'Dissensus’ and the emergence of activist leadership in the baby room of UK early childhood settings
Article
Sakr, M. and Halls, K. 2024. 'Dissensus’ and the emergence of activist leadership in the baby room of UK early childhood settings. Education, Citizenship and Social Justice. https://doi.org/10.1177/17461979241241514
Type | Article |
---|---|
Title | 'Dissensus’ and the emergence of activist leadership in the baby room of UK early childhood settings |
Authors | Sakr, M. and Halls, K. |
Abstract | In the context of a chronically under-funded and fragmented Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) sector in England, there is an urgent need for models of leadership that emphasise action and advocacy. In the baby room, where pay, conditions and status are at their lowest, this is particularly the case. In this article, building on the model of activist leadership put forward by Woodrow and Busch (2008), we consider ‘dissensus’ as a foundation for activist leadership among baby room leaders working in English nurseries. Dissensus is the willingness to express and explore differences, disagreements and tensions. In gathering the perspectives and experiences of 15 baby room leaders, we identified three threads of dissensus which we consider in this article: 1) the desire for baby room educators’ contributions to be recognised as more than ‘just care’, 2) feelings of resentment around being overlooked and undermined by ECEC colleagues outside of the baby room and 3) questions around pay and conditions in the baby room. We consider these threads of dissensus as a potential starting point for activist leadership in the baby room. |
Keywords | dissensus; activism; advocacy; leadership; early childhood; babies; education; activist leadership |
Sustainable Development Goals | 4 Quality education |
Middlesex University Theme | Creativity, Culture & Enterprise |
Research Group | Centre for Education Research and Scholarship (CERS) |
Publisher | SAGE Publications |
Journal | Education, Citizenship and Social Justice |
ISSN | 1746-1979 |
Electronic | 1746-1987 |
Publication dates | |
Online | 16 Apr 2024 |
Publication process dates | |
Accepted | 04 Mar 2024 |
Deposited | 25 Mar 2024 |
Output status | Published |
Publisher's version | License File Access Level Open |
Copyright Statement | This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access page (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage). |
Digital Object Identifier (DOI) | https://doi.org/10.1177/17461979241241514 |
Web of Science identifier | WOS:001203789500001 |
Language | English |
https://repository.mdx.ac.uk/item/108v0w
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