Research Areas

Ideology, Race, Learning, Teaching, Technology

Thomas M. Philip’s research focuses on how teachers make sense of power and hierarchy in classrooms, schools, and society. He is interested in how teachers act on their sense of agency as they navigate and ultimately transform classrooms and institutions toward more equitable, just, and democratic practices and outcomes. His recent scholarship explores the possibilities and tensions that emerge with the use of artificial intelligence, data analytics, and digital learning technologies in the classroom, particularly discourses about the promises of these tools with respect to the significance or dispensability of teacher pedagogy.

Representative publications include:

Philip, T.M. & Sengupta, P. (2020). Theories of learning as theories of society. A contrapuntal approach to expanding disciplinary authenticity in computing. Journal of the Learning Sciences. 

Philip, T.M. & Gupta, A. (2020).  Emerging perspectives on the co-construction of power and learning in the Learning Sciences, mathematics education, and science education. Review of Research in Education, 44, 195-217. 

Philip, T.M., Gupta, A., Elby, A., & Turpen, C. (2018). Why ideology matters for learning: A case of ideological convergence in an engineering ethics classroom discussion on drone warfare. Journal of the Learning Sciences, 27(2), 183-223. 

Philip, T.M., Olivares-Pasillas, M. C., & Rocha, J. (2016). Becoming racially literate about data and data literate about race: A case of data visualizations in the classroom as a site of racial-ideological micro-contestations. Cognition and Instruction, 34(4), 361-388.

Philip, T.M. & Garcia, A. D. (2015). Schooling mobile phones: Assumptions about proximal benefits, the challenges of shifting meanings, and the politics of teaching. Educational Policy, 29(4), 676-707. 

Philip, T.M., Schuler-Brown, S., & Way, W. (2013). A framework for learning about Big Data with mobile technologies for democratic participation: Possibilities, limitations, and unanticipated obstacles. Technology, Knowledge and Learning, 18(3), 103-120.

Philip, T.M. & Garcia, A. (2013). The importance of still teaching the iGeneration: New technologies and the centrality of pedagogy. Harvard Educational Review, 83(2), 300-319.