Women in higher education

The high level of admissions of women into higher education in Japanis analysed in the context of examining revised views about the highereducation of women resulting from changes in the traditional view of therelationship between higher education and social values. Despite the shiftin womens educational expectations, there is still clear evidence that agender track continues; typically men congregate in four year institutionswhilst women focus on Junior Colleges and on particular courses of studydeemed to be appropriate for women. The gender track is furtherdemonstrated by detailed studies of the Junior College and the WomensCollege. Womens employment opportunities are shown to have been affected byrestrictive attitudes of employers which tended in the past to impose onwomen particular modes of employment. The reasons for the emergence of achange in these attitudes in the latter part of the 1980s are explored andthe impact of the Equal Employment Opportunity Act of 1986 is examined. Thearticle concludes by considering the wider implications for women, both inthe work-place and in society more generally, of these developments. It isnoted that highly educated Japanese women tend to hold more conservativevalues and may see their education as an expression of their social statusrather than a way of increasing their earning power. The recentestablishment of a number of courses in Womens Studies may well have aninfluence upon future developments in ideas about women and higher educationin Japan.     

Private higher education in Australia

In the post World War Two era and prior to the mid 1980s Australia has been characterised by exclusive public provision, financing and regulation of higher education. The 1980s, however, have been marked by considerable turmoil which culminated in the 1988 White Paper. Circumstances provided by the reform of the higher education system, the booming overseas student market and unmet domestic demand have provided a window of opportunity for private providers. This paper charts the growth of private provision, federal and state government responses and the pressures for subsidy and regulation. The paper concludes that the policies of both levels of government are hastening the development of what Geiger (1988) defines as a peripheral private sector of higher education in Australia.     

Education and schooling

An analysis of the concept of education has been thought necessary by philosophers of education in the past in order to provide a measuring stick against which the genuineness and quality of purportedly educational activities and educated people could be gauged. R.S. Peters and John Wilson have both offered new analysis of education and it is here argued that each fails: Peters' because it will allow too much to count as educational and Wilson's because it will permit too little. The author's position is that the concept of education is too vague to admit of precise characterization, hence further analysis is futile. In its place is offered an analysis of the concept ofschooling. Schooling is less vague and can be divided intotypes of schooling each of which provides criteria for establishing the genuineness and quality of educational activities and educated people.

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Zusammenfassung In der Vergangenheit wurde eine Analyse des Erziehungsbegriffs von Erziehungsphilosophen für nötig gehalten, um einen Maßstab zu schaffen, anhand dessen Echtheit und Güte von beabsichtigten erzieherischen Aktivitäten und der Ausgebildeten abgelesen werden könnte. R.S. Peters und John Wilson haben beide eine neue Erziehungsanalyse vorgeschlagen, und der Autor legt dar, daß eine wie die andere fehlschlagen: Peters Analyse, weil sie erlaube, zu viel zum Erzieherischen zu zählen und Wilsons, weil sie zu wenig gestatte. Der Autor meint, daß der Erziehungsbegriff viel zu ungenau ist, um abgrenzende Beschreibung zuzulassen, und daher weitere Analyse vergeblich ist. Stattdessen wird eine Analyse des BegriffsSchulung vorgeschlagen. Schulung ist weniger ungenau und kann in zwei Schulungstypen unterteilt werden, welche beide Kritieren liefern, zur Feststellung von Echtheit und Güte der erzieherischen Aktivitäten und der Ausgebildeten.

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Résumé On pensait autrefois que l'analyse du concept de l'éducation présentée par les philosophes de l'éducation était nécessaire à l'élaboration d'une échelle de mesure d'après laquelle on pouvait apprécier l'authenticité et la qualité des activités pédagogiques visées et des personnes instruites. R.S. Peters et John Wilson ont présenté l'un et l'autre une nouvelle analyse de l'éducation et l'on démontre dans cet article que les deux échouent: celle de Peters parce qu'elle prend trop en considération l'aspect pédagogique, celle de Wilson pas assez au contraire. L'auteur pense que le concept de l'éducation est trop vague pour permettre une définition précise, ce qui rend tout autre analyse futile. On offre donc à la place une analyse du concept de l'instruction. L'instruction est moins indéfinie et peut être divisée entypes d'instruction, chacun pouvant fournir les critères de détermination de l'authenticité et de la qualité des activités pédagogiques et des personnes instruites.

