We speak with Meira Levinson, Professor of Education at Harvard, about her website justiceinschools.org and books of “hard cases,” designed to help educators and youth workers think about the ethical implications of their decisions. Often, there are no perfect solutions, and  these decisions can have far-reaching consequences in children’s lives. A former teacher herself, Meira would like teachers to be able to consult with specially trained school ethicists.

We have a new video podcast series with Dr. Levinson where we explore timely discussions and ethical dilemmas in education! Click here to know more about it.

Overview

00:00-00:43 Intros

00:43-3:50 Justice in Schools (justiceinschools.org)—what it is and why Meira Levinson started it

03:50-08:49 Why cases in case studies must be hard

08:49-16:14 Scenarios

16:14-17:32 Writing and researching the cases

17:32-21:05 Variation in cases among regions and countries

21:05-22:44 Who and how people are using the cases

22:44-24:10 No cost to users except for multi-media version

24:10-28:52 Defining success

28:52-30:52 Out-of-school-time cases

30:52-38:43 Involvement of students and parents

38:43-39:15 Unknowns about outreach

39:15-41:00 Outro

Transcript

Click here to see the full transcription of this episode.

References

Click here to know more about our new video podcast series “What Would You Do?”. An initiative of EdEthics and Ethical Schools Podcast, each episode includes a dramatization of an ethical dilemma that could be faced by educators along with a discussion of the case facilitated by Harvard Graduate School of Education professor Meira Levinson.

Soundtrack by Poddington Bear