Forward to special issue: Teacher education for high poverty schools

The six papers in this special issue are all related, in one way or another, to the National Exceptional Teaching for Disadvantaged Schools program (NETDS). NETDS began in 2009 at Queensland University of Technology (QUT) in Brisbane, Australia, and with the support of philanthropy expanded to another six universities nationally. Although the papers in this issue are all related to NETDS, they are not necessarily about NETDS; rather, they reflect the range of scholarship taking place within this emerging network and provide a window on how teacher education for high poverty schools within mainstream Initial Teacher Education (ITE) programs can be done differently. Together, the papers draw on the scholarship of researchers who were already respected experts in the field of teacher education and high poverty schools prior to involving themselves in the program. The first five papers are written by scholars from the seven Australian universities who now deliver NETDS programs. The remaining paper is by researchers who are part of the extended international NETDS network, in this case, from Spain. Collectively, these papers represent a broad coalition of scholars with whom we collaborate and who are engaged with the NETDS program at both theoretical and practical levels. Importantly, all contributing authors share the common goal of shifting how teachers work with students who have been historically marginalised and disadvantaged.