     

“Without Contraries is no Progression”: Dust as an All-Inclusive, Multifunctional Metaphor in Philip Pullman's “His Dark Materials”

Drawing on John Milton's Paradise Lost and on motifs found within Gnostic mythology and the poetry of William Blake, this article explores Philip Pullman's reworking of the Judeo-Christian myth of the Fall. At the centre of this investigation is Dust: a conventional metaphor for human physicality inspired by God's judgment on humanity. This article suggests that Dust is re-presented in the trilogy in a more positive manner through the development of Milton's metaphor of the dark materials into a substance in which good and evil, and spirit and matter—conceptual opposites that form the basis of religious dualism—coexist.     

Swedish Universities towards Self-Regulation: A New Look at Institutional Autonomy

Swedish universities are required to change towards more effective self-regulation as the government has recently reduced state steering and devolved further responsibilities to them. In this paper, self-regulation is related to the concept of autonomy, a concept which is analysed on the two dimensions of purpose and authority, resulting in four models of state governance and consequently in a different space of action for the institutions. However, in order to develop self-regulation, the space granted must also be used effectively to realise autonomy. Six Swedish higher education institutions are analysed concerning how they have used their new space of action and what restrictions they have met in their efforts for self-regulation.     

The cultural grid: A framework for multicultural counseling

The Cultural Grid suggests a structure for interpreting a person's behavior in the context of culturally learned expectations. When two persons' expectations are similar, but their behaviors are dissimilar, cross cultural misunderstanding is likely to result. When their expectations are dissimilar, the result is likely to be a personal misunderstanding even though their behaviors are similar. This article introduces a framework for differentiating personal and cultural differences in the interview which is essential for appropriate multicultural counseling. The alternatives are to allow apparent and obvious cultural differences to mask underlying personal differences or to incorrectly assume that two persons who appear culturally similar are having a personal disagreement.     

Career Development and the Needs of Young College-Educated Females in Taiwan

This interpretive study examined the lived experiences of young college-educated Taiwanese women employed as clerical workers. Using hermeneutic phenomenology as the research methodology, the study explored the meanings of the participants lived experiences. Systematic text analysis of the data revealed various experiences and expectations. Experience themes identified in the study were: (a) bored and busy; and (b) disrespected and mistrusted. Major expectation themes revealed are: (a) career dreams and aspirations; and (b) desire for meaningful work. The study emphasised the importance of career development education in young Taiwanese women. The experiences of Taiwanese female clerical workers as recorded in the study reflected a need for career development, which might provide insightful information for career development scholars and practitioners.     

Scientific Understanding: Lacey's ‘Critical Self-Consciousness’ Seen as Echoes of J.D. Bernal

From a consideration of the nature of scientific understanding and the control of nature Lacey proposes a set of criteria by which the reform of science teaching might be guided. He uses the term critical self-consciousness to describe the development of learner's appreciation of the character of scientific activity, its applications, and the choices citizens face in society. By this latter he means responsible participation, presumably in the debates surrounding the character of scientific activity, its applications, and the choices inherent in these. In this paper I show that Lacey's vision of the schooling of science through the development of critical self-consciousness has been articulated by others at different epochs, and probably from different ideological perspectives. Knowledge of these will help Lacey in his search for an education in science which promotes citizens' participation rather than alienating them from decision-making in society.     

