Constraints to change in traditional educational systems: Lessons from the Chilean case

Educators from developed countries arrive in the third world with a set of recipes large enough to cope with all the problems of the country they want to help. Their advice, however, is usually not taken into account. The present paper describes the main constraints limiting innovation in the Chilean case. It is hoped that a better understanding of the functioning of this school system (representing the actual situation in more than 90% of the less developed countries) will help those experts to design more realistic proposals.

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Résumé Les éducateurs des pays développés offrent au Tiers-Monde toute une série de formules suffisamment élaborées pour remédier aux difficultés que rencontre le pays auquel ils viennent en aide. Il reste que ces éducateurs ne sont pas toujours écoutés. La présente communication décrit les principaux obstacles qui se dressent lors des tentatives d'innovation au Chili. Le fonctionnement du système éducatif Chilien est représentatif de la situation réelle qui prévaut dans plus de 90% des pays en voie de développement et l'on espère qu'une meilleure compréhension de ce système aidera les spécialistes en question à élaborer des projets plus réalistes.

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I have benefited greatly from advice and criticism from many friends, especially Russell Davis, Noel McCinn, Joseph Farrell, Sister María José Tresch, Richard Durstine, and Jane Hobson. I am grateful to all colleagues participating in the experiment.     

从政策定位到市场定位——对中央电大定位问题的一点思考

教育部办公厅２００１年１号文件，就中央电大的性质、任务、手段、目标作了原则性规定，这无疑为中央电大今后的生存和发展奠定了一个法规性的基础。据此，我们可以说，中央电大已经有了一个政策性定位。但就此认为，中央电大的定位问题已经解决，则不然。一、政策定位不等于市场定位１．政策保护与市场竞争教育产业的市场竞争，已经超出了人们的预想，北大、清华之间的名校之争，普通高校、成人院校、自考、民办高校、各种社会力量办学等等教育机构间的彼此竞争，已近白热化程度。这种种现象表明：虽然国家对教育这一特殊产业规定了一些市…     

From a laboratory curiosity to the market place

Polymers that exhibit high electrical conductivity have successfully been synthesized in the last few decades. The early problems associated with the stability and solubility of such conducting polymers have largely been overcome using chemical intuition and experimentation. A fairly wide range of interesting applications based on these polymers is emerging; some of these are highlighted in this article.     

Moving from resistance to agreement: The case of the Chilean teacher performance evaluation

The paper discusses the process whereby a system of teacher evaluation was established in Chile through a lengthy and complicated process of negotiations between the three main institutions concerned: the Teachers’ Union, the Association of Chilean Municipalities (managers of the public school system) and the Ministry of Education. The process is examined in the light of discussions centred on teacher accountability and tensions between the concepts of formative and summative teacher performance evaluation. In order to understand the issues that arose along the process the article provides historical background information about conflicts surrounding teachers during the Military Government (1973–1990) as well as a discussion on how the different parties involved incorporated the different perspectives on teacher accountability and evaluation of teacher performance that are found in the literature and policy discussions in other geographical contexts. In its conclusion, it focuses on the importance of time, consultations and negotiations in order to reach the implementation of a system that is both appropriate and feasible for the agreed purposes.     

From training to performance: A case study

Faced with the prospect of engaging nearly two thousand employees before the situation became urgent, this case study shares why the best interests of employees, customers, and shareholders are neither disparate nor a zero‐sum game. It also shows how it takes passionate leadership coupled with proven HPT principles to unlock synergies. Its hallmarks are high employee engagement, quality customer interaction, and improved profitability.     

From unbundling to market making: reimagining,reassembling and reinventing the public university

ABSTRACT

In Britain and New Zealand the neoliberal assault on universities has shifted from new public management and funding models to the special status of the public university. The project aims to complete neoliberal business initiated 25 years ago by more fully marketising and financialising universities, starting with ‘unbundling’ and outsourcing and culminating in new forms of privatisation, rent-extraction and rebundling. This paper analyses two documents commissioned beyond government to create political momentum for this project: Avalanche is Coming and The University of the Future. These both capture the zeitgeist of reform while simultaneously creating the university futures that they portend. We examine the market-making work they perform in reimagining and reinventing universities ahead of policy reform. We argue that claims made to support fundamental restructuring of public universities lack substance or evidence. Rather, each is underpinned by different configurations of ideology and self-interest that together envelope universities in new agendas of marketisation, financialisation and privatisation. We suggest that in this latest restructuring of public universities critics should pay more attention to the work of consultancies and think tanks alongside the micro-details of market making. By doing so, they too might reimagine public universities, but for a different political project.     

