Keywords

1 Introduction

In this chapter, we explore the educational turn as we discuss the challenges for teachers working with diverse student groups across educational sectors. For us, the central issues focus on how we can reimagine education as an interdisciplinary space for collaboration rather than a site that promotes individualism where teachers work in silos. In this chapter, we frame our discussion around ‘academic activism’ (Barnett, 2021), which Barnett defines as being exhibited in a situation of epistemic injustice and as an expression of epistemic agency. We consider the place of academic activism in preparing teachers to develop their agency to address the educational fault lines that exist for students from diverse cultural, linguistic, and educational backgrounds. This also requires rethinking funding to higher education to support collaboration and dismantle discourses of competition (see Chap. 10).

We draw on our experiences as researchers and educators in the areas of early childhood, disability and neurological difference, English as an additional language (EAL) and vocational education and training delivered to secondary school students. Globally, across educational systems, education is increasingly being constructed within human capital discourses where education policies focus on the production of students as future productive citizens that need to be ready for the current and changing labor market (Rizvi & Lingard, 2010; Roberts-Holmes & Moss, 2021). These education discourses are shaped within neoliberal ideologies with a focus on managerialism, accountability, marketization, and commodification. Parents are positioned as informed consumers who choose the ‘best’ educational settings for their children.

Angus (2010) argues that ‘evidence is mounting that the neo-liberal experiment has been a failure on many grounds, not least because of its de-professionalizing effect on teachers’ (p. 231). Teaching becomes instrumental where the focus of teaching is on the gathering and reporting of data as an administrative task and the teaching of prescriptive outcomes. Neoliberal ideologies place educational success at the site of the individual (student, teacher, and lecturer) and their engagement with teaching and learning. Issues of educational inequality and access are neutralized through quality discourses, namely, that highly qualified teachers and national curriculum, and standards provide a level playing field for all students (Savage et al., 2013). These discourses purport the notion that if a person works hard enough, they can be successful. In this chapter vignettes are presented to examine how neoliberalism silences inequities. We argue that the restrictions during the pandemic made the educational gaps visible. These gaps are not new, rather they have been hidden through neoliberal quality discourses. The chapter invites teachers and academics to rethink the ways in which we might (re)engage in academic activism to speak out against inequity beyond pandemic moments. As such, the educational turn has allowed opportunities to question who has access to education and reimagine educational pedagogies within the changing contexts and landscape of higher education.

During 2020 and 2021 for many countries worldwide schooling has been disrupted due to the pandemic. The response has been a focus on online remote learning, the skills required by teachers to teach in the digital space, and the deployment of technology for students. Materials, pedagogy and policies have been focused on supporting student outcomes and diminishing learning delays often homogenizing the learner as if they are experiencing education and disruptions equally. This is a time where the teaching profession needs to reengage with the question of what is the role of education? There is a need to reconsider and reflect on what works well in different locations for diverse learners, and the implications for developing next practices in pedagogy, not just now during a global crisis, but beyond. This raises many questions and challenges globally for the training of preservice teachers and the role of the university. What types of teachers do we want to produce? What are the effects of instrumentalist teachers? How do we support the development of politically active teachers who critically reflect on how their pedagogical practices support relational teaching that makes inequities visible in the classroom? Giroux (1995, 2007), calls for teachers to engage with border pedagogies and be border crossers where we engage with and theorize power, ideology, and pedagogy. How can preservice teacher programs provide theories and opportunities to critically engage in dominate educational discourse to speak back to policy and pedagogy that silences diversity and difference? What are the possibilities for universities to refine and refocus on education as a more interdisciplinary and interconnected site for collaboration to draw on distributed expertise?

2 The Educational Contexts

In this section, we provide four vignettes from different educational contexts. They were selected because they mainly operate outside what would typically be considered as mainstream educational cohorts and contexts. The vignettes illustrate some of the challenges and highlight the pedagogic fault lines that were evident during the extended lock-down in Melbourne for those who educate diverse students from varying developmental, cultural, social or linguistic backgrounds. The vignettes illustrate the realities and the silo approach to education which re-enforces the marginalization of not just the students but also the teachers who catered for these diverse students during the 18 months of on-again off-again lockdown in Melbourne. They also highlight the inequalities of who has access to education during a health crisis across these differing educational cohorts and contexts. We ask the reader to consider the questions these vignettes raise about which students and teachers are forgotten in the larger educational machine? And how universities might work to disrupt the silo approach to teaching across structures, policy, and pedagogy bringing separate sectors and expertise together to create interdisciplinary communities of practice (see also Reaching for Reconciliation in Digital Spaces).

