Search

How does exposure to authoritarian content in education affect support for autocratic leadership? While higher levels of education are linked to less support for autocratic leadership, states often leverage education to foster regime loyalty in their population. Due to the unavailability of comprehensive data, previous research has not adequately examined how state interference in education might condition the link between education and support for autocratic leadership. Using historical data on education systems from the 20th century provided by the EPSM dataset, alongside individual-level survey data from the ESS and the WVS, this paper tests the conditioning effect of ideology in education. We employ causal inference methods by exploiting compulsory schooling reforms in 15 European countries and account for both the content in the curriculum and the teachers' ideological convictions. The study highlights the role of regime-specific ideology and inter-personal socialization in shaping the strength of the 'education effect'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Global education agendas and scholarly literature are increasingly focused on systems change in education, in part stemming from a concern around student learning. But there is less attention in the literature about cultural change, meaning the everyday narratives, norms, values, and purposes that get enacted and reshaped within education systems. This paper examines everyday cultural practices in schools and in the social arena that contribute to and inhibit efforts toward education system change in Vietnam. It examines the contested narratives, including values and purposes of schooling and goals for learning, that circulate among policymakers, principals, and teachers. The authors draw on data from their long-term engagement with the education system in Vietnam, as well as a mixed methods study of the education system over six years. We show the shared narratives as well as the contestations around learning, pointing to changes that are occurring in the Vietnamese education system. However, a key component of cultural change—a deliberative dialogue that can shift norms and practices—is insufficiently attended to amidst other technical and policy efforts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

U.S. K–12 school districts that traditionally utilized ongoing "formative" assessments of student progress increasingly rely on additional "interim" assessments to predict student performance on standardized tests. Moreover, some districts are experimenting with merit-based teacher bonuses tied to standardized test scores. We examine the relationship between interim assessments and teacher bonuses using a two-period principal–agent model. The school district (principal), operating under a limited budget, decides whether to implement interim assessments and how much merit pay to offer, and teachers (agents) choose how much effort to exert in each period. We use two-state (proficient versus not proficient) Markovian dynamics to describe the evolution of student test readiness, in which the transition probability in a given period depends on both teachers' effort decisions and the starting state. Our results indicate that, despite the popularity of interim assessments, their usefulness is far from guaranteed. In particular, the accuracy promised by these assessments is a double-edged sword: positive midyear results can make it easier to incentivize second period teacher effort, but negative results can have a demotivating effect. Moreover, even when an interim assessment does result in a higher probability of the school ending the year in the proficient state, the resulting higher expected costs of merit-based bonuses for the district may exceed the available budget. Thus, even a free interim assessment might be too expensive for the school district. This paper was accepted by Charles Corbett, operations management. Funding: This research was supported by the Risk Management Center Russell Ackoff Doctoral Student Fellowship and the Fishman-Davidson Center for Service and Operations Management, both at The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Supplemental Material: The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2020.01547. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we summarise the existing literature and present new empirical evidence in order to address the questions of whether educational expansion is an effective tool for reducing inequality and whether some educational systems have better associations with lower inequality and others worse. We argue that – depending on the form the policies take, on the extent of intergenerational correlations in income and on the levers of educational access – policies that aim at increasing education are not necessarily beneficial in the sense of reducing inequality. Differential impacts of different systems by gender are particularly striking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines how the distinction between complicated and complex education systems contributes to our understanding of global governance and how "soft power" concerned with gender is used in international development organisations' responses to Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4, the global goal for education. Four global governance approaches which shape these organisations are distinguished: partnership building, gender mainstreaming, gender activism and contestation by global feminist movements. These strands of soft power have implications for how meanings of gender, education, power and accountability are interpreted. The work of three organisations – the Global Partnership for Education (GPE), the Gender at the Centre Initiative (GCI) and the Malala Fund – are reviewed to exemplify these global governance approaches. The analysis draws on a close reading of the organisations' published documents to build a history of how the gender concerns of SDG 4 came to be interpreted, negotiated, contested or ignored. The activities of the three organisations show considerable interplay between concepts of complicated and complex education systems. The discussion raises questions regarding what kind of work soft power in gender and education does in a context of huge and growing global inequalities and insecurities. In addition, the question is posed why there is still no institutional base to articulate a global feminist politics which confronts and seeks to dismantle unjust structures of power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Internationally, research comparing education systems across countries and jurisdictions is valuable and can elicit nuanced insights into how particular systems operate. This paper's interest lies in considering the scope and content of research comparing education systems across the four UK nations (England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales). This study sought to determine the coverage of UK cross-national comparative education