Forty years ago, the Castañeda v. Pickard landmark case marked an important milestone in the fight for equitable education for English learners in law, and for the first time linked theory, resources, and outcomes. Notwithstanding the important progress it marked in advocating for greater resources for English learners and accountability for…

Education is key to the structural integration of immigrants and their children. While research indicates that educational inequalities by migration background are a serious issue, relatively little is known about when, how and why they develop. The current paper adds to the literature by investigating to what extent achievement gaps by migration…

This article questions the perceived optimism regarding a new centrist left-wing 'United Kingdom (UK) government' stance on English to Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) provision. It examines the impact of neoliberal policies, particularly those of the New Labour government (1997-2010), and compares them with previous/subsequent Conservative…

This case study builds on Bourdieu's theory of practice to explore the ways in which two rural lower-class EFL learners--Andy and Xu--developed contrasting digital literacy trajectories in non-instructional and naturalistic settings. This study also seeks to examine how different online literacy trajectories impact rural lower-class students'…

This research sits within the wider field of emergent research considering how foreign nationals experience ESOL education in England, exploring how these particular experiences are understood through a gendered lens. It identifies how women from different ethnicities have varied experiences and opinions on equal access to ESOL provision. In…

Outdoor environmental education aims to immerse students in environmental spaces and create opportunities for classroom learning to be applied in the field. However, students from Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) and low-income communities often have less access to these educational opportunities. This study examined the…

In this article, we present our vision of a transformed second language acquisition and teaching (SLA/T) disciplinary community that approaches second language (L2) education through four pillars. The first pillar is praxeology (i.e., the study of human action) to highlight the sociocontextually emergent nature of L2 competence. It locates the…

This phenomenological study sought to understand the lived experiences of socially disadvantaged students from the Universidad Nacional, Costa Rica, who faced digital inequality during emergency remote education amid the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as their challenges vis-à-vis the transition to in-person classes in 2022. Using a hermeneutic…

The adoption of English medium instruction (EMI) in higher education has gained popularity in China's tertiary education as a result of globalization. International students in Chinese universities are celebrated as part of soft power projection to extend China's global impact. Informed by Piller and Cho's concept of "Neoliberalism as…

This qualitative study uses deductive thematic analysis to examine the L2 motivation of social science lecturers working in English Medium Instruction (EMI) contexts at selected Sri Lankan universities. Drawing on Dörnyei's (Dörnyei in The psychology of the language learner, Routledge, London, 2005) L2 Motivational Self System (L2MSS) as its…

The emergence of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) text generator tools and the potential challenges for higher education (HE) have characterised informal academic discussion on multiple fora. Specifically examining the case of English medium instruction (EMI) assessment academic integrity, this study sought to explore this conundrum by…

This article was initiated by our discomfort regarding recent policy developments in Nordic early childhood education (ECE) where previous decades' policies on creating solidarity, equality and universal access to social welfare and promoting democratic participation are seemingly waning. While from a global perspective, these policies might seem…

Higher education has undergone important shifts over the past two decades, with U.S. universities placing more emphasis on career readiness and internships becoming an integral part of academia (National Association of Colleges and Employers [NACE], 2021). Moreover, the student population in U.S. universities has become more diverse (National…

Language education policy in Arizona has been on a rollercoaster over the last five years. Between 2019 and 2024, the state shifted from strict English-only enforcement to loosening restrictions and encouraging dual language approaches, then back to strict English-only enforcement. In this forum piece, we use approaches from critical discourse…

This study employs critical content analysis to investigate school districts' identification process of gifted Emergent Bilinguals (EBLs) in North Texas. Despite the diverse population and significant presence of EBLs in Texas, this group is notably underrepresented in gifted programs. In order to uncover the inequities for gifted EBLs, this study…