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This study explores the discourses used to frame and implement standards for teacher preparation in the United States as developed by the National Council of Teachers of English. Using Critical Discourse Analysis and theories from the New Literacy Studies as lenses, Dr. Burns explores and explains the policy processes used by professional educators to govern their work. He offers research-based critiques of the ways policy language used in teaching and teacher education empower and (more often) impede individuals´ ability to utilize their professional knowledge and exercise political power as experts and true authorities in their field. The study also examines how representations of literary studies and other major topics in literacy education intersect, overlap, and conflict in ways that pose important challenges that all curriculum designers and education reformers must confront in order to successfully engage national education reforms.

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Dr. Burns is an Associate Professor of Literacy at the University of Kentucky. He is a winner of the Fry Award, the Hopkins Award, and the Emig Award for his research on literacy and English language arts. He is also the chief author of the first nationally validated standard for social justice education in the history of the United States.

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