research ('home international' research) between 2000 and 2022. We chose this time period as 1999 marks the devolution of education policy to each UK nation. We aimed to investigate what educational issues had been discussed in the literature and identify any gaps in the content covered by the research. An exploratory, high-level review of 'home international' education research was conducted, based on the review of abstracts. We searched several research databases using a variety of keyword combinations to identify relevant literature published since 2000. Our search identified 53 studies that met our selection criteria. Using a meta-synthesis approach, we coded the content of each abstract to build a picture of the range and thematic coverage of research involving comparisons between at least two of the four UK nations. The analysis of abstracts identified that, over the last two decades, UK 'home international' research has tended to include comparisons of all four nations, coverage of multiple educational phases and a focus on national education policy reviews. Furthermore, we pinpointed a number of gaps in coverage that might not have been anticipated (e.g. relatively little cross-national research focusing on assessment). This high-level review uncovers the landscape of recent 'home international' research, allowing us to view issues that are driving the cross-national research agenda in the UK and recognise implications relevant to education systems that may resonate with jurisdictions beyond these four UK nations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the effects of education system types and characteristics on changes in the distributions of literacy and numeracy skills during the upper secondary phase of education and training. Whereas there is a substantial literature on system effects on skills during the primary and lower secondary phases of education, much less has been written about these effects in relation to the upper secondary phase. This article reports on research using quasi-cohort data for 15-year-olds in PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment) and 18- to 20-year-olds in the Survey of Adult Skills to test the effects of a range of system indicators on changes in skills distributions during the upper secondary phase. Consistent with some dominant theories, our difference-in-difference analysis identifies a range of system characteristics associated with skills inequality reduction in upper secondary education and training, which relate to 'system standardisation' and 'parity of esteem', and which can explain why some 'system types' are more effective than others in reducing skills inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Historically, teachers had been delegated the primary responsibility for the organization and management of classroom instruction in US public schools. While this delegation afforded teachers professional autonomy in their work, it has also resulted in disparities in students' educational experiences and outcomes within and between classrooms, schools, and systems. In the effort to improve instruction and reduce disparities for students on a large scale, one reform effort in the US has focused on building instructionally focused education systems (IFESs) where central office and school leaders collaborate with teachers to organize and manage instruction. These efforts are playing out in a variety of contexts in the US, including in public school districts, non-profits, and other educational networks, and it is shifting how teachers carry out the day-to-day work of instruction. In this comparative case study, we investigate two IFESs in which efforts to improve instruction pushed against historic norms of teacher autonomy. We found that these new systems are not at odds with teacher autonomy, but rather these systems reflect a transition to more interdependent notions of teacher autonomy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Energy literacy is a developing field of research and practice that provides a comprehensive way of understanding how energy functions in the universe, on the earth, and in our social and personal lives. This literature review, building on an increasing momentum of research across various disciplines, outlines current energy literacy scholarship focused on a range of educational contexts (i.e., K-12, higher and post-secondary, teacher education and professional programs, and informal education). This review aims to show how energy literacy serves as a multifaceted way of developing knowledge and experiences about energy, which is an integral part of environmental and sustainability education, and that links to educational research and scholarship that supports energy transition in society more broadly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We study the effects of grade nondisclosure (GND) policies implemented within master of business administration (MBA) programs at highly ranked business schools. GND precludes students from disclosing their grades and grade point averages (GPAs) to employers. In the labor market, we find that GND weakens the positive relation between GPA and employer desirability. During the MBA program, we find that GND reduces students' academic effort for a given course by approximately 4.9% relative to comparable students not subject to the policy. Consistent with our model, in which abilities are potentially correlated and students can substitute effort toward other activities in order to signal GPA-focused abilities, students participate in more extracurricular activities and enroll in more difficult courses under GND. Finally, we show that students' tenure with their first employers after graduation decreases under GND. This paper was accepted by Suraj Srinivasan, accounting. Supplemental Material: The online appendix and data are available at https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2023.4816. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a conceptual model which explains the challenges of providing high quality sustainable, teacher professional development at scale. It provides a framework to support holistic thinking at a systemic level, applicable across different systems. It draws on sociocultural theories of learning and encourages the user to think about the knowledge and skills required by actors at different levels of the system and the structures required to support their learning. It brings together the needs of teachers, school leaders and Education Officers (at the County, District or Provincial level). The empirical evidence for this model comes from a seven-year programme of activity supporting school-based professional development in Zambia. Evaluation findings highlight the importance of the role of mid-level professionals (District and Provincial Officers) in ensuring the sustainability of gains made through development projects. This is important because the professional development needs of those supporting teachers are often neglected.

