The transformative education framework emphasizes a community-centric approach that intersects human rights, sustainability, and imagination to encourage students to engage in social and ecological democracy. It critiques traditional pedagogical methods, advocating for diverse curricula that empower student voices, valid interpretations of knowledge, and community involvement through authentic learning experiences. The role of educators shifts to that of mediators, facilitating students' exploration of sociocultural contexts while encouraging critical thinking and thick description of complex issues.

1. TRANSFORMATIVE
EDUCATION FRAMEWORK
Kurt Love, Ph.D.
Central Connecticut State University

2. WHAT IS A
TRANSFORMATIVE EDUCATION?
Transformative education exists at the nexus of:
Human Rights Sustainability Imagination
Transformative education is community-centric and
focused on supporting students to enact
social and ecological democracy

3. WHAT IS A
TRANSFORMATIVE EDUCATION?
Transformative education exists at the nexus of:
Human Rights Humans have the right to survive free of oppression
Sustainability Preserving ecology by not depleting resources beyond
what is able to be replenished for future generations
Imagination Use of creativity to explore curiosity and use of
spirit to explore fulfillment
Transformative education is community-centric and
focused on supporting students to enact
social and ecological democracy

4. What is
Transformative Learning?
Learning is a process
of changing one’s
relationships with
her/his community,
which consist of
interconnections with
nature and society.

5. Zoe Weil & “Solutionaries”

6. Thinking
Convergent Thinking -
All paths lead to a single destination. This is rooted in a
belief that there is only one “Truth.”
Traditional Liberal/Progressive
scaf
Truth Thought fold
New
Truth
d Thought
scaffol
Thought Thought

7. Thinking
Divergent Thinking -
Explore many paths in authentic settings with questions
that have no predetermined answer.
Transformative
New New
Thought Thought Relationship
Critical Communities
Info Questioning
New New
Thought Thought Relationship

8. Divergent Thinking

9. Divergent Thinking &
Transformative Learning
Divergent thinking
contextualized in
community provides
students to not only
learn “basic” skills, but
also opportunities for
democratic discourse,
participation and
contributions to the
world in which they
live.

10. Messages in Water

11. We Teach “Reality”
Are teachers allowed to teach about
lesser known information?

12. What is
Transformative Learning?
Assumptions:
• Information is diverse, culturally
grounded, and a representation of
a value system (knowledge/power
relationship).
• Learners are constantly
investigating their own locations
(positionalities) in relationship to
culture, ideology, power
structures, technology, and nature.
• Learners are constantly
investigating processes in
community (via the content areas)
that perpetuate hegemonic
relationships

13. Power & Education
Power-Over Power
Power-With
Domination Nature Ecological
over nature, sustainability,
social injustice, human-nature
docile & connection,
oppressed Education social justice,
student students
engaged in
creating social
Community and ecological
justice

14. TRANSFORMATIVE
PEDAGOGIES
Critical pedagogy Red Pedagogy
Feminist pedagogy Peace education
Queer pedagogy Holistic education
Ecojustice pedagogy Aesthetic education
Indigenous education

15. TRANSFORMATIVE
FRAMEWORK
1. Questioning power/knowledge relationships
2. Students voices are legitimized
3. “Thick description”
4. Community-based learning: relevant, authentic, and contemporary
connections
• Connecting with art, spirituality, emotions, and nature
5. Students-as-researchers
6. Teacher-as-mediator

16. QUESTIONING POWER STRUCTURES AND
POWER/KNOWLEDGE RELATIONSHIPS
Knowledge is created by the privileged dominant elites of a society and
reflects the views and values of that group.
This “knowledge” becomes part of the general consensus of reality
Knowledge from the privileged dominant elites may have hidden messages
present in the form of Eurocentrism, White privilege, racism,
classism, patriarchy, anthropocentrism, androcentrism,
scientism, corporatism, hyper-patriotism, consumerism,
globalization, naturism, heterosexism, homophobia, etc.
Questioning this relationship often means re-centering marginalized
voices.

17. 3 Types of Curricula
• Mainstream Curriculum - Curriculum that is
explicit
• Hidden Curriculum - Messages that are present
but hidden (i.e. forms of oppression and
privilege)
• Null Curriculum - Messages that are silenced,
omitted, or marginalized.

18. 3 Ways to Teach About
Columbus
• Mainstream Curriculum - Columbus was a strong, brave
“explorer” that opened the doors for European
colonization of the Americas.
• Hidden Curriculum - Europeans are more advanced and
sophisticated than the indigenous peoples of the Americas.
Eurocentrism, patriarchy, technology over nature.
• Null Curriculum - Columbus violently exploited and
dominated the indigenous peoples of the Americas, which
was part of a larger European mindset that allowed for
genocide, enslavement, assimilation, colonization and in
contemporary settings, globalization (or global
Westernization).

19. STUDENT VOICES ARE
LEGITIMIZED
Students generate knowledge, which is seen as
legitimate by the teacher.
The student’s experiences, worldviews, value systems,
and identities are legitimate lenses of analysis of the
content.
This applies especially to students of color, female
students, GLBTQ students, working class or poor
students, or any students that have socially and/or
culturally oppressed identities.

20. “THICK DESCRIPTION”
Superficial
Mainstream These two
Message might set up a
Null binary
Message
These two
Relationships generally show a
complexity not
Tensions binary “packaged”
Deep info

21. “THICK DESCRIPTION”
Avoid binaries
(including the binary relationship between mainstream and null
content)
The “Who” matters: Students should be able to articulate
knowledge and understandings from different social, cultural, and
political frames.
Include null content, relationships and tensions.