2.1 Early Childhood Vignette

Historically, in many Western countries, the policy context in early childhood education and care has been part of a workforce strategy, with a focus on supporting women to participate in employment and support the national economy. In the 1960s in the United States, the Perry Preschool Project undertook research which looked at the effects of a high-quality preschool program for a group of three-and four-year-old children from an African American background who were living in poverty and had been assessed as being at a high risk of failing in the education system (Schweinhart & Weikart, 1981). In more recent times, influenced by the neurosciences, the importance of the early years of life in relation to environments and relationships on brain development has been identified as a significant impact on lifelong learning and successful outcomes for children (Mustard, 2006). Internationally, governments have turned their attention to the importance of early quality education for young children to ensure that they are productive future citizens (OECD, 2019).

During the pandemic in Australia, education departments across the country worked with schools to support teachers to develop online material to support students to learn from home. Early childhood services were not part of this resourcing or support. Long day care and preschools remained open to support front-line workers to continue to deliver essential services to keep economies going across nations. For families who were unable to work during shutdown periods children didn’t attend care and there was no mandated requirement for early childhood services to provide online learning to children birth to 5 years of age. The Federal government provided an Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) Relief Package to support services with low utilization ‘to ensure the viability of the ECEC Sector and the continued provision of care for children of essential workers and vulnerable children (for the period 6 April to 28 June 2020)’ (Department of Education, Skills and Employment, 2020, p. 3). This period has highlighted the precarious status of early childhood education and the inequity for young children to access early learning and early intervention. Globally, emerging issues will rise across the coming years about the impact of young children missing early education. For current and preservice teachers, there are a number of challenges and provocations that will need to be examined. What skills and knowledge do current and future teachers need to become (1) advocates for young children as learners who should have equal access to education like any other older learner; (2) what would be the best ways to support remote learning for young children that reflects their developmental skills and capabilities; (3) what skills and knowledge do preservice teachers need to develop flexible curriculum and resources for children birth to five years? The retention of early childhood teachers in Australia is already a challenge due to comparative poor working conditions compared to other educational services (United Workers Union, 2021). How has the lack of pedagogical support created further incentives to retrain to work in other sectors? How does higher education promote and support early childhood teachers?

2.2 Students with Disability and Neurological Difference Vignette

Prior to the pandemic, a key focus of policy commitments and initiatives was creating equitable access to education and fostering inclusion for students with disability (SWD). In spite of policy frameworks and legislation initiatives inclusive education for all has not been realized (Tiwari et al., 2015). This inequity in educational access and outcomes was in many ways both illuminated and exacerbated by the rapid switch to remote home learning during the pandemic. Media reporting around experiences of families of SWD internationally in the pandemic period described a number of common issues, with parents and carers reporting that SWD were under acknowledged, “unfairly left out or forgotten” (Knopf, 2020) and that it [felt] “a little bit like they [were] acknowledging these kids after all the other kids” (Cardoza, 2020). Rather than these students’ needs being considered as part of core teaching or overall initial planning, family members and carers of SWD reported that their children were “being forgotten.., or being the last group to be considered after arrangements had been made for the rest of the class” (Dickinson et al., 2020) and that “their education [was] “pushed to one side” during the course of the pandemic “for the convenience of the majority” (Weale, 2020).

The shift of responsibility for students’ education to families in remote learning allowed family’s an insight into children’s progress and learning needs. Which in turn resulted in concerns about the ability of schools to cater for SWD specific learning needs both during and prior to the pandemic. A lack of differentiated instruction led to some students being excluded from learning platforms that other students were using, provided with different work that “highlighted” the “low expectations” the school had [with] [s]ome teachers [making] very little effort to ensure [SWD] could participate in classes (Henrique-Gomes, 2020). Many parents voiced concerns regarding lack of adequate support, noting that SWD were more vulnerable than students without disabilities as the learning “gap and the lost time … [was] already a lot more dramatic, … and so this [was] going to put them a lot further behind” (Cardoza, 2020). It was not only families that expressed concern, many educators also spoke of the “the challenge of just reaching their [SWD], engaging them online, knowing if they were understanding” (Sparks, 2021) illuminating the lack of support and skills to cater for this vulnerable group.

Falling behind academically was not the only concern raised in reviewed media. Social isolation from peers was cited as negatively impacting SWD mental health. Families reported that when teachers did provide social supports families felt supported, reported reduced feelings of social isolation and increased engagement in learning for SWD (Dickinson et al., 2020).