Impact and adjustment: foreign students in comparative perspective

Foreign study is a multifaceted phenomenon - its impact is felt on academic institutions in both the host and sending countries, on the economies of nations, and of course on the individuals involved. With more than one million students studying abroad, foreign study has assumed considerable importance in higher education planning. This article considers the many aspects of foreign study and discusses the interrelationships of these elements. The policies of the host nations, for example, have an impact on higher education planning in the sending countries. The non-return of foreign students, traditionally referred to as the brain drain, is considerably more complex than was once thought since Third World graduates settled in the industrialized nations often retain contacts with their home countries and increasingly return after a period abroad. This article also considers the various push and pull factors which determine the constantly changing flow of foreign students.This study was supported by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, Centre for Educational Research and Innovation. It was presented at the International Seminar on Higher Education and the Flow of Foreign Students, convened by the Hochschul-Informations-System, with support from the Federal Ministry of Education and Science and the Lower Saxony Ministry of Science and Arts in Hannover, Germany on 26th–28th April 1990.     

Intuitive rules: A way to explain and predict students' reasoning

Through our work in mathematics and science education we have observed that students react similarly to a wide variety of conceptually unrelated situations. Our work suggests that many responses which the literature describes as alternative conceptions could be interpreted as evolving from common, intuitive rules. This paper describes and discusses one such rule, manifested when two systems are equal with respect to a certain quantity A but differ in another quantity B. We found that in such situations, students often argue that Same amount of A implies same amount of B. Our claim is that such responses are specific instances of the intuitive rule Same A—same B. This approach explains common sources for students'; conceptions and has strong predictive power.This revised version was published online in September 2005 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

From Conant's Education Strategy to Kuhn's Research Strategy

The seminal influence of Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions on the history, philosophy, and sociology of science illustrates how changes in pedagogical demands can significantly alter patterns of research. Kuhn's book was honed as a teacher in the General Education of Science curriculum designed by Harvard President James Bryant Conant, to whom Structure is dedicated. The courses targeted non-scientists who would have to make policy decisions in the dawning Atomic Age, where science would play an increasing role, despite the public skepticism generated by the atomic bomb (which Conant administered). Conant wanted these future policymakers to be connoisseurs of science who understood problematic Big Science as continuing the basic mindset of culturally valued Little Science. This partly explains why Kuhn presented science as following the same stages, regardless of the specific science and period under discussion. I consider three other senses in Conant's curriculum left its imprint on Kuhn's research practice: the use of case histories to manufacture the internal/external history distinction; the invention of the historiographical mirage known as normal science; the application of the incommensurability thesis to create a more receptive attitude to past scientists.     

Policy communities,issue networks and the formulation of Australian higher education policy

Governments in most western countries consult extensively with clientele groups in the process of formulating higher education policy. The nature of these consultative mechanisms, in turn, influences the manner in which decisions are made, and the substance of policy outcomes. This article explores the changing style of government-interest group interaction in Australia over the decade 1985–94 and how these changes have effected the way policy is determined. It is argued that Australia has gone through three phases over that time. Until 1987 policy was formulated by a stable policy community. From 1988–90, when a number of major reforms were introduced, this framework was replaced by a brief period of state direction. During the early 1990s a new environment characterised by unstable issue networks emerged.     

Gender-group differences in the learning behaviour of entering first-year university students

This study explores the existence of structural gender differences in the learning behaviour of first-year students on entry to university, based on responses to an extended form of the Approaches to Studying Inventory. The focus is on underlying dimensions of variation, that distinguish between the manner in which male and female students recalled and reported on their most recent experience of studying Science in their final secondary school year. Such differences as emerge are only partially interperatble in terms of classic deep or strategic structures. It is argued that gender-sensitive sources of variation, as manifested, are worth of further investigation and are of potential strategic value to university departments insofar as they are able to locate difficulties that students bring with them early in their undergraduate studies.     

The impact of scienceware and foundations on students' attitudes towards science and science classes

In this paper, we describe changes in students' ideas about science classes, attitudes about science, and motivations for studying science, in a classroom designed to support projectbased science learing. Using a survey designed to provide a measure of students' attitudes towards science classes and science, we have compared students enrolled in a traditional high school biology course, with students enrolled in an integrated, project-based science course called Foundations I. Survey responses were analyzed to look at differences between and within two groups of students over the course of one school year. In general, the results of this study suggest that providing students with opportunities to collect and analyze their own data in science classes results in a change in students' ideas about science classrooms. Foundations I students' increased tendency to agree with statements about using information, drawing conclusions, and thinking about problems, implies a change in their understanding of what it means to do science in school. These students, in contrast to students in the traditional Biology course, no longer describe their science experience as one of memorization, textbook reading, and test taking. Instead they see science class as a place in which they can collect data, draw conclusions, and formulate and solve problems.     