To what extent do features of education systems in the secondary school influence university graduates being overeducated? Previous research shows that the social origin and the field of study of university graduates are relevant predictors of overeducation. However, the strength of the influence of their social origin varies across fields of study. Having a privileged social origin prevents university graduates from being overeducated in fields of study that are not occupationally focused (e.g. humanities), while it is less relevant in other fields (e.g. engineering). The unevenly distributed effect of social origin in relation to the field of study may also vary across countries, depending on the influence of the secondary education system on social selection. Social origin may provide a filter earlier in vocationally oriented educational systems, whereas in comprehensive systems the social filter occurs at the graduate's entry into the labor market. This would make university graduates from nonoccupationally focused fields of study and with a disadvantaged social origin more vulnerable to being overeducated in countries with comprehensive secondary school systems, while in vocationally oriented systems social origin may be less influential at that later stage. Using Research into Employment and professional FLEXibility/Higher Education as a Generator of Strategic Competences (REFLEX/HEGESCO) data in combination with macro-level indicators, I assess how secondary education systems mediate the influence of social origin in terms of the university graduate's risk of overeducation by field of study. When using a subjective measure of overeducation results suggest that social origin is less important in predicting the overeducation of university graduates in countries with greater vocational orientation at the secondary level, while in comprehensive systems social origin regains its influence as a filter when graduates in nonoccupationally oriented fields join the labor market. Yet, results do not hold when using an objective measure of overeducation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Researchers have long theorized that characteristics of education systems impact both perceived and experienced corruption in public schools. However, due to insufficient cross-national survey data with measures on corruption in education and unassembled yet publicly available institutional data, there are few empirical tests of this theory. This article provides the rare direct test of the relationship between corruption in European public schools and three education system factors: government expenditure on education, education staff compensation, and teacher workload (pupil–teacher ratio). With a newly constructed harmonized data set for European countries, and controlling for national economic factors and individual characteristics, results of multilevel analyses suggest partial support for the theory that specific institutional characteristics of education systems impact public school corruption. The theorized institutional factors have different effects that depend on whether we examine bribe-giving experience or corruption perception. Results show that bribe-giving experience in public schools of Europe is weakly yet significantly related to education staff compensation. For corruption perception, low levels of government expenditure on education and a lopsided pupil–teacher ratio (too few teachers per student) increase the probability that people view corruption as prevalent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Less-educated workers have the lowest participation rates in job-related further training across the industrialized world, but the extent of their disadvantage varies. Using data on 28 high- and middle-income countries, we assess different explanations for less-educated workers' training disadvantage relative to intermediate-educated workers, with a focus on the role of labor market allocation (i.e. job tasks, other job features and firm characteristics). Shapley decompositions reveal a broadly similar pattern for all countries: differences in labor market allocation between less- and intermediate-educated workers are more important for explaining the training gap than differences in individual learning disposition (i.e. cognitive skills and motivation to learn). Our analysis further suggests that the training gap is related to educational and labor market institutions and that labor market allocation processes play a key role in mediating any institutional 'effects'. Strong conclusions regarding the role of institutions are hampered by the small country-level sample, however. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The need to constantly and consistently improve the quality and quantity of the educational system is essential. E-learning has emerged from the rapid cycle of change and the expansion of new technologies. Advances in information technology have increased network bandwidth, data access speed, and reduced data storage costs. In recent years, the implementation of cloud computing in educational settings has garnered the interest of major companies, leading to substantial investments in this area. Cloud computing improves engineering education by providing an environment that can be accessed from anywhere and allowing access to educational resources on demand. Cloud computing is a term used to describe the provision of hosting services on the Internet. It is predicted to be the next generation of information technology architecture and offers great potential to enhance productivity and reduce costs. Cloud service providers offer their processing and memory resources to users. By paying for the use of these resources, users can access them for their calculations and processing anytime and anywhere. Cloud computing provides the ability to increase productivity, save information technology resources, and enhance computing power, converting processing power into a tool with constant access capabilities. The use of cloud computing in a system that supports remote education has its own set of characteristics and requires a unique strategy. Students can access a wide variety of instructional engineering materials at any time and from any location, thanks to cloud computing. Additionally, they can share their materials with other community members. The use of cloud computing in e-learning offers several advantages, such as unlimited computing resources, high scalability, and reduced costs associated with e-learning. An improvement in the quality of teaching and learning is achieved through the use of flexible cloud computing, which offers a variety of resources for educators and students. In light of this, the current research presents cloud computing technology as a suitable and superior option for e-learning systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The emergence of the remarkable phenomenon of information and communication technology (ICT) in the last two decades of the twentieth century, and its integration into the formal education systems of leading countries, has expanded learning opportunities and facilitated easy access to educational resources. Due to the vast amount of information available, there is a growing emphasis on information management. This approach allows students to enhance their learning by utilizing various tools and visual aids. These tools help in teaching and training by engaging students' different senses, making learning more realistic, practical, and enjoyable. The quality of education and the effectiveness of educational systems are among the most important concerns for educational developers, and decision-makers in any country. The areas of education is one of the fields that has undergone fundamental changes with the emergence of information technology. Information technology has been recognized as an effective tool in the learning and teaching process. In this research, we will discuss the role of ICT and its impact on enhancing the quality of education systems. The results demonstrate that ICT plays an effective role in the design, planning, implementation, learning, educational evaluation, and structure of education. This includes aspects such as timing, suitability, accuracy, adequacy, realism, speed of transmission, learning accuracy cost reduction, and educational effectiveness. Based on the aforementioned points, educational institutions must offer a suitable framework for integrating ICT into education through thorough planning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Achieving Human Security For All (HS4A) is a process that depends on our ability to imagine a future state that is different to present conditions, under which HS4A remains elusive. Only a very few eminent thinkers have recognized, however, that imagination is its own unique and important noetic or cognitive function independent of rationality, giving us access to an ontological sphere that otherwise remains closed to us. Meanwhile, for rationalist science philosophy, which has dominated our education systems since the Enlightenment period, imagination has long been understood as nothing but a preoccupation with the unreal, the mythic, the marvelous, the fictive, and fanciful—entertaining perhaps, but of no serious consequence. In this paper, I argue that rationalist modernism, along with a mass education system designed in keeping with this modernist ‘spirit of the times’, has led to our collective imprisonment within the real, the concrete, and robbed us of the capacity to reflect and transform ourselves and our relationship to the world and each other. This state of affairs will ensure humanity’s rapid demise given the mounting security challenges we now face, that is, unless we can reinstate the faculty of imagination within scientific epistemology and in education, and thus escape our entrapment.