In contrast to media that covered the challenges of equitable access, reporting that focused on schools and teachers who were proactive in identifying and addressing access issues for SWD were scarce. The press described some strategies that schools actively engaged to increase access to remote learning for all students. These educators outlined strategies such as teaching that was “more robust (explicit) and structured with daily schedules and live classes and fewer online platforms” (Stein & Strauss, 2020). It outlined the importance of “stay[ing] consistent and keep[ing] a routine (Knopf, 2020). “Open communication… and frequent check-ins with students and parents” (Villano, 2020) was highlighted as key to inclusion and social support and along with inclusive pedagogical choices supported these vulnerable students not to be “pushed to the side” at risk of becoming a sidenote to the teaching and learning process.

2.3 English as an Additional Language Vignette

In Australia, similar to the UK, USA, and Canada, English as an Additional Language (EAL) students are positioned largely on the peripheries of mainstream educational contexts (Davison, 2014). Within the Australian context, EAL students are eligible to attend English language centers for between six and twelve months. In English language centers, the curriculum is taught by EAL teachers who have studied at university for their EAL qualification. One of the challenges faced by EAL teachers in language centers is to teach students from diverse linguistic and educational backgrounds and to ensure their preparedness for entering primary or secondary education. EAL teachers’ expertise is informed by second language acquisition theory, as different approaches are required to learn a second language. They are not only teaching students to communicate in everyday conversation; EAL teachers are also developing students’ cognitive academic language skills, important for learning and participating in educational contexts. In addition, EAL teachers need to cater for their students diversity by developing their English language skills through consideration of both their language level and prior educational experiences. These aspects of English language are taught with the aim of preparing students for mainstream schooling. In mainstream school, EAL students are not necessarily taught by EAL teachers, depending on available staff and resources. Within secondary education contexts, the challenges are amplified as in the state of Victoria, Australia, EAL curriculum closely mirrors the mainstream English curriculum.

The extended lockdown and pivot to remote learning highlighted some of the inequalities for EAL learners. While students could be kept to a set routine, the educational environment via technology was difficult for EAL teachers. Some of the students struggled with understanding how to use the technology within the learning environment. Some students were shy to communicate online, preferring to remain quiet and not communicate orally with their teachers. This resulted in busy work focusing mainly on writing skills, and less on speaking and listening skills.

EAL teachers found it difficult to transfer EAL pedagogy to an online environment (particularly around oral language teaching and learning). While this is not an issue only for EAL teachers, it is important to consider that EAL students in language centers have only six months to one year to develop their English language skills before they enter their local schools. This government policy did not change during lockdown, and there has been a negative impact of student learning.

There has also been a loss of EAL teacher expertise since 2020. English language center enrolments have all but evaporated as Australian borders remain shut which limit new enrolments. This has resulted in the closure of one center in 2020 and outsourcing of English language center staff to mainstream schools to support student learning in 2021. This has highlighted the precarious position of EAL teachers as they are positioned as support staff with limited pedagogic authority in mainstream schooling. This has been an issue for EAL for many years in Australia, as well as UK and Canada (Arkoudis, 2005; Leung et al., 2015). As a result, EAL teachers have limited academic activism and ability to share and impact teaching in mainstream classrooms to support EAL students, especially when faced with the possibilities for losing their positions due to decreasing enrolments.

2.4 VET Vignette

Policy makers world-wide recognize that a skilled workforce is vital for the economic development and sustainability of a nation (OECD, 2010) and that Vocational Education and Training (VET) will play a pivotal role in a country’s post-pandemic social and economic recovery (ILO, World Bank and UNESCO, 2021). Whilst this may entail helping displaced workers upskill or reskill to find new employment opportunities in industry growth areas (ILO, World Bank and UNESCO, 2021), it also entails helping young people to make a successful transition into the labour market from school and/or further education and training. That is, vocational education and training offered to young people whilst at school can help them develop the broader capabilities required to become adaptive, resilient, lifelong learners that will support their career development in a rapidly changing world of work (Firth, 2020).

In Australia, VET can be delivered in a variety of learning contexts including schools, industry, and/or formal off-the-job training settings. Within the school context, students can undertake nationally recognized VET qualifications (or partial qualifications) in combination with general/traditional subjects as part of their final school completion certificate. These VET courses can be delivered entirely by the school or by other approved providers through either partnership and/or auspicing arrangements. The courses are designed to help students develop industry-specific technical competencies, gain greater awareness of employment pathways, and develop transversal life and career skills to support successful post-school transitions into the workplace and/or further education and training whilst satisfying the requirements of their final years of compulsory schooling (Firth, 2020).

