美国西部州长大学的管理模式及启示

美国西部州长大学是美国远程教育领域具有特色的非盈利性虚拟大学,自创办以来为美国高等教育领域的发展提供了新的模式和动力,促进了美国高等远程教育领域的改革和发展.它的管理模式独具特色,在行政管理、教师管理、教学管理以及质量管理等方面的成功经验值得我们借鉴.     

Reluctant partners in modernization: The National Autonomous University of Mexico and its links with industry

We identify the discourse which underlies a series of interviews with opinion leaders who represent academia, industry, and government in Mexico. All three sectors identify with modernization and claim that higher education should play a more active role in transferring modern technology to Mexican industry. Privately, however, all informants appear to oppose such a technology transfer for various reasons. The contrast between public and private positions suggests an eroding confidence in the role of higher education as a factor of modernization. Political power in Mexico once derived its legitimacy from social and economic stability, not from science and technology. Lately stability is increasingly being questioned, while conservative institutions of higher education such as UNAM are caught in the crossfire. Our research suggests a persistence of pre-industrial stereotypes derived from an obsolete Colonial ideology which has outworn its usefulness. These results demand a re-interpretation of the crisis in our higher education system. While the National University has consistently satisfied the demand for graduates in the country (Lorey 1993), in 1995 more than 120,000 applications for freshman registration were rejected. Graduates from public universities are being displaced from political decision-making. The question of reform of higher education in Mexico has serious implications for the future of the nation.     

略论清代清水江流域的义学教育

清代清水江流域的义学教育是贵州少数民族教育的重要组成部分,它在当时特定的历史背景下得到逐步发展,并且呈现出以官办为主、空间分布广泛、多分布在少数民族地区、发展存在阶段性波折、在特定的教育目的下有着特定的教学内容等特征。清代清水江流域义学教育的发展对清水江流域的社会文化发展产生了影响深远。     

Competencies in Higher Education: A Critical Analysis from the Capabilities Approach

With the creation of the European Higher Education Area, universities are undergoing a significant transformation that is leading towards a new teaching and learning paradigm. The competencies approach has a key role in this process. But we believe that the competence approach has a number of limitations and weaknesses that can be overcome and supplanted by the capabilities approach. In this article our objective is twofold: first, make a critical analysis of the concept of competence as it is being used in higher education, identifying its limitations and weaknesses; and second, present the potential of the capabilities approach for higher education and review its complementarity to the competence approach. We begin with a brief characterisation of the capabilities approach and its implications for education. Then we examine some implications of the competencies approach in higher education and the reasons that led us to choose the DeSeCo proposal for comparison with the capability approach. We then go on to compare the two approaches, addressing 1) the aims of education and 2) the concept of competence and capability. Finally, we address the implications of incorporating the capabilities approach in learning and teaching in higher education.     

Further Education: Starting Afresh

While attention is currently focused on new legislation to do with children of school age, a new act on further and higher education has recently come into operation. Deborah Cooper, director of Skill: National Bureau for Students with Disabilities, discusses its implications for students with disabilities and learning difficulties.     

Public higher education in the Philippines

Summary Clearly, the national government of the Philippines has decided to increase the number and comprehensiveness of its public colleges and universities. While private colleges and universities are likely to dominate higher education in the Philippines for the remainer of this century, it appears that public, tax-supported higher education will become increasingly available there. The Philippines is not a wealthy country but it is devoting a substantial portion of its national resources to public higher education. In 1983, higher education received 2.85 percent of the national budget, a figure that has been rising for years. Compared with some highly developed countries, this is not a large percentage, but for a country that has traditionally relied on private higher education, it is a major and growing investment in the public sector.While many of the better universities in the Philippines are private, many other private educational institutions are small and struggling. As their financial resources become more limited, and as less expensive, tax-supported higher education becomes increasingly available, a lot of the struggling private colleges will probably close. This process is also being hastened by actions of the government to upgrade quality, for example in the case of the many private colleges that developed after World War II. In an attempt to improve the academic quality of these marginal institutions, the Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports has been given extensive authority, and while its intrusion into private institutions has been modest by some measures, its requirements are affecting them all and will speed the demise of some. This is bound to lead to a stronger role for public higher education in the Philippines, a country that is striving diligently to improve the education and hence the quality of life of its people.The author is grateful to several officials of public and private colleges and universities whom he interviewed in the Philippines in March, 1983, and particularly to Mr. S.B. Bangug, Philippine Association of State Universities and Colleges, and Dr. Amado C. Dizon, Executive Vice President, Philippine Association of Colleges and Universities, who provided major assistance.     