The coordination of skill supply and demand in the market model of skill formation: testing the assumptions for the case of Chile

ABSTRACT

The importance of skill formation for young people and the challenges of youth unemployment and underemployment are at the forefront of global development agendas. However, there is still an open debate about the most adequate policy frameworks to tackle these societal challenges and, particularly, about the role that the state and the market should play in the coordination of skills supply and demand. Taking Chile as a case study, the paper analyses how the market model of skill formation is re-contextualised by practitioners and other stakeholders at the local level. Through a realist evaluation approach, the paper tests to what extent the underlying theoretical assumptions of the market model hold up when confronted with the reality of the contexts in which young people, education providers and employers make decisions. The case of Chile is particularly interesting for the comparative literature because of its extreme neoliberal orientation and the centrality of the market in the allocation of resources and opportunities among different social groups. The findings show the limitations of the market for coordinating the supply and demand of skills and its negative consequences on the educational and work prospects of young people, especially the most disadvantaged..     

Chile's higher education: between market and state

Presently, most Higher Education policy issues that are debated in Chilean society revolve around the question of the type of relations that should connect the Higher Education system with the state and society.During the 1980–1990 period, Chilean Higher Education underwent drastic changes under a Military Government, directed to the achieving of three main goals: to open-up the Higher Education system, to differentiate its institutional structures, and to partially transfer the cost of state-financed institutions to the students and/or their families (cost recovery) thus forcing these institutions to diversify their funding sources.As a result of the 1980 reforms, both the institutional composition and the financing of Higher Education experienced dramatic changes. New establishments mushroomed. In turn, the rapid increase in the number of institutions resulted in three major effects:first, Higher Education became private-dominant in the non-university levels and has now a dual public/private nature at the university level;second, establishments grew more regionally dispersed but overall enrolment distribution changed in the direction of a still higher concentration in the capital city;third, creation of new entrance opportunities shows an increasing over-extension with respect to enrolment demand. Also funding of Higher Education was drastically altered by the 1980 reforms. Incremental funding was replaced by a diversified funding system which contemplates the employment of four different mechanisms: public institutional core funding, competitive public allocations rewarding institutions that enrol the best students, a Government financed student-loan scheme, and competitive financing of research projects.A new, democratically elected Government was established in 1990. Its Higher Education policies include three major objectives: to fully restore institutional autonomy cancelling all measures of governmental intervention and reinstating the right of faculty members to freely choose their authorities and provide for the self-government of public universities; to increase public spending without changing the diversified-funding approach adopted by the former Government, and to change the legal framework of Higher Education with the aim of introducing more stringent accreditation and evaluation procedures and institutional accountability.     

Postretirement work from a gender perspective: in-depth analysis of the Chilean case

ABSTRACT

Due to the ever-increasing life expectancy rates worldwide, there has been an emerging need to conduct more research on older adults’ participation in the labor market after reaching the state pension age. This study aims to analyze the factors associated with postretirement work in Chile, a country characterized by a strong persistence of a male-breadwinner model endorsed by deeply-rooted traditional gender roles, and at the same time characterized by a dual-earner model strongly encouraged by a neoliberal system. Relying on a gendered life course perspective and using a nationally representative survey, we conducted logistic regression analyses to explore how a number of cumulative advantages and disadvantages (such as work trajectory, job satisfaction, and caregiving duties) shape working beyond legal retirement age and the intrinsic motivation to continue working among economically active older adults in Chile. One of the main findings of the present study is that intrinsic motivation to continue working was a remarkably significant predictor of postretirement work among older Chilean adults, especially among women. The results also suggest that even though older women are motivated to continue working, the national labor market is unlikely to offer such possibility. The findings of this study have implications for practice in the sense that they demonstrate the imperative need for organizations to focus on intrinsic motivation-related factors in striving to improve employees’ willingness to stay within the company after the state pension age.     

从情感到理性--关于我国当前道德形势的再思考

改革开放以来,许多传统的道德观受到了极大的冲击,引发了关于道德观念的深刻反思.从道德观念的角度看,要摆脱道德与经济的二元思维,确立社会实践的一体化观念;要克服片面的道德理想主义,确立从实际出发的科学道德标准;要纠正道德主体的错位,确立人民大众的道德主体地位.集体是以一定社会关系为纽带的个人联合体,它呈现多层次、多样化的面貌;对集体和个人之间的关系加以具体分析.在道德建设上,要以道德人格的确立和健全为重心,要着重于公德系统的规范化,要强化和改进管理教育行为的道德示范功能.     

From centrally mandated to locally demanded service: the Russian case

This paper first highlights recent changes in the environment of Russian universities and considers how institutions of higher education (HEIs) are responding to the challenges and opportunities of the new environment through drawing on case studies of three relatively successful universities. Secondly, it considers how the recent changes, by pushing universities to seek new and more locally based sources of revenue, have lead to a significant modification of the concept and practice of university service. While the Russian university in the Soviet period was expected by virtue of the collectivist ideology to supply service to the people, these activities tended to come from above as gifts to society. In the new environment, service is both increasing and is becoming more sensitive to local needs. The overall effect may be to energize the Russian university, but there is considerable concern that it may at the same time erode the long-standing tradition of intellectual excellence.     