These VET courses have also been designed to help improve school engagement and retention rates among vulnerable, disadvantaged groups of learners who prefer to learn through applied learning pedagogies where they can ‘apply their knowledge and skills in situations with real-world relevance’ (O’Connell & Torii, 2016, p. 77). Traditionally, these learners may have included students with low levels of prior academic achievement; students with little motivation to study academic subjects with a strong theoretical basis; students with disabilities or special needs in main school or specialized settings; as well as students seeking a vocational and applied pathway into further education, training, and/or employment directly from school (Firth, 2020; Polesel et al., 2020). The pandemic-enforced shift to remote learning was particularly challenging for the VET sector with its applied learning pedagogies, but it also highlighted the agility and innovative capacities of the sector with practical classes delivered via video link, learning tools and kits delivered to homes, and knowledge content packaged in new ways. Through the VET sector emerging innovations may be identified that are applicable more broadly and the benefit of drawing on collaborative practices to enhance delivery and remain responsive to diverse study bodies.

Moving forward, as Australia attempts to recover from the pandemic, applied VET programs within school settings may be the key to reengaging the large proportion of young people who were disengaged with remote learning during the midst of the pandemic and have continued to be disengaged with schooling as schools returned to on-campus teaching. That is, the benefits of applied, experiential learning can be realized by all learners, irrespective of age and/or level of education. However, to develop authentic learning experiences for learners, teachers need to develop “specialized applied pedagogy skills to cater for the diverse needs of student cohorts” (Firth, 2020, p. 4). They must be able to make strong connections between what is being learnt and the ‘real world of work’ and learn to become ‘reflective practitioners’ (Downing & Herrington, 2013, p. 239). This raises the question as to what extent does pre-service teacher training adequately prepare teachers to apply age specific, applied learning pedagogies to their teaching? Currently, there is very little coverage of vocational and applied learning programs in pre-service teacher training in Australia and limited leadership and mentoring support within the schools (Firth, 2020).

3 Strengthening Teacher Efficacy

The vignettes above are presented to highlight equity and access issues for learners during of the pandemic. Educational inequities existed long before the pandemic, and if we do not make this visible there is a risk that these gaps will continue long into the future. Across the vignettes are three key issues. Firstly, there is a lack of recognition and parity of esteem for teachers specialist skills and knowledge that sit outside the mainstream such as early childhood, EAL classrooms, VET, and special education. Questions need to be asked as to why this is the case, and what are the implications for attracting and retaining teachers in these fields? Teaching in the early years is often associated with care rather than education. Care is seen as a natural mothering ability that can be undertaken by women innately and without skill (Moss, 2006) and therefore devalued. Further, care cannot easily be categorized, accessed, and reported on, limiting possibilities to rank and benchmark. VET education is framed within applied learning and often positioned as training that students who have lower academic outcomes are guided toward. Secondly, teachers in these spaces have curriculums and outcomes that reflect universal state or national government priorities. These curriculums are Eurocentric and founded on middle class developmental norms. This means that students from diverse backgrounds (neurologically, physiologically, linguistically, economically, and culturally) are displaced or marked as deficit when the content and assessment does not recognize differential learning. Thirdly, teachers are operating within neoliberal education policies becoming instrumental in their teaching practices and expected to have the expert skills and knowledge to meet the needs of all their students. Where teachers lack these knowledge and skills neoliberal discourses place the responsibility at the site of the individual teacher to undertake professional development or upgrade their training. Rather than non-teaching time becoming a space for this upskilling, administrative tasks are prioritized where student data is documented, collated, and reported on to the school community and broader education authorities.

