Abstract
Since 2003, Harry Brighouse, Mitja Sardoc and Randall Curren have done superb work to build Theory and Research in Education into a journal that publishes the best theoretical, empirical and conjectural papers contributing to the development of educational theory, policy and practice. Our journal today has more than 8000 subscribers and is increasingly read online: in 2016, our papers were downloaded nearly 50,000 times. That said, our journal remains relatively compact. Theory and Research in Education publishes three issues a year (whereas other journals in our field publish more) and this has allowed us to focus on publishing work that is true to our name: scholarship that addresses lasting questions in educational theory and that brings argument and empirical analysis or both- to bear on theoretical questions in education in a way that is succinct, clear and closely argued. While we are open to work from all areas of education and from many traditions, our journal has an analytical style and prizes precision in expression and rigour in argumentation.
I have been involved with the journal since first guest-editing an issue with Randall Curren in 2014 and it is a great privilege now to assume the role of Editor-in-Chief. I am lucky to be supported by Mitja Sardoc as Managing Editor and could not have asked for better preparation than the 2 years I have worked on the journal under the leadership of our outgoing Editor-in-Chief, Randall Curren. I wish to pay tribute to his excellent editorship and am pleased that he remains a supportive member of our Editorial Board. On assuming the Editorship, I would like to thank all the members of our Editorial Board for their continued hard work, as well as the many ad hoc and returning reviewers who give their time and effort to the journal. Our journal could not function without their hard work, so often unsung.
In this issue, we publish six papers, matched around three broad themes.
In their papers, Michel Croce and Maria Silvia Vaccarezza, and Kristján Kristjánsson discuss the educational importance and functioning of moral exemplars in the context of moral education (an issue previously discussed in our journal in 2013, volume 11, number 2). In ‘Educating through exemplars: Alternative paths to virtue’, Croce and Vaccarezza consider moral heroes and moral saints as forms of moral exemplars and ask whether the kind of moral exemplars we hold up in moral education must exhibit all of the virtues together. In his paper ‘Emotions targeting moral exemplarity: Making sense of the logical geography of admiration, emulation and elevation’, Kristjánsson asks what emotions may drive someone to try to follow the example of a moral exemplar, exploring in particular the role of moral elevation or awe as driving force in emulating the example set by a good moral role-model.
In their papers, Christopher Martin and David O’Brien tackle issues to do with justice in university education. In ‘Should the public pay for higher education’, Martin takes up the issue of the fairness of student debt and asks how the burden of funding universities should be shared between individual students and the public purse. In ‘Inequality of opportunity: Some lessons from the case of highly-selective universities’, O’Brien asks whether relatively advantaged students ‘squeeze out’ less-advantaged students from selective universities in the United States. O’Brien asks how we should think about the ‘big squeeze’ and what fair equality of opportunity amounts to for the very worst off students, but also for those students who have narrowly been ‘squeezed out’ of elite universities.
In ending, Bryan Warnick and Johannes Giesinger turn to two relatively unexplored questions in the field of justice in schooling. In ‘Paying students to learn’, Warnick explores the rise of ‘cash-for-grades programmes’ and asks whether there is, fundamentally, something anti-educational about paying a student for attaining certain grades. In ‘Educational Justice, Segregated Schooling and Vocational Education’, Giesinger discusses the segregated system of academic and vocational schooling found in Germany (but also in Austria and Switzerland). Giesinger criticises the unfairness inherent in this system and locates a solution in thinking about vocational education.