Expanding spaces for transformation: Supporting social justice in a distributed learning environment

This research explores the intersection of blended learning and social justice education with the intention of supporting transformative learning. The blended learning model employs the advancements in technology that allow for an environment that fosters trust, deep reflection, personal connections between students, and course content and continuous dialogue that bolsters the probability of student transformation. This qualitative study analyzed stories of 12 adult students of a blended, social justice course and discovered several common factors that together created deep personal transformation of ideology on social justice issues. The conditions and components that supported student transformation of adult students in a blended learning course were content matters, authentic interactions, faces and spaces, and confronting self.