Professor Heather Smith

I am a passionate advocate of the transformative role of education for social justice. My teaching and research focus on developing greater understandings about and action for race and language equality. Specifically, I draw on critical race theory (CRT) and critical understandings of whiteness. In working against discrimination of minoritized languages towards a just pedagogical approach, I draw on the theory/pedagogy of translanguaging (where all languages of a pupil are valorised and pupils are enabled to draw on all of their languaging practices in the pursuit of learning).  

My recent research as PI (working alongside Professor Vini Lander, Leeds Beckett University) was a project to develop an anti-racism framework for Initial Teacher Education to support the racial literacy of teacher educators for their work with student teachers, in order tomitigate racial inequities in education. This led to the writing of an anti-racism framework for initial teacher education/training.

I was PI for an Erasmus funded European Project, entitled: ROMtels (Roma translanguaging enquiry learning space), which improved education for Roma pupils across Europe by enabling a translanguaging pedagogy (€261,317). ROMtelswas shortlisted for the Times Higher Education Awards 2020 Research Project of the Year (Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences). 

I am Docent Chair of Multicultural Teacher Education at Helsinki University, Finland. 

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Recent keynotes

British Educational Research Association Presidential Seminar Series on Anti-Racism in Education, Edinburgh, 1st November 2024.