International students are an important global cohort of 'noncitizens' whose experiences are central concerns for urban sociologists and migration scholars. Drawing on survey fieldwork conducted among international students in the private rental sector in Sydney and Melbourne during 2019, this article provides new knowledge about the hardships experienced by international students who report financial stress. Using a modified scale developed by the Australian Bureau of Statistics, we highlight the accelerating role of high levels of financial stress in producing disruptive events such as housing evictions and fears of homelessness, as well as reliance on inadequate housing like 'hot-bedding'. Financial stress is significantly more likely for students from low-GNI (gross national income) countries and higher stress reduces wellbeing. Access to paid employment, however, does not 'protect' against higher financial stress. We conclude that higher education policymakers need tools and policies to prevent disruptive life events among international students related to financial stress, particularly those associated with housing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores a pathway from social origin at adolescence to numeracy acquisition in young adulthood. A variation associated with vocational track attendance and numeracy acquisition between two different traditions of education systems is identified; namely, between education systems of German (Austria and Germany) and English (UK and US) speaking countries. Key results demonstrate that tracking at the level of upper and post‐secondary schooling is closely related to skills gaps that affect labour market outcomes. This implies that vocational programme graduates achieve comparatively weaker in numeracy tests in German‐speaking countries. In contrast, this effect of disadvantage in numeracy skills is not observed among young adults attending vocational tracks in English speaking countries. Also, the results suggest that a more stratified system might reinforce social inequality by increasing a skill gap in the use of numeracy in daily life. Drawing on empirical findings, the discussion underscores that policy interventions are necessary for mitigating the reproduction of skills inequality among young adults. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wellbeing has recently been given a more prominent place in education policy and discourse, with critics arguing that an overemphasis on achievement comes at the cost of well-being. This raises questions concerning possible trade-offs between the traditionally dominant focus on learning and achievement in education and the growing emphasis on well-being. Can education systems promote high achievements and wellbeing simultaneously, or is reduced wellbeing an inevitable price to pay for high academic achievements? In this study, I investigate possible trade-offs between country-level achievement and individual wellbeing using five waves of the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) and the Health Behaviour in School-aged Children (HBSC) data, spanning over 18 years and including more than one million pupils in 45 countries. I find weak and inconsistent empirical support for a trade-off. While there is a modest negative relationship between country-level achievement and some indicators of well-being, this does not hold when adjusting for possible confounders or country-fixed effects. I also find no or weak evidence for heterogeneous effects depending on individual achievement. I conclude that concerns regarding possible trade-offs between achievement and wellbeing are not supported by cross-country comparative data. However, the predominantly null findings also imply that policymakers should not expect miracles in terms of wellbeing from high-achieving education systems. High achievements may be good from an academic perspective, but do not seem to make much of a difference from the perspective of wellbeing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The education systems of the four UK nations are diverging, and the education system in Wales is undergoing major reform with substantially increased emphasis on health and wellbeing. Understanding the implementation of major policy and system reforms requires an understanding of system histories and starting points. This study aimed to explore the perceived roles of schools in contemporary society, and how this role has evolved over time; the aims of the reforms, with a particular focus on health and wellbeing; and perceived barriers and facilitators for implementation. Interviews were held with senior stakeholders in the Welsh education system who held a strategic role in shaping the reforms. These included senior members of government and schools with a remit in either design of the curriculum or educationalists' professional learning, Wales's school regulatory body, and those with a multidisciplinary remit in health and education. Interviews were subjected to thematic analysis, which produced a number of themes related to each objective, including 'a changing society and increasing expectations on schools', 'the perceived role of schools in supporting health and wellbeing', 'the aims of the reform', 'what will success look like?', 'national level barriers and facilitators' and 'community and school level barriers and facilitators'. Findings suggest that education system reform requires change at multiple levels of the education system. Consideration of each level, and the interactions between them, is necessary for achieving change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author critically analyses the persistence in comparative pedagogy of such approach to conducting interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research, inadequate to the state of integration of the sciences worldwide, and perpetuating the atomisation of the humanities and social sciences characteristic of the 20th century. As such, the author explains the reasons for comparative education to become more open in exploring education in its broader political, cultural, religious, legal and economic context. The discipline necessarily needs to consider the comparative nature of ideas, paradigms, theories, concepts or philosophies of education, to refine its diagnostic tools with respect to differences in the aforementioned contexts, and to refine theory maps and methods of comparative research thus minimising errors in comparison of what is, nonetheless, incomparable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many authors argue that autonomy is nonexistent in a centralized education system, given that it is a characteristic of decentralization, whereas schools in a decentralized education system have more autonomy. The researchers compare the level of curriculum autonomy granted to schools in a centralized system (Portugal) and to those in a decentralized system (Canada), based on interviews and content analysis of those responsible for the administration and organization of schools. It appears that, in the Portuguese case, there is some school autonomy, essentially centered on the collective, although teachers do not recognize or take ownership thereof. In the Canadian case, autonomy is granted on an individual basis to each teacher. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Educational mobility is assessed using many social background factors. • Level of inequality: circumstances explain 21% of achievement variation in Switzerland. • Canton-level inequality ranges from 14% to 30%, higher in German-speaking regions. • Stratification in secondary school increases inequality without raising student achievement. • More instructional time in primary school improves performance and reduces inequality. • Spending on compulsory education is linked to lower educational inequality. This study uses a comprehensive approach to assess educational mobility by considering multiple social background factors. The inequality of educational opportunity (IEOp) framework estimates the share of inequality in educational performance attributable to circumstances beyond students' control, reflecting the social justice principle that inequalities not based on individual choices are unfair. This analysis uses representative data from Switzerland's end-of-compulsory school exam to examine how social and family background characteristics contribute to variability in student performance, resulting in an inequality of educational opportunity index. The results show that circumstances beyond students' control account for 21% of the variation in achievement at the national level. Canton-level analysis reveals variations from 14% to 30%, with higher educational inequality in the German-speaking regions. Decomposing the IEOp estimates highlights key factors such as the number of books at home, parental education, and occupation. The level of inequality correlates with institutional features such as secondary school stratification, primary school inputs, and spending on compulsory education. Higher stratification is associated with greater inequality of opportunity without improving overall student achievement. Conversely, more instructional time in primary school enhances student performance, particularly for those from lower socioeconomic backgrounds, reducing inequality. Increased spending on compulsory education is also linked to reduced IEOp. The findings support the theory that early-age schooling can reduce inequalities and improve achievement while challenging the notion that stratification in secondary schools is necessary to enhance student performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many Chinese students dislike hyper-competitive public school exams but find competing in e-sports games enjoyable. Some students are perceived to game 'too much' by their parents, who, anxious about gaming's impact on their grades, send their children to treatment camps for 'Internet addiction'. This article documents parents' and student-gamers' experiences of competition in China's formal education system, online gaming, and professional e-sports. As student-gamers move between these competitive arenas, they develop counter-hegemonic understandings of what competition does and reconfigure their sense of self. Their movements reveal that, far from a symptom of neoliberal ideology, the prevalence of competition in China marks dialectical interactions between various ideologies and the lived experience of competitive practices. This finding contradicts simplistic conflations of competition and neoliberal economic models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Target 4.6 calls for all youth and a substantial proportion of adults to be able to read. Progress toward achieving this goal began after the World Conference on Education for All in 1990. Two decades after the conference, national governments, international donor agencies, and local and international nongovernmental organizations had built schools, trained teachers, and distributed textbooks. Though that work continues, the focus has turned to ensuring that all children learn to read. Achieving Target 4.6 requires reform of national education systems built up over the last three decades. This article reviews the literature that informs efforts to change education systems in ways that support early-grade reading. Now is the time to focus on reforming and strengthening the education systems that will achieve Target 4.6. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The United States Agency for International Development, World Vision, and the Australian government established All Children Reading: A Grand Challenge for Development (ACR GCD) to address problems that prevent children from gaining foundational reading skills. ACR GCD mobilizes the private sector, academia, and nongovernmental organizations in problem-solving dialogues that support the development, testing, and promotion of new solutions to these problems. It also advances EdTech innovation and research to improve reading outcomes for marginalized children in low-resource contexts to effectively build bridges over system constraints in ways that lower the risk of pilot-testing and eventual large-scale replication. This case study describes some of ACR GCD's funded innovations and its nontraditional approach to employing grant competitions (in which innovators propose solutions to broadly described problems) and prizes (in which innovators develop solutions to specifically identified problems). For innovations that have been evaluated, this article summarizes the findings on their impact on learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The South African education