Unfreezing higher education institutions? Understanding the introduction of quality management in teaching and learning in Germany

Quality management (QM) in teaching and learning has strongly “infected” the higher education sector and spread around the world. It has almost everywhere become an integral part of higher education reforms. While existing research on QM mainly focuses on the national level from a macro-perspective, its introduction at the institutional level is only rarely analyzed. The present article addresses this research gap. Coming from the perspective of organization studies, it examines the factors that were crucial for the introduction of QM at higher education institutions in Germany. As the introduction of QM can be considered to be a process of organizational change, the article refers to Kurt Lewin’s seminal concept of “unfreezing” organizations as a theoretical starting point. Methodologically, a mixed methods approach is applied by combining qualitative data derived from interviews with institutional quality managers and quantitative data gathered from a nationwide survey. The results show that the introduction of QM is initiated by either internal or external processes. Furthermore, some institutions follow a rather voluntary approach of unfreezing, while others show modes of forced unfreezing. Consequently, the way how QM was introduced has important implications for its implementation.     

Conceptualizing curriculum differentiation in higher education: a sociology of knowledge point of view

Sociologists of education rooted in social realism have for more than a decade argued that knowledge matters in education, there are different kinds of knowledge, not all forms of knowledge are equal and that these differentiations have significant implications for curriculum. While this argument has made an important contribution to both theoretical and policy debate, the implications for curriculum have not been sufficiently addressed. In other words, a theory of differentiated knowledge has not translated into an adequate theory of differentiated curriculum. Drawing on Basil Bernstein’s work on knowledge differentiation and Karl Maton’s Legitimation Code Theory, this paper offers an empirically derived emerging framework for conceptualizing differentiated higher education curricula with a particular interest in occupationally and professionally oriented curricula. The framework illuminates the principles underlying curriculum differentiation, thus enabling a richer conversation about epistemological access and progression.     

Reconsidering vulnerability in higher education

Vulnerability appears to be increasing in the neoliberal and corporate authoritarian university, but few articles have explored vulnerability in depth in higher education. This paper provides a systematic understanding of vulnerability and considers its implications for academics. First, the author examines vulnerability as conceptualized within psychological and philosophical lenses. The author posits that vulnerability has positive potential and is not just a cause for concern. Next, the paper explores vulnerability in terms of relationality and afect in the context of diferent professional and social positions, and the rise of managerialism in diverse national and disciplinary environments. That vulnerability circulates through interrelations suggests that it is not a problem that can be ameliorated through giving academics more resources as individuals. Rather, vulnerability stems not from individual neediness or fragility, but from interactive operations and processes within communities. The essay concludes by considering the implications of reconceptualizing academic vulnerability alternatively as a positive learning disposition in higher education.

     

Academic Standards and Mass Higher Education*

This article considers the role of academic standards in the wider context of the problem faced by modem societies of how to reconcile the survival and provision of elite higher education with the emergence of mass education. From the advantage of an outside perspective it examines the division between higher and further education and reflects on the implications of that separation and on the costs and consequences of the academic standards that characterise the British system of elite higher education. It considers the prospects for the emergence from further education of a truly mass system of institutions marked by lower per capita costs and lower standards standing alongside and linked with a system of higher education marked by very high academic standards. The article concludes that what is still lacking is a general recognition that all degree-granting higher education is only a part, albeit a central part, of a broad system of post-secondary and continuing education, marked by a diversity of standard, mission and cost, which has as its mission the advanced education of a whole society and not just its leadership.     