As we think about the future of the teaching profession inclusive of all educational contexts we pose the questions—What does it mean to be a teacher? What skills and knowledges does a critically and ethically engaged teacher need to create a classroom in which all children feel connected, respected and capable of ‘success’? What might a community of learners look and feel like that reflects, celebrates, and supports diversity? The critique of neoliberal ideologies helps to acknowledge the way that teaching has become an individual rather than a collective endeavor. Teaching has become instrumental with a predominate focus on data collection to assess, compare and rank learners locally, nationally and globally (e.g. PISA, TIMMS and QS World University Rankings). The result is that teachers attempt to build expertise through ongoing available professional development and upgrading of qualifications. This discourse rubs against the grain of existing research that shows that effective inclusive education requires teachers and other educational professionals to regularly engage in collaborative problem solving. For example, through whole school/institutional collaboration, staff (and associated professionals) can share ideas and strategies to address the specific challenges faced by individual students (Carter & Hughes, 2006). Research shows that when collaborative plans are consistently implemented students’ academic and social skills improve (Hunt et al., 2001). Within a community of learners, individual teachers are not required to be experts in all areas but to foster proficiency and build skills along with collaborating with others to address equity for diverse students and enhance learning for all students. At moments of crisis for student learning, teachers do come together to develop a collaborative approach to address the issues. This results in reactive rather than proactive collaboration. This has been the case, for example, in dealing with EAL students in various educational contexts (Arkoudis & Harris, 2019). A distributed expertise approach to inform pedagogy creates different opportunities for student learning across the whole classroom (Arkoudis & Harris, 2019). How might we rethink the scholarship of teaching and learning to situate the important place of collaboration and partnerships?

Through examination of the vignettes, it is apparent that the institutional/government/public gaze needs to be disrupted. Educational inequities are not new. They pre-existed the pandemic and are imbedded in structures and systems of education. To not pay attention now will result in the continued disadvantage and discrimination of the same communities of learners into the future. The experiences of moving to remote learning have created an opportunity to rethink how SoTL can establish an evidence base for facilitating learning for all students. Without this renewed focus drawing on the benefits of collaborative problem solving and distributed expertise, we will continue to replicate the inequalities that exist for diverse student groups or return to casting shadows on the deepening fault lines.

4 Equity and Advocacy at the Centre of the Teaching Profession

As we explore the educational turn post pandemic, we call for a (re)turn to the work of scholars such as Giroux (1995, 2007) and Freire (1970) to recognize the importance of critical pedagogies and to empower teachers as political activists in and out of the classroom. Freire (1970) reminds us that.

Education as a practice of freedom – as opposed to education as a practice of domination – denies that man is abstract, isolated, independent, and unattached to the world; it also denies that the world exists as a reality apart from people. (p.8)

Teaching as a practice of freedom, a way to open up fair and equal opportunities for learners, requires the teaching profession to critically question how current systems and pedagogies privilege particular students and not only silence but marginalize (and at times demonizes) others. To create border pedagogies that support respect and navigate diverse cultural and academic knowledges and learning; teachers need to turn their gaze inwards to recognize their own biases and limitations along with those of educational institutions. Teachers across all educational sectors from early childhood to higher education need skills and opportunities to firstly, reflect on systems and pedagogy that supports inclusion and diverse learning and recognize the gaps; secondly, explore opportunities as teacher researchers to use experience and classroom evidence of inclusion and exclusion to advocate for change; and finally, to seek and be permitted opportunities to access and engage with collaborative problem solving and expertise. Distributed expertise both external and, equally importantly, internal to the teaching profession needs to recognize and value the knowledge and input of teaching specialists, industry, allied health, families, student voice, and diverse cultural communities. There is clear and consistent evidence that inclusive educational settings, those that offer ongoing opportunities for the sharing of skills, knowledge and methods to facilitate learning, can confer substantial short- and long-term benefits for students with and without disabilities (Hehir et al., 2016; Kritikos & Bimaum, 2003).

To create change there needs to be engagement with expertise, interdisciplinary knowledge, and diverse paradigms to disrupt the dominant ways that learners are seen, assessed and their learning facilitated. Drawing on the same knowledge, interventions and pedagogical practices results in a remapping of the image of the student and of the teacher within a binary of success/fail. When we draw on diverse knowledge and experiences, we create what Dahlberg (2003) calls an ‘ethical encounter’. In these encounters, the taken for granted truths of how we see and assess the learner and pedagogy is ruptured and new possibilities come to light. To question and change thinking, knowing and doing that is embedded in the SoTL the existing silos of expertise and practice that exist in the teaching profession need to be broken down. Working as a collective community creates opportunities for radical transformational educational change.

5 Speculative Implications for the Future of Higher Education

In rethinking higher education, we cannot separate the experiences and realities of teachers in the workplace to our pedagogy approaches in the higher-education institution. Academics also need to demonstrate and model academic activism to allow the teachers that we are educating to take on these roles within their teaching contexts. Silos exist between governments, schools, and higher education institutions. There is a need to develop collaborative practices and infrastructure to support the addressing of big educational issues and to break down the silos that exist. To create real change requires collaboration across higher education and research, government, and schools so that the real-life emerging needs in practice in schools are addressed to inform change. Yong and Watterson (Global Distribution of Students in Higher Education) refer to this as rethinking the ecology of higher education.

