Democratic Communities, Equity, and Excellence: A Deweyan Reframing of Educational Policy Analysis

Concern for academic excellence and equity often structures the work of mainstream policy analysts. These matters certainly deserve careful attention, but this focus often obscures many other important concerns. In particular, analysts are often inattentive to the relation between educational policy and the creation of democratic communities. To highlight the impact of this omission, I examine mainstream debates over tracking policy. While exploring these debates, I consider how placing greater attention on Deweyan notions of democratic community might enrich policy dialogues and alter the form and focus of mainstream policy discussions.