22. FAST FOOD RESTAURANTS
Mainstream: Fun, tasty, family-oriented
Null: Unhealthy
Relationships & Tensions: Serves millions every
day, especially those that have limited access to food
Avoid binary-thinking here, but can use this deeper
understanding to work for a “sustainable” change

23. AUTHENTIC CONTEXTS
Authentic contexts are real world issues that are
currently present.
Teachers need to take time to research and understand
these current topics, know and develop meaningful
relationships in the community, and turn them into
cognitively appropriate questions for students to explore
and investigate.

24. COMMUNITY
INVOLVEMENT
The classroom is extended beyond the traditional “four walls.”
Students explore knowledge that is present in the community
through connecting with cultural commons -- elders,
artists, musicians, government officials, activists, community
organizers, journalists, health care workers, researchers, family
members, etc.

25. COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT IN
THE CULTURAL COMMONS
Oral histories Connecting with artists/
musicians
Ethnographies
Field trips
Raising Awareness
Meeting/petitioning gov’t
Art Exhibits officials
Activism Interviews
Connecting with elders Observations
Connecting with community Comedy Night
leaders
Slam Poetry Evening

26. COMMUNITY
INVOLVEMENT STAGE 1
Researching the Community
Interviews Ethnography
(family, friends, members of (cultural thick description)
organizations, leaders, veterans, artists,
scientists, lawyers) Participatory Research (reporting on
their experiences)
Observations
(the mall, school, sporting event, school Demographic Research (census, state
dance, playground, on the internet via dept websites)
social network sites, environment)
Literature Research
Case Study (local newspapers, internet)
(focus on one person, group, location,
ecology) Field Trips as sites for all of these

27. COMMUNITY
INVOLVEMENT STAGE 2
Action in the Community
Art Exhibits Theatre of the Oppressed
(Art show, public art, instillations, eco- (Forum theater, rainbow of desire,
art, murals, street art, “guerrilla art”) image theater, legislative theater)
Poetry Slams Reports & Publications
(Writing to local newspaper, having a
Critical Performances journalist present, BOE meetings,
(Plays, musicals, choir pieces that community groups, WWW)
rework and recontextualize texts or
existing pieces) Documentary Film
(Local issues, local attitudes, local
Video Game projects, film festival)
(Social or Eco-themed)
Habitat for Humanity House

28. TEACHER'S ROLE =
TEACHER-AS-MEDIATOR
Teacher provides various sociocultural contexts for students to
explore and research.
The point here is not to stop at just the "facts" of the curriculum.
The point is to really interrogate knowledge and curriculum through
different sociocultural perspectives or frames and provide learning
experiences where students provide thick description by investigating
authentic questions.

29. HARTFORD TO WATERBURY
Traditional:
“How can you drive from Hartford to
Waterbury?”
Teacher gives directions and students meet at a
predetermined destination. Students graded on
their ability to follow directions and arrive at
destination under a strict timetable

30. HARTFORD TO WATERBURY
Liberal/Progressive:
“How can you drive from Hartford to
Waterbury?”
Students can choose their own path to drive
to predetermined destination. Students graded
on their ability to describe their directions and
arrive at destination under a flexible to strict
timetable.

31. HARTFORD TO WATERBURY,
NEW HAVEN TO BRIDGEPORT
Transformative:
“What are issues and challenges that different
peoples experience with transportation from
Hartford to Waterbury? To what extent do they
differ from New Haven to Bridgeport?”
Students investigate issues of social justice
connected to transportation between Hartford and
Waterbury as well as New Haven to Bridgeport.
Students graded on their “thick descriptions”
generated through their investigations. Timetable is
flexible based on the needs of their studies.

32. STUDENT OUTCOMES:
HARTFORD TO WATERBURY
Traditional: Students describe directions from Hartford
to Waterbury (by car)
Liberal/Progressive: Students describe directions they
want to take, but still result with the same directions as the
goal (most likely by car)
Transformative: Students analyze issues of accessibility
and equity for people of different levels of socioeconomic
backgrounds, and they also describe the directions (by car &
mass transportation)

33. STUDENT'S ROLE =
STUDENT-AS-RESEARCHER
Students focus on understanding "authentic" issues in the world.
They examine, explore, interpret, research, and study
different sociocultural contexts, histories, and relationships.
Statistics Ethnographies
Surveys Artistic Interpretations
Demographics Interviews
Case Studies Biographies

34. STUDENT'S ROLE =
STUDENT-AS-RESEARCHER
Students are generally focused on answering authentic
questions that connect back to these:
1. Who are we as a community?
2. What are we doing?
3. What do we want to do?

35. ART & AUTHENTICITY
Art brings us immediately to the facts and skills that
are in our curricula
Art locates us in the issues of community

36. JUST THE “FACTS”
Community Community:
Who we are,
Learning
Art what we’re
is doing, and
engaged what we want
because of to do
Facts
the Skills Art:
context, Concepts Ways to
not explore and
interpret
the
relationships
content and knowledge
in community

37. VIDEO LINKS
Zoe Weil & Solutionaries
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t5HEV96dIuY
Ken Robinson & Divergent Thinking
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U
Messages in Water
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6q3QlqaLzyo