities, passing through policy, the media and pedagogy. Section 3 covers insights and implications from research on the special needs of different “equity groups,” illuminating the way in which a “one-size-fits-all” approach tends to limit quality education to only dominant groups. And Section 4 contains lessons learned by researchers and practitioners who attempted to manage equity and quality within various educational contexts and with a variety of marginalized populations.

Written by teachers, researchers and academics from all over the world, this book represents a powerful response to the international call for quality education of all students in mathematics around the globe.