Transformative change moves beyond the technical and instrumental. It requires a deep theoretical, historical, social, political, and cultural understanding of education. Transformative change requires a shift from neoliberal human capital discourses that focus on quality, high returns and consumer markets. Higher education needs to lead education as an emancipatory practice for students and teachers which requires collaboration, solidarity, collegiality, and agency (Moss, 2014). Moss argues that education and the teaching profession should value ‘interdependency, obligation, responsibility, and contest a self-interested autonomy’ (p. 109). Moreover, there is a need to disrupt understandings of students as a homogenized group. The implication of this discourse is that teachers need to not only reflect on their own practice but also identify structures that need to be challenged to enable all learners to achieve their potential. Teachers rather than governments need to drive curriculum. Few professions (e.g., medicine) allow government to drive curriculum and position themselves as experts of discipline knowledge and assessment. The teaching profession needs to take back control of curriculum content and pedagogy. Preservice training courses need more focused anti-bias content across subjects that enables teachers develop the skills to teach, reflect, and evaluate curriculum and the impact on diverse learners. Preservice training needs to provide teachers with the skills and confidence to advocate for change that will improve outcomes for all students. This requires a rethinking of the structure of university curriculums and the facilitation of connection between interdisciplinarity scholars both within faculties of education and across the university more broadly. In this way, Universities can develop a distributed expertise framework and assist to establish a culture of enquiry in future teachers through building their valuing of communities of practice, rather than siloed expertise. This positions expertise and teachers as valued whilst illuminating the insensibility of the teacher taking on the mantel of expert of all.

This returns us back to the idea of academic activism. If we are asking teachers to be critical pedagogues, then we require academics in preservice teacher training to engage with radical transformative curriculum. Academic activism requires universities and education faculties to speak back to government policies and teacher certification boards, using SoTL as the evidence base to inform change. We need to create sites for debate and dissensus to rethink education as a site for democratic freedom where participation, cultural knowledge exchange, and dialog are the norm and children, families, teachers, and diverse communities can speak and be listened to. Morin (1999, p.90, cited in Moss, 2014) wrote.

Democracy implies and enhances diversity among interests and social groups as well as diversity between ideas, which means it should not impose majority dictatorship but rather acknowledge the right to existence and expression of dissenting minorities and allow the expression of heretical and deviant ideas. (p.120)

What might democratic higher education curriculum look like? How could we imagine preservice training where students across programs come together? What are the possibilities for more group assessment that involved interdisciplinary and cross-sector inquiry? What would ‘training’ in networking and interdisciplinary partnerships require? How would relational pedagogies and partnerships disrupt assessment matrix?

Shifting pedagogical approaches is not enough. Creating change within higher education to support interdisciplinary and integrated collaboration within and across faculties/schools and universities will require a return of governments’ financial investment in higher education. Universities have become a knowledge-based industry that promotes competition rather than collaboration. Universities rely on full fee-paying students and industry and government tenders to fund academics. Job security and the casualization of employment have also perpetuated competition with every task or activity itemized and formulated within a workload model. The ‘ownership’ of subjects equals workload points which equals renewal of a contract. What are the risks when inviting others to teach within a subject? The risk is sharing hours and potentially a reduction in the time fraction you are employed. Equally what are the risks of working collaboratively across faculties or universities for teaching and research—the loss or sharing of income? Future sustainability of universities that promote academic activism and collegial collaboration across sites to challenge educational equity will require imagination, innovation and leadership (and funding). This work was required pre-pandemic and will not disappear with a vaccine or digital technology post pandemic.

How might higher education, locally, nationally, and internationally express dissensus and pose heretical and deviant ideas to create more inclusive education opportunities for all students and teachers? We suggest that part of the answer lies in also establishing a distributed expertise approach in collaboration with educational bodies, universities, and schools to break down the silos that exist and focus on challenging the status quo of educational curriculum and pedagogic practices. We cannot go back to what we have had before because that ship has sailed. Therefore, we need to use the spaces that the pandemic has afforded to foreground what the future should look like to improve outcomes for marginalized students, thereby improving outcomes for all students. Academic activism and drawing on distributed expertise are one way to address the fault lines that the pandemic has exposed, and reinvesting in higher education needs to occur alongside this. Higher education should lead the way in partnership with other educational sectors, resistance to neoliberal government education policies will require a collective endeavor.