Between the Hammer and the Anvil: lifestyles of Russian students in the years of permanent crisis

This article attempts to look at Russian students in the broader social, economic and political context as it has developed over the past 13 years. While society needs higher education to consolidate its identity that was deeply wounded by the shock of the political and economic collapse of the early 1990s, it still lacks the means to maintain it. As a result of a complex interplay of various actors and their short‐term interests, Russian youth is being literally stored as students in higher education institutions, barely able to survive physically, with little hope for improvement in a foreseeable future.     

Understanding teachers’ attitudes and self-efficacy in inclusive education: implications for pre-service and in-service teacher education

Although there are clear differences in national policies regarding inclusive education, the international debate has not fully considered their impact on implementation within different countries, for example on teacher education. This paper reports on results from a comparative study of in-service teachers’ attitudes and self-efficacy in implementing inclusive practices in South Africa and Finland and its implications for teacher education in these countries. A sample of 319 South African and 822 Finnish primary and secondary education teachers completed a questionnaire containing a scale measuring sentiments, attitudes and concerns on inclusive education as well as a scale measuring teachers’ self-efficacy in implementing inclusive practices. A comparative analysis indicated that whereas the overall sentiments towards disabilities were positive in both countries, teachers had many concerns about the consequences of including children with disabilities in their classrooms. While the most positive aspect of self-efficacy among the South African teachers was their self-efficacy in managing behaviour, the Finnish teachers saw this as their weakest point. Self-efficacy, in particular efficacy in collaboration, was clearly related to overall attitudes towards inclusion. The implications of these findings for pre-service and in-service teacher education are discussed.     

Blurred Vision?: Public and Private Higher Education in Indonesia

If, as some have argued, private higher education is now the most dynamic segment of higher education, it is also the case that its growth, partly in response to the increasing mismatch between spiralling demand and limited state capacity, is often ad hoc. The article examines the contours of this trend in Indonesia, where the balance of public and private higher education has shifted sharply over the last two decades. While the private sector has been responsible for much of the expansion in higher education, its role in relation to quality is more questionable. Indonesia’s economic burdens, sharply exacerbated by the effects of the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s, make it likely that the trend towards privatisation, including of its public institutions, will continue. Together with the current rise of trans-national higher education, however, this is only likely to sharpen existing difficulties around longstanding issues of quality, equality, and regulatory capacity.     

高等学校《本科教育教学质量报告》透视(笔谈)

教育部拟建立全国高等学校教育教学质量年度报告发布制度,表明我国对高等教育质量的期待已从学校层面上升到了国家意志层面。2011年9月底,39所"985工程"大学首度公开发布了各自的《本科教育教学质量报告》,说明我国高教界已开始对社会期待和问责作出回应。尽管不能说各大学不重视,但它目前还没有很好地发挥信息平台、质量保障和管理监督的功能。作为创建具有中国特色的高等教育质量保障制度的重要举措,它还有待于从质量标准、报告内容和形式等方面进一步规范和完善。     

Analysing the national and institutional policy landscape for foreign academics in Thailand: opportunity,ambivalence and threat

While academic expatriation is a longstanding global phenomenon, Thailand has emerged in recent years as an increasingly popular destination for internationally mobile academics. The objective of this article is to identify current policy dispositions towards foreign academics at the national and institutional levels in Thailand. The article finds that within Thai higher education policy discourse, foreign academics are framed in three primary ways: as opportunities, as absent or unimportant, and as threats to Thailand. While foreign academics are often cast as experts who might accelerate the economic development of the nation and enhance the competitiveness of the Thai higher education sector, they may also be presented as threats to Thai culture, values and security. However, the most prevalent disposition found in this study was one of absence and marginality, suggesting a high degree of ambivalence toward foreign academics. The article concludes with implications for future researchers and policymakers to consider.     