system is increasingly unable to meet the growing needs of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Recent studies in the Western Cape, one of the better resourced provinces in South Africa, showed that the pathway to care for children with ASD was an inconsistent and lengthy process, and that many children with ASD waited for extended periods to get access to an appropriate school placement. It is therefore clear that scalable and sustainable solutions are required to improve access to appropriate education for children with ASD. Methods: Here we performed a qualitative study using thematic analysis of ten multi-sectorial ASD service provider interviews in theWesternCape Province to examine provider perspectives and proposed solutions tomeet the educational needs of children with ASD. Results: Provider perspectives were grouped in three categories: "bridging the gap across the spectrum and lifespan", "gaps to bridge", and "building bridges". The first category captured provider perspectives of the service-related needs inherent to a diagnosis of ASD. The second category summarized service provider views of the challenges associated with providing services to children with ASD and the third category captured provider perspectives on potential actions to improve ASD education services delivery in the province. The overarching theme that emerged was "We're doing the best we can to bridge the gap". Conclusion: Participants provided ten key recommendations for service strengthening that may lead to contextually relevant innovations to meet the educational needs of children with ASD in the province. Findings from this study has direct relevance to other South African provinces and may have relevance to improve pathways and reduce service delivery gaps also in other low-and-middle-income countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

BackgroundThe South African education system is increasingly unable to meet the growing needs of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Recent studies in the Western Cape, one of the better resourced provinces in South Africa, showed that the pathway to care for children with ASD was an inconsistent and lengthy process, and that many children with ASD waited for extended periods to get access to an appropriate school placement. It is therefore clear that scalable and sustainable solutions are required to improve access to appropriate education for children with ASD.MethodsHere we performed a qualitative study using thematic analysis of ten multi-sectorial ASD service provider interviews in the Western Cape Province to examine provider perspectives and proposed solutions to meet the educational needs of children with ASD.ResultsProvider perspectives were grouped in three categories: “bridging the gap across the spectrum and lifespan”, “gaps to bridge”, and “building bridges”. The first category captured provider perspectives of the service-related needs inherent to a diagnosis of ASD. The second category summarized service provider views of the challenges associated with providing services to children with ASD and the third category captured provider perspectives on potential actions to improve ASD education services delivery in the province. The overarching theme that emerged was “We're doing the best we can to bridge the gap”.ConclusionParticipants provided ten key recommendations for service strengthening that may lead to contextually relevant innovations to meet the educational needs of children with ASD in the province. Findings from this study has direct relevance to other South African provinces and may have relevance to improve pathways and reduce service delivery gaps also in other low-and-middle-income countries.

Objective: The largest pandemic in history, the COVID-19 pandemic, has been declared a doomsday globally. The second wave spreading worldwide has devastating consequences in every sector of life. Several measures to contain and curb its infection have forged significant challenges for the education community. With an estimated 1.6 billion learners, the closure of schools and other educational institutions has impacted more than 90% of students worldwide from the elementary to tertiary level. Methods: In a view to studying impacts on student’s fraternity, this article aims at addressing alternative ways of educating—more specifically, online education—through the analysis of Google trends for the past year. The study analyzed the platforms of online teaching and learning systems that have been enabling remote learning, thereby limiting the impact on the education system. Thorough text analysis is performed on an existing dataset from Kaggle to retrieve insight on the clustering of words that are more often looked at during this pandemic to find the general patterns of their occurrence. Findings: The results show that the coronavirus patients are the most trending patterns in word search clustering, with the education system being at the control and preventive measures to bring equilibrium in the system of education. There has been significant growth in online platforms in the last year. Existing assets of educational establishments have effectively converted conventional education into new-age online education with the help of virtual classes and other key online tools in this continually fluctuating scholastic setting. The effective usage of teaching tools such as Microsoft Teams, Zoom, Google Meet, and WebEx are the most used online platforms for the conduction of classes, and whiteboard software tools and learning apps such as Vedantu, Udemy, Byju’s, and Whitehat Junior have been big market players in the education system over the pandemic year, especially in India. Conclusions: The article helps to draw a holistic approach of ongoing online teaching-learning methods during the lockdown and also highlights changes that took place in the conventional education system amid the COVID pandemic to overcome the persisting disruption in academic activities and to ensure correct perception towards the online procedure as a normal course of action in the new educational system. To fill in the void of classroom learning and to minimize the virus spread over the last year, digital learning in various schools and colleges has been emphasized, leading to a significant increase in the usage of whiteboard software platforms.

