Colette murray

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Children's Rights in Una and Beyond: Transnational Perspectives

International collaboration:Mutual support and solidarity

Unexpected meeting, lasting impact

In Search of Social Justice, 2018

Diversity and social inclusion exploring competences for professional practice in early childhood education and care

As the ECEC sector grows in confidence across Europe the journey towards respect for diversity is... more As the ECEC sector grows in confidence across Europe the journey towards respect for diversity is essential for training and practice. There will be arguments and discussions which should be encouraged in a healthy profession. By putting forward the competences outlined in this publication the DECET and ISSA Networks are to be congratulated in leading this dialogue.

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Contesting early childhood professional identities: A cross-national discussion

Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood, 2018

In this collective article, the authors explore constructions of early childhood practitioners an... more In this collective article, the authors explore constructions of early childhood practitioners and how they disconnect and reconnect in a global neo-liberal education policy context. The contributions to the conversation provide windows into shifting professional identities across five national contexts: New Zealand, the USA, Ireland, Australia and Denmark. The authors ask who benefits from the notion of distinct professional identities, linked to early childhood education as locally and culturally embedded practice. They conceptualize teachers’ shifting subjectivities, drawing on Kristeva’s philosophical conception of identity as constantly in construction, open and evolving. Arguments for the urgency to counter the global uniformity machine, streamlined curricula, standardized assessment and deprofessionalization are not new. However, the authors wonder whether these arguments are missing something. Does our localized and highly contextualized identity construction enable ‘divide ...

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Pavee children A study on childcare issues for travellers

SIGLEAvailable from British Library Document Supply Centre- DSC:02/42866 / BLDSC - British Librar... more

Confronting and Countering Bias and Oppression through Early Childhood Policy and Practice: An Introduction

Across the globe, there has been sustained anti-bias and anti-oppressive scholarship and policy w... more Across the globe, there has been sustained anti-bias and anti-oppressive scholarship and policy work addressing social inclusion in early childhood and teacher education, grounded in the work of Louise Derman-Sparks and the ABC Task Force, 1989 (Kumishiro, 2000; Murray & Urban, 2012; Swadener, Aquino-Sterling, Nagasawa, & Bartlett, 2009). In this special issue, contributors address a range of social inclusion focused policies and practices across continents, including the challenges and opportunities of implementing anti-bias education. This kind of research takes a principled stance as it works to ameliorate, and eventually eliminate, exclusionary practices impacting young children and their families. The primary goal of this special issue is to rethink the importance, conceptualizations, and enactments of scholarship on anti-bias and socially inclusive approaches in early childhood education contexts.

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What’s Wrong with Equality? Developing a Critical Conceptual Understanding of Equality of Condition in Early Childhood Care and Education

Feminism(s) in Early Childhood, 2017

There is a deep ambivalence in Western society about caring and loving generally (hooks 2000). Lo... more There is a deep ambivalence in Western society about caring and loving generally (hooks 2000). Love and care is seen as a largely personal and private matter. This is despite the fact that love, care and solidarity are essential components of human survival and Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) practice. In Ireland, the ad hoc nature of the ECCE policy structure, the limited conceptualisations of quality and equality in the sector for both children and adults, as well as increasing demands on ECCE workers draw our attention to the gendered nature of the sector, and to women being essentialised as carers. Recent moves at policy and practice levels to discard care in the naming of the sector in Ireland (replacing ECCE with Early Childhood Education) can be linked to the value placed on care and to the status of ECCE workers versus education and primary teachers. This might explain why some ECCE workers have begun to refer to themselves as early childhood educators. This could be seen as an effort to bring them closer to the dominant discourse, achieve recognition and status in an effort to improve working conditions. This chapter draws on feminist and egalitarian theories to critique the ‘equality of opportunity’ principle that is present in various ECCE policy documents in Ireland. Through a more robust equality framework Equality of condition (Baker et al. 2004) I examine the conditions afforded to the ECCE sector versus the primary school sector. My particular focus is on the dimension of love, care and solidarity (Baker et al. 2004) in ECCE.

Reconceptualising and (re)forming early childhood professional identities: Ongoing transnational policy discussions

Policy Futures in Education, 2020

Problematic policy constructions of the purpose of education implicate professional identities an... more Problematic policy constructions of the purpose of education implicate professional identities and working conditions of professionals working with the youngest children. This paper builds on our earlier writing, to contest teacher professional identities in Australia, Ireland, Denmark and the United States of America, to illustrate the crucial importance of contextualised policy landscapes in early childhood education and care. It uses prevailing policy constructions, power imbalances and tensions in defining teacher identities, to ask crucial questions, such as what has become of the professional ‘self’. It questions the fundamental ethics of care and encounter, and of worthy wage and other campaigns focused on the well-being of teachers when faced with a world-wide crisis. The cross-national conversations culminate in a contemporary confrontation of teacher identity and imperatives in increasingly uncertain times as evolving in light of the COVID-19 pandemic.

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Conscious Noticing: Anti-bias from Policy to Practice

This article explores implications of implementing the Anti-bias Approach (Derman-Sparks & the AB... more This article explores implications of implementing the Anti-bias Approach (Derman-Sparks & the ABC Task Force, 1989) for the Irish Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) sector at policy and training levels. A recent initiative at policy level requires the ECCE sector to address diversity, equality, and inclusion in practice from an Anti-bias perspective. An exercise built on Anti-bias Goals and Principles – Equality-Proofing the physical environment – is outlined. The findings are analysed from interviews and the Equality-Proofing Exercise carried out in Early Childhood services by 85 undergraduate students from the Institute of Technology Blanchardstown, Ireland. Results demonstrate that meaningful diversity and equality training is necessary to ensure that all children are acknowledged and represented in the ECCE setting. Implications for current and future policy development and pre-service and in-service training are highlighted and discussed.

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Beyond recognition

The Routledge International Handbook of Young Children’s Rights

Contesting early childhood professional identities: A cross-national discussion

by Mathias Urban, Colette murray, and KYLIE SMITH

In this collective article, the authors explore constructions of early childhood practitioners an... more In this collective article, the authors explore constructions of early childhood practitioners and how they disconnect and reconnect in a global neo-liberal education policy context. The contributions to the conversation provide windows into shifting professional identities across five national contexts: New Zealand, the USA, Ireland, Australia and Denmark. The authors ask who benefits from the notion of distinct professional identities, linked to early childhood education as locally and culturally embedded practice. They conceptualize teachers’ shifting subjectivities, drawing on Kristeva’s philosophical conception of identity as constantly in construction, open and evolving. Arguments for the urgency to counter the global uniformity machine, streamlined curricula, standardized assessment and deprofessionalization are not new. However, the
authors wonder whether these arguments are missing something. Does our localized and highly contextualized identity construction enable ‘divide and rule’ politics by global agents such as the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, World Bank and international corporations? The authors’ (preliminary) answer is to build individual and collective professional
identities that are grounded in diverse local contexts and in a broader transnational professional (political) consciousness and collective voice.

A Minority within a Minority? Social Justice for Traveller and Roma Children in ECEC

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