Keeping the Promise

This volume raises critical questions about the qualities of democratic educational leadership during a time when the promise of democratic education and public life risks being abandoned, forgotten, and emptied of meaning. A diverse chorus of scholars in education take on this issue by analyzing the cultural context of educational leadership in the age of No Child Left Behind, by offering democratic counter-narratives of educational leadership, and by deconstructing popular culture representations of educational leaders. In doing so, they re-situate leadership within a political context and link it to struggles over social justice and human freedom. The contributing scholars also radically re-think educational leadership in ways that include teachers, university-based educators, and scholars as leaders.

The Editors: Dennis Carlson is a professor in the Department of Educational Leadership and affiliated with the Center for Education and Cultural Studies at Miami University. He received his Ph.D. in educational policy studies from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and is the author of several books, including (most recently) Leaving Safe Harbors: Toward a New Progressivism in American Education and Public Life (2002). He is currently President of the American Educational Studies Association. C. P. Gause, a former elementary teacher and K-12 school administrator, is currently Assistant Professor of Educational Administration in the Department of Educational Leadership and Cultural Foundations at the University of North Carolina-Greensboro. He received his Ph.D. in educational leadership from Miami University. He recently was guest editor of a special issue of the Journal of School Leadership on «Edu-tainment,» and has published articles on youth, identity, and popular culture.