The world of education continues to be presented by national education systems that are more or less integrated into international programs and initiatives. Students in modern conditions of digitalization, internationalization and mobility receive education from different sources and contexts. All of them reflect the values, attitudes and worldview of their carriers. In such a situation, the national-cultural and global-cultural self-determination of students develops. The fact that it is possible to form multidirectional identities is a challenge to education. The purpose of the article was to identify the sources and contexts of the formation of different identities. The article is theoretical in nature. Analysis, communication and interpretation are methods which were used. The methodological approach of A. Straus was used as a methodological base. As a result of the study, it was revealed that the main sources and contexts of the formation of the national and cultural identity of students in most countries are national education systems. The main sources and contexts for the formation of the global identity of students included global education, international organizations and the Internet. The article shows how ambiguously different countries assess the value of the identity, which of the countries are ready to sacrifice national self-determination, and which are not. The issues of national-cultural and global-cultural self-determination of students can hardly be considered.

Across many low- and lower middle-income countries, aid donors are promoting results-based financing approaches as a means to link their funding directly with development outcomes. In this paper, we explore one such approach, the Programme for Results (PforR) financing approach in support of Ethiopia's large-scale education quality reform. We assess whether the PforR approach is fit for purpose, drawing on interviews with 72 key donor and government stakeholders. Our findings suggest that the ability of the approach to achieve its stated goals of building capacity and strengthening the system for equitable learning is limited in this context. While the approach is helping to reorient attention from inputs to results, questions remain as to whether the focus is on the right results. Our findings highlight the need for the careful design of such approaches that take account of the context including with respect to ensuring that necessary preconditions are in place prior to implementation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article aims to identify the moderating effect of two dimensions of the stratification of education systems (the extent to which the first selection is based on students' ability and the age of first selection) on social background gradient in educational attainment. Individual-level data of the European Social Survey (round 1 to 9) is complemented with new contextual indicators measuring various education systems' characteristics. This article's contribution to the debate is twofold. First, it simultaneously investigates two dimensions of the stratification of education systems that have never been analyzed in cross-country studies investigating long-term educational outcomes. Second, it provides a series of indicators of education systems' characteristics collected by means of an online expert survey whose validity and reliability is also tested. Findings show that the two dimensions of the stratification of education systems have opposite effects. As the first selection is increasingly based on students' ability, social background gradient in educational attainment increases. In contrast, postponing the age of first selection decreases social inequality in educational opportunity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The National Guidelines for Trauma-Aware Education in Australia were developed in response to a rapidly growing interest in trauma-aware education across the country and to address the lack of site- and system-level guidance for application of trauma-aware practices in schools and early childhood services. Although research into trauma-aware education was increasing and resources and training and support programs were being developed across Australia, there were no nationally agreed upon guidelines providing consistency to thinking, policy, and practice. Drawing from public health and health promotion models for establishing guidelines for trauma-aware policy and practice, the Guidelines were developed through a thorough process of incorporating research evidence and expert and end-user input. The Guidelines were developed across 2017–2019 and were finalized in 2021 and provide an important first step in a national response to trauma-aware education in Australia. This article will describe the “story” behind the development of the Guidelines. It is hoped that this “story” will help others considering development of systemic resources to inform the establishment and enhancement of trauma-aware policy and practice in schools and early childhood education services.

In this article we explore Australian policymaker perspectives on the quality assurance of career development (CD) programmes in schools. We found that Australian policymakers are concerned about the quality of CD provision in schools and have a wide range of approaches that they deploy to ensure and assure quality at the school level. Quality assurance within the country is focused on the qualifications and professionalism of the people delivering career development programmes rather than on systemic or organisational quality. We also found that the range of quality assurance tools that are deployed by such policymakers varies across the different Australian jurisdictions and is influenced by geography, the size of the jurisdiction and the level of priority given to career guidance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper "Rethinking education in the digital age" highlights the changes that took place in the education systems in Europe during the Covid-19 pandemic. The digital transformation has changed society and the economy, with an increasing impact on everyday life. However, before the COVID-19 pandemic, its impact on education and training was much more limited. The pandemic has shown that it is essential to have an education and training system ready for the digital age. It also demonstrated the need for more developed digital capabilities in the field of education and training. Moreover, it has exacerbated challenges and inequalities between those with access to digital technologies and those without access, including those from disadvantaged backgrounds. In the face of accelerated digital change, it is essential that education and training systems are properly adapted. While responsibility for the content of education and the organization of education systems lies primarily with the EU Member States, in recent years we have seen an increase in the willingness to distribute and exchange best practices on digital education, as well as to develop tools and common frameworks at EU level. The EU can play a more active role in identifying, distributing and scaling up good practice and supporting member states and the education and training communities as a whole with tools, frameworks, guidance, technical qualification and research. The crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic has led to a growing awareness of the need to improve the use of technology in education and training, to adapt pedagogies and to develop digital skills. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article aims to analyze democratic management as a principle of the right to education in the State of Tocantins, in times of Pandemic Covid-19. The discussion aims to elucidate public policies aimed at quality educational services in the public network – covering urban and rural education – and the state system's actions to guarantee the right to education in the exercise of democracy. The research is based on dialectical historical materialism, having as reference the bibliographic and documental research and normative collection issued, mainly, by the Ministry of Education, National Council of Education, Tocantins State Government and State Council of Education and data from CONVIVA. With critical attention, it points out the non-existence of educational policies and the State Education System's commitment to the situation of educational crisis and especially to the right to education in terms of democratic management.

