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This text investigates UK policy issues and strategies in an international context, highlighting the importance of educational exclusion and disaffection on the international agenda. The authors examine the problems and key areas of policy development for education.
This book argues that education policy is as often driven by political ideologies as by solid research evidence. It makes a plea for more discipline-based research on education, and reasserts the importance of the sociology of education as an essential resource for making sense of contemporary education policy
Since its introduction over 50 years ago, the A-level has been a constant subject of debate in schools, HE and government. Sometimes hailed as a 'gold standard', there is now intense speculation about the future of the A-level in particular, but also about post-14 qualifications in general. The furore about quality and standards which accompanies each year's A-level results has become an annual fixture in the UK press calendar. With the introduction of Curriculum 2000, and an increasing number of calls for Baccalaureate-style examinations, vocational qualifications and more, the need for serious debate - and change in this field is clear. Based on primary research by two of the leading commentators on the qualifications, this book is a wide-ranging and critical view of the fundamental approaches of the education system in Britain today. With government action on this subject looking inevitable, this will be a challenging and important book for anyone interested in this debate.
Participation - and particularly widening participation to students from less-privileged social groups and those who have traditionally not entered HE - has been a major issue since at least the early 1950s. Widening participation has been an active policy of almost all UK governments over the past 40 years, but the issue is now reaching a possible impasse, with numbers at best static and key groups still effectively excluded from higher education. This is a major political issue as well as one of the most significant issues facing educational establishments. With issues such as student fees and high drop-out rates still political hot-potatoes, this book is a timely and important survey of the real issues behind participation, and non-participation, and is sure to be as controversial as it is useful. Contents is structured in two parts, looking at first the changing context of HE and secondly at issues behind how to develop strategies for widening participation. Contributors come from across the HE spectrum, from Colleges of HE to traditional universities.
The story of the revolutionary transformation of the British educational system in the second half of the 20th century from a rigid hierarchy for a minority, to a fundamental right of all citizens, one of the most valued and enduring features of the welfare state - and the crisis of the meritocracy that this has entailed.
Exclusion and miseducation of black children is endemic in the US and UK. This book takes a long, hard look at the two countries and uncovers what they can learn from each other in their approaches to tackling this problem. The material in the book is the result of extensive work with educators, researchers and scholars working in the area of education and disaffection in the US and the UK. Richard Majors and his contributors are at the vanguard of research into this topic and this book is one of the most important titles published on the education of black children in recent times. Gathering together the issues and looking at real-world approaches, this book does not simply advance the debate: it tables some serious solutions to serious problems. This is a ground-breaking book based on cutting-edge research from writers and experts recognised the world over for their expertise. People will take note of what this book has to say.
For 50 years, educator and sociologist Geoff Whitty resolutely pursued social justice through education, first as a classroom teacher and ultimately as the Director of the Institute of Education in London. The essays in this volume - written by some of the most influential authors in the sociology of education and critical policy studies - take Whitty’s work as the starting point from which to examine key contemporary issues in education and the challenges to social justice that they present. Set within three themes of knowledge, policy and practice in education, the chapters tackle the issues of defining and accessing ‘legitimate’ knowledge, the changing nature of education policy und...
This book provides an account of the curricular consequences of the outcomes approach to education (NVQs GNVQs etc). It contains contributions from leading experts in the field and, as such, is likely to become the core text in this area. An initial discussion of the main themes leads the reader into a discussion of key ideas and the theory behind the Outcomes approach covering, in addition, issues concerning standards and quality. Areas of the curriculum covered include assessment, modularization, flexible learning and work-based learning, higher level competences and the autonomous learner. It should be of interest to all concerned with the development of the curriculum, ranging from school sixth forms through further and higher education to professional industrial trainers with an interest in the development of education and training in the UK.
This book explores the ways in which the contemporary university is talked about, and talks about itself. Focusing on English higher education, Jones documents how an under-confident sector internalised the language and logic of government policy, and individual institutions then set about normalising competition and gaming short-term advantage at the expense of collectively serving a common good. A flawed marketisation project was attended and sustained by hostile discourses, with purportedly woke universities becoming a soft target for right-leaning politicians and media commentators, and campuses reluctant battlefields for manufactured culture wars. Within this context, integrity deficits...