Third in the series Sociocultural Studies of Educational Policy Formation and Appropriation, this volume brings together scholars from North America, South America, and Europe to examine the relationship between ethnographic research and educational policy. The product of papers and discussions originally taking place at the Interamerican Symposium on Ethnographic Educational Research, the book presents both original empirical research reports and theoretical-methodological proposals for using ethnography to study and influence educational policy. After an introduction and opening chapter that highlight the different ways of conceptualizing education, education policy, and diversity across American borders, five full chapters address the relationship between ethnography and educational policy through sustained empirical attention to specific research sites and projects.

The next section of the book presents shorter position statements that relate specific research or policymaking experiences and reflect on the ways that ethnography can be involved in a project of formulating or revising policy. In this section, edited transcriptions of workshop discussions give the reader a vibrant sense of the challenging issues facing educational ethnographers attempting to address policy. The book closes with a commentary by a veteran educational ethnographer. Of interest to educators, researchers, and policymakers across the Americas, this volume contributes to an ongoing dialogue about how ethnographic research can intersect advantageously with the policymaking enterprise.

En este libro se presenta un estudio etnografico acerca de una iniciativa docente que discute la organizacion por grados en la escuela primaria. Si bien esta propuesta parece referir a cuestiones tecnicas, puede ser considerada como la expresion contemporanea de un debate historico sobre los principios politicos que estructuran el sistema de instruccion moderno en relacion con la desigualdad social. Por ello este trabajo considera los origenes de la escuela en relacion al dispositivo de la graduacion y las experiencias reconocidas como antecedente por parte de los protagonistas, para luego analizar dos experiencias contemporaneas considerando las teorias sociales en uso y las particularidades del ejercicio de las practicas docentes en las aulas.