Research interest in the comparison of education systems emerged parallel with the study of social development and the general globalization of social resources. The contemporary context of research discourse puts researchers in a position of necessary collaboration and partnership, with a special emphasis on the comparative analysis of educational phenomena. The aim of this study is the analysis of the theoretical understandings of the role of comparative research in the cognition of pedagogical phenomena as well as the transformation of the comparative methodological apparatus in the contemporary context. The research tasks are aimed at analyzing the historical development of comparative research, epistemology, the function of comparative research in pedagogy, as well as its importance in pedagogy. The importance of developing pluralism in the methodological approach of comparative research is emphasized in order to strengthen research capacities for its future development in pedagogical sciences. The study relies on the historical method and the method of source content analysis.

Cloud computing is considering as a popular computing model in the Western World. It is still not well understood by much higher education (HE) institutions in the developing world. CC will have a huge effect on the academic and learning environment which will enable their users (i.e., students, educators, and heads) to play out their undertakings adequately with less expense by using the accessible applications based on the clouding offered by the cloud specialist organizations. This study aims to evaluate the factors that influence the adoption of CC for Higher Education within the Kurdistan Region in Iraq. The study was performed utilizing a non-experimental study exploratory research design. This exploratory study included an essential investigation into secondary data. The study development and modeling of secondary data to highlight the final results of the research. Through reviewing the literature of the existing frameworks in CC adoption, it is showed that there are limited institutions developed over the latest years. Moreover, HE in Kurdistan Region needs continued attention to get government support and redesign the educational system to cover all the core aspects in a better way. Here, at any time there is a need to access the applications, software and hardware, platform, and infrastructure; the most required is to have the internet service.

The aim of this study was to identify the influence of technology on the education systems of South Africa and Russia. The study has brought to light the importance of technology, and that it contributes to the increase of quality of education. The correct application of relevant technology in education can be used as valuable support to education delivery, it can stimulate creativity, contribute to the development of higher-order cognitive thinking skills, assist learners to develop technological skills and finally it can help economic growth in the country. Moreover, the study created an opportunity to highlight differences and similarities in the purpose of technology, the access to and distribution thereof, the implementation thereof in classrooms and the challenges in terms of implementing them successfully. By using a comparative method, the researchers had the opportunity to identify gaps in the research for future studies, methods for the implementation of technology and universal challenges, such as the digital divide. This study has provided ample evidence of the value that technology adds if successfully implemented and how much value it can bring towards an education system. This is also the reason why an education system of any country should ensure the sustainability of the implementation of technology in the system. It is important that the education systems of both South Africa and Russia proceed to directly identify and address gaps in their approaches to implementing technology. It is also important for these countries to release more relevant data and policies regarding this topic, specifically in education. Although the role of the BRICS organisation is identified as the science and technology innovation (STI) initiative, there are no clear indicators in policy documents or references to technology in education. Moreover, looking specifically at the BRICS countries, it is clear that they have made strides in addressing such challenges as stipulated in the literature. To conclude, this research can be used to further address the challenges and limitations that were identified in the study in order to assess the future impact of technology on an education system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Covid-19, the most severe global pandemic since the Spanish flu that followed World War I, threatens nearly every country, from global powers to developing nations. This threat presents a concurrent challenge for educational systems. With schools closed during the pandemic, students and teachers have had to stay at home worldwide. This shift has required us to move beyond conventional ideas regarding education. From kindergarten to higher education, schools offered web-based and online classes, both synchronous and asynchronous. However, while technology emerged as a savior, it is not possible to achieve thorough learning only by listening or watching content. Instead of championing technologies in which pedagogy is irrelevant, schools must invest in helping students become lifelong learners, enrich their learning processes, and focus on critical self-reflection, problem-solving skills, imagination, ideas, and projects involving social problems. A significant attempt to redefine the concepts that we have traditionally used must be made. The aim of this article is to develop new suggestions on how curriculum as the essence and core of all educational systems can be reconceptualized for the post-Covid-19 era. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]