ABSTRACT
This chapter will examine how teachers at Milltown High interpreted and responded to school and LEA policies on multicultural and antiracist education. In researching this question I took the view that any study of educational innovation must centre on the perceptions of practitioners at the chalk face, as clearly they determine the reality of that innovation. I was interested in how individual teachers and groups (e.g. subject departments) responded to the basic idea of LEA and school policy, how they interpreted the content of such policies, and how their views and interpretations influenced their practice and their departmental and pastoral arrangements. I conducted semi-structured interviews with thirty-two of the teachers to explore these questions. Most of the interviews were tape-recorded and lasted between half an hour and one hour.