Data mining approach to professional education market segmentation: a case study

In this research, a combination of both quantitative and qualitative approaches is used to identify different market segments in the education industry. To solve the research problem, an exploratory approach to data mining is used and, using a series of interviews with experts, the factors affecting segmentation are identified. Then, using the clustering method (in the form of specific two-step and K-means algorithms), customers are clustered and features of each cluster are identified. This research is based on data provided by a large Iranian research and education company. After examining the clusters identified in both methods, it is determined that the clusters provided by the two-step algorithm are more in line with the organizational and market reality of the business. Finally, the marketing mix model is used to formulate strategic approaches and actions.     

Managing the state and the market: 'new' education management in five countries

Within the field of education management studies, recent reforms promoting devolution and choice are often seen to provide exciting new opportunities. It is claimed that the 'new'education management, with its emphasis on site-based decision-making and consumer accountability, will enable headteachers and principals to 'take control' of their schools and make them more productive environments in which to work and study. However, our review of research findings from five different countries that are putting in place devolution and choice policies suggests that these new opportunities are more illusory than real. Positioned between the competing demands of the state and the market, school managers are becoming increasingly isolated from colleagues and classrooms — leading to a growing divergence between the managers and the managed. The paper considers the implication of recent developments for managers in general and for women managers in particular and concludes by discussing the relationship between the personalisation of responsibility and the legitimation of crises within the state and public education.     

Evaluating local labour market policy: the case of TECs

Abstract

The 1988 Government White Paper ’Employment for the 1990s’ proposed the establishment of Training and Enterprise Councils (TECs) throughout England and Wales, to promote and support small businesses and self‐employment, and to plan and deliver training in their local areas. Placing the responsibility for the formulation and delivery of training almost entirely in the hands of local private sector employers, the TEC initiative has proved to be a highly controversial and contested area of policy. Accordingly, it has attracted a sizeable multi‐disciplinary academic literature which variously portray it as either innovative and revolutionary, or a retrograde high‐risk strategy. This paper commences by placing TECs in the long‐term historical context of previous national and local training measures in England and Wales, which is surely essential to any assessment of the extent to which they mark a novel and relevant modem response to contemporary training and labour force requirements, or a mere re‐working of obsolete government policies and responses to high unemployment levels. This is followed by a brief discussion of the emergence, and state encouragement, of an ‘enterprise culture’ in the 1980s. Against this background, the final section of the paper outlines the establishment of TECs, providing examples of their operation, and reviews the body of literature regarding their potential and actual strengths and weaknesses. It is argued that the historical contextualisation of TECs is fundamental to any evaluation of the extent to which they are an appropriate revolution in training and enterprise, or simply a newly packaged continuation of earlier, discredited, training policies and initiatives.     

从“江中健胃消食片”看市场定位之重要性

市场定位的实质是使本企业与其他企业严格区分开来,使顾客明显感觉和认识到这种差别,从而在顾客心目中占有特殊的位置。"江中牌健胃消食片"通过对市场细致的分析之后,确定自己的位置,取得了巨大的成功。     

From the market to the classroom: how ed-tech products are procured by school districts interacting with vendors

Educational technology research and development - School districts are adopting educational technology products at an increasing rate over the years. As more and more products become available,...     

Evaluation criteria for competency-based syllabi: a Chilean case study applying mixed methods

In recent decades, higher education institutions worldwide have been moving from knowledge-based to competence-based curricula. One of the greatest challenges in this transition is the difficulty in changing the knowledge-oriented practices of teachers. This study evaluates the consistency between syllabus design and the requirements imposed by a competence-based learning environment. To make this comparison, the study sets four criteria (C1: explicit relationship between syllabus and graduate profile; C2: precision of the learning outcomes and assessment criteria; C3: contents that mobilise the learning outcomes; and C4: learning and assessment activities) derived from the literature and a thematic analysis of competence-based learning in higher education. Afterwards, a sample of 150 syllabi from different disciplines of five Chilean public universities were analysed, all of which stated the use of learning outcomes and competences in their learning models. Using a three-point Likert scale derived from the aforementioned criteria and their indicators, a comparison was made between the actual practices reflected in the syllabus design and the previously established criteria. Results show a gap between the declaration of a competency-based curriculum and actual syllabus outlines. Moreover, there are important differences among disciplines. Although all disciplines present high levels of accomplishment for Criteria 1 and 3, only the discipline of health sciences presents an acceptable level for Criteria 2 and 4. It is recommended that further research be undertaken towards identifying effective competency-based syllabus design.