The Dearing Report and the Maintenance of Academic Standards: Towards a New Academic Corporatism

The Dearing Report has given the responsibility for maintaining standards and quality in British higher education to the Quality Assurance Agency (QAA). While this quango may be able to ensure 'threshold' standards, it is more doubtful whether it can help institutions to sustain high academic quality. Nonetheless, the Report has three potentially very significant consequences: it represents another move towards the creation of a national curriculum in higher education, it offers a more restrictive interpretation of university autonomy, and – despite its protestations – represents a threat to the growing diversity of British higher education. The thrust of the article is that the Report has charted an uneasy 'middle way'between market forces and statism in the quest for quality control in higher education. It remains to be seen whether the academic corporatism represented by the QAA can resist the pressures of the state and the market.     

Hong Kong University and Polytechnic Grants Committee

The political uncertainties surrounding Hong Kong's future as a British Crown Colony have not inhibited either the Hong Kong Government or its particular version of a University Grants Committee (UGC) system from devising and planning a continuing expansion of higher education at a time when most other countries are levelling off or contracting their own.This article deals with the many unique features of the Hong Kong situation of which perhaps the most important is the nature of the Hong Kong Government - traditionally colonial and potentially authoritarian, not elected yet highly sensitive to Chinese opinion both internally and externally, and highly efficient in most of its management activities in spite of a strongly laisser faire tradition.The Hong Kong UGC system is charged with much wider planning functions throughout higher education than elsewhere and is responsible for the polytechnic as well as the two universities - hence its trans-binary designation as the University and Polytechnic Grants Committee. While this has helped its overall planning and academic guidance roles, it has involved it in severe difficulties in relation to its basic financial role which requires it to develop methodologies of financial assessment of Polytechnic costs for which no overseas models exist. Its academic membership is still entirely from overseas, with inevitable repercussions on its ability to arrange adequate collective discussion and its reliance on its local secretariat who act as the Government's de facto Department of Higher Education.     

高等教育发展的良性互动--宁波高教发展侧记

宁波市经济的迅速发展对宁波的高等教育发展提出了新的要求和提供了强大的经济基础，对高等教育人才产生了更大的吸纳能力。高等教育的迅速发展改善了宁波的城市品位、投资环境，高校成为宁波的人才培养基地和高层次人才的引力场，高等教育的发展也成为城市发展和经济增长的积极促动力量和实现高等教育从奢侈品到生活必需品转化的纽带。     

Academic Workload and Quality

While there is an increasing demand of academics to do more teaching, research and community service, there is also increasing pressure to improve the quality of such work. The emerging dilemma between increasing the quantity and quality of academic work and its implications are the focus of this paper. Academic work appears to be taken for granted by administrators as it is rarely defined in contracts, either quantitatively or qualitatively. In this paper the complexity of the relationships between quantity and quality of academic work is analysed in terms of relevant concepts and processes. It is argued that the achievement of higher quality in academic work requires a better understanding of the factors involved by academics, administrators and the funding bodies responsible for higher education.     

Educational Quality Assurance in Universities: an enhanced model

In the last decade or so there has been a proliferation of literature(s) concerning quality assurance (QA) in a variety of contexts. The literatures which have primary relevance to higher education span a range of disciplines or transdisciplines, including management science and development evaluation, organisational behaviour and change, and the study of higher education. While evolution has occurred in approaches to QA in many institutions, piecemeal, non‐systemic or poorly planned and integrated approaches are still common. This paper distils some key ideas from the literatures on QA and higher education culture and practice and proposes a model for educational quality assurance (EQA). The model is evolutionary, in that it (1) is built on and integrates ideas from research, practice and case evidence; (2) integrates key elements of educational environments which influence the quality of climate, process and outcome, but which are often not strongly linked in QA strategies or systems; and (3) has continual quality improvement in student learning at its heart and as its primary goal, with accountability as an important consequence.