The anchoring weight of slavery continues to ground schools by design and implementation, 151 years after the 13th Amendment to the Constitution was ratified. Empirical literature is rife with evidence that Black and Brown youth are penalized more frequently and with greater harshness than their white, suburban counterparts for the same offenses (Gregory, Skiba, & Noguera, 2010; Welch & Payne, 2010), to the point where Triplett, Allen, and Lewis (2014) describe this phenomenon as a civil rights issue. The authors examine how a constellation of school-sanctioned discipline policies have connected the legacy of slavery with punishment. In order to curb burgeoning suspension rates that disproportionately target Black youth, schools and grassroots organizations have adopted various tiers of Restorative Justice (RJ). This article draws upon existing theoretical frameworks of Restorative Justice to discuss new approaches and directions, as well as the limitations of its hyper-individualized applications in K-12 schools. Finally, the authors assess two case studies that aim to transform schools and community engagement by refocusing restorative philosophy on the ecological conditions of student contexts, rather than the presumed intrapsychic symptoms habitually ascribed to youth behavior and Black culture.

This mixed-methods cross-national study investigated the effectiveness of reality pedagogy (an approach in which teachers become part of students' activities, practices and rituals) in terms of changes in student perceptions of their learning environment and attitudes towards science. A questionnaire was administered to 142 students in grades 8-10 in the Bronx, New York City and Dresden, Germany. The questionnaire combines learning environment scales from the Constructivist Learning Environment Survey (CLES) and the What Is Happening In this Class? (WIHIC) questionnaire with attitude scales from the Test of Science-Related Attitudes (TOSRA). Student interviews were used to support questionnaire findings. Quantitative data analyses revealed that reality pedagogy had a greater impact on students in the Bronx than in Dresden, with qualitative data clarifying differences in how reality pedagogy was enacted in each geographic area. Overall, our findings add to the body of evidence concerning the effectiveness of reality pedagogy as an approach to teaching and learning science across a variety of contexts.

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An important challenge for the geoscience community is developing engaging, accessible, and effective experiences within introductory courses, which are often gateways to geoscience majors. This study evaluates low-barrier-to-entry and flexible assignments focused on a pedagogical innovation: faculty replaced one of their usual course components (research paper, lab, etc.) with a Student-Produced Audio Narrative (SPAN) assignment. SPAN assignments require students to engage with geoscience content by telling a scientific story using simple audio-recording and production techniques. The hypothesis is that SPAN assignments will increase students' personal connection to geoscience course content. The pilot study included 8 faculty and 693 students across a range of institution types, course structures, class sizes, and content topics during the control and implementation semesters. The study evaluated student responses to SPAN assignments both quantitatively, using a pre/post survey, and qualitatively, using semi-structured interviews. Survey results show that students experienced positive changes in the categories of personal relevance, sense of curricular innovation, and future intentions to study science. Interview results indicate that much of the increased senses of innovation and personal relevance came from the creativity and choice the students experienced during the SPAN assignment. Taken together, these results indicate that SPAN assignments are innovative to students and effective pedagogical tools that can positively change students' perceptions of their learning environment and attitudes toward science. PurposeIntroductory geoscience courses play a key role in building a more diverse and larger geoscience workforce as well as a science-literate public. Exit surveys reveal that nearly one-third of geoscience majors choose their major as a result of an early experience, such as an introductory course, in either community college or the first undergraduate year (Wilson, 2016). These students enroll in an introductory geoscience course for reasons other than a major, such as general education requirements, but then leave on a path to the geosciences. Introductory courses serving non-STEM majors are valuable recruitment opportunities for increasing the number and diversity of geoscience majors. However, there is a large and well-documented disparity between the number of students enrolled in introductory courses and the small percentage who become geoscience majors (Martinez & Baker, 2006). Therefore, introductory courses must employ new and different pedagogical techniques to help close this gap.Reaching introductory students is critical but difficult (e.g., Egger, 2019a). Geoscience faculty teaching introductory courses, particularly at two-year colleges (2YCs), face challenges such as: difficulty providing research, field, and laboratory experiences; discipline isolation; and students' limited exposure to geoscience careers and opportunities (Wilson, 2014). Experiences and activities focused on introducto...

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