Book excerpt: This book provides a comprehensive introduction to the core disciplines, and contemporary concerns, that inform the study of education in Aotearoa. As a collection, the work provides a critical account of education policy trajectories and speculates on their limits and possibilities in the changing social and political landscape of Aotearoa New Zealand in the first half of the 21st century. The work has two aims. First, to serve as an introductory text for students in initial teacher education and other education programmes. Secondly, to be a resource for practitioners, policy makers, administrators and other stakeholders seeking to update their knowledge of the disciplines that comprise education studies, and their application in the current environment. It builds on the premise detailed in the Introduction: that all educational theory--in Aotearoa and beyond--must be understood and applied with due regard to personal, historical, and global context.