Associate Professor Kate le Roux
Associate Professor Kate le Roux’s research, teaching and leadership are located at the intersection of languages, literacies, mathematics, and disciplinary knowledge-making in science and engineering. She draws theoretically on critical thought in mathematics education within the socio-political and socio-ecological, languages and literacies, and a Southern knowledges approach to decoloniality. With a deep commitment to democratising knowledge production in mathematics education, Kate collaborates and thinks with scholars in diverse contexts, plays local and international editorial roles, and supports the use of multilingualism in academic spaces. A central thread in these collaborations and research leadership involves asking what is at stake when we place mathematics and mathematics education within, rather than external to, pressing and related social and ecological challenges. This includes innovating curriculum for students to learn and use mathematics practices seen as important in their futures as scientists, and exploring teacher professional learning towards this goal.
Kate has a PhD in Mathematics Education (University of the Witwatersrand, 2011). She is a former Mandela Mellon Fellow at the Hutchins Center for African & American Research at Harvard University. Kate is currently co-chairing the International Commission on Mathematical Instruction (ICMI) Study 27 “Mathematics Education and the Socio-Ecological”. She holds a University of Cape Town-University of Bristol Senior Fellowship (2024 to 2027)
Selected Publications
Le Roux, K., Ngoepe, M., Shaw, C. (2025, online). Languages and literacies in and for decoloniality in research and practice in undergraduate STEM education: Thinking from a university in the deep political South. Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education. https://doi/10.1080/09518398.2025.2601559
Makramalla, M., Coles, A., le Roux, K., & Wagner, D. (2025). Mathematics education for sustainable futures: A strengths-based survey of the field to invite further research action. Educational Studies in Mathematics, 119(3), 535-556. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10649-025-10389-x
Swanson, D. M., & le Roux, K. (2025). Sharing conceptual gifts by bringing into dialogue sociopolitical mathematics education, decolonial thought, and critical global citizenship education. In A. Chronaki & A Yolcu (Eds.), Troubling Notions of Global Citizenship and Diversity in Mathematics Education (pp. 89-106). Routledge.
Le Roux, K., & Motala, S. (2025). Cartographies for (re)storying scales of socio-ecological interactions in mathematics education. In K. le Roux, A. Coles, A. Solares-Rojas, A. Bose, C. Vistro-Yu et al. (Eds.), Proceedings of the 27th ICMI Study Conference (Mathematics Education and the Socio-Ecological) (pp. 220–227). MATHTED and ICMI.
Le Roux, K. (2024). (Im)mobile languages and literacies in mathematics education: Thinking about knowledge making from and for the relational, geopolitical South. Prometeica Revista de Filosofía y Ciencias, 31, 285-299. https://doi.org/10.34024/prometeica.2024.31.16375.
Le Roux, K., Murugan, J., Marquard, S., and Adams, P. (2023). Undergraduate mathematics students’ use of learning resources towards accessing mathematics. African Journal of Research in Mathematics Science and Technology. 27(1), 25-35. https://doi.org/10.1080/18117295.2023.2180189
Le Roux, K., Ngoepe, M., Shaw, C., & Collier-Reed, B. I. (2023). Language and disciplinary literacies for accessing, learning and communicating meaning: Students’ experiences of the transition from school to first-year undergraduate engineering. European Journal of Engineering Education, 47(6), 1144-1163. https://doi.org/10.1080/03043797.2022.2122406
De Freitas, E., Sinclair, N., le Roux, K., Solares, A., Coles, A., & Ng, O.-L. (2022). New spatial imaginaries for international curriculum projects: Creative diagrams, mapping experiments, and critical cartography. Special Issue of Qualitative Inquiry: Posthuman creativity, 28(5), 507–521. https://doi.org/10.1177/10778004211068201
Ngoepe, M., le Roux, K., Shaw, C., & Collier-Reed, B. (2022).
Conceptual tools to inform course design and teaching for ethical engineering engagement for diverse student populations. Science and Engineering Ethics. 28, #20, 23 pages. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11948-022-00367-4
More information about my research publications can be found at: http://www.ldg.uct.ac.za/node/1195951 ;
http://uct.academia.edu/KateLeRoux ;
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Kate_Le_Roux
Email: Kate.leroux@uct.ac.za