Research and scholarship: Perceptions of senior academic administrators

This paper reports selected findings from the first stage of a study on the research role within academic work in Australian universities. These findings come from the interview component of the study and discuss the perceptions that senior academic administrators hold on research and scholarship. The analysis of the interviews indicates that research covers a wide and varied range of activities across the disciplines found in a university and therefore needs to be defined broadly. However, research has three major attributes: new knowledge, enquiry and publication of results and views. Scholarship was perceived to be part of the research process, providing the context for good research by adding the element of breadth to the depth of research. In addition, scholarship describes the manner of pursuing a serious, sustained line of enquiry as well as the dissemination process.     

Policy change in Austrian higher education: indications of a new approach

Despite significant expansion in participation over the last three decades, Austrian higher education has been slow to change either its elitist self-concept or structure. But, as is the case elsewhere, the Austrian academic community is beginning to be confronted with such concepts as efficiency, strategic planning, deregulation, and performance evaluation. Inadequate admission policies, extreme overcrowding, and high dropout rates are but three factors placing pressure on Austrian higher education to reform. The system is not only in need of increased budget allocations, but also requires new policies to guide it into the 21st Century.     

Counsellor education and the future: Cautious sailing

The future remains always elusive and yet by examining the present, some hints of what is to come may be seen by the discerning. In this article, six existing social forces (the baby boom, the new woman, the silicon chip, disenchantment, the monetary system and the increased tempo of modern life) are reviewed as well as some of the implications of these forces for counselling education programmes. The hope is that such an examination will help counsellors and counsellor educators to be better prepared for the future and therefore better able to influence it.University of Alberta     

‘... for more and better religious education’

Mahner and Bunge argue that (1) science and religion are incompatible, in order to develop their thesis, that (2) a religious education ... is an obstacle to the development of a scientific mentality, and that therefore we should only teach our children (3) how science explains the existence of religion in historical, biological, psychological and sociological terms, and that (4) religious education should be kept away from public schools ... I offer brief comments on each of these strands of their argument. Religionists, to use Mahner and Bunge's term, generally come from a specific stance so I shall make it clear, from the outset, that these remarks come from a Christian standpoint, even though many of them are much more widely applicable. Although I agree with some of the observations which Mahner and Bunge make, my conclusions are generally opposite to theirs on each of the four points.     

Counter images of Australia's movement to an undifferentiated higher education system: An analysis

This article is concerned with reactions to systemic change as Australian higher education was transformed from a binary system (of Colleges of Advanced Education, CAEs, and universities) to a unitary system of universities. It, in turn, was part of the much more influential role which government now played in higher education affairs. The counter images relate to the expressive positions of those who were either opposed to, or had deep reservations about, this transformation.The counter imagists offer a perspective, worthy of study, of the impact of profound change upon higher education. Further, since reform, in Australia, had similar causes to that in other OECD countries (the impact of mass higher education, economic rationalism, an official view of higher education as an instrument of national economic revival), its manifestations in one national setting, and reactions to it, are likely to be of international interest.More specifically, the counter imagists were concerned about the loss of differentiation in the new unitary system: To them, it would affect total higher education delivery by making is less specialised, introduce an artificial egalitarianism into higher education affairs and have an adverse bearing upon the effectiveness of traditional universities, particularly their research contribution. There was also anxiety about direct role played by government in institutional funding and related management decisions, as well as the setting of a wider higher education agenda, through measures such as national priorities and social equity goals.The counter imagists, then, are those who took a prominent, but conservative role, in the debates during the half decade of great change in Australian higher education, 1988–1993, and were vigorous in their defence of the autonomy of universities. The article is introduced by placing systemic change in its historic setting, including the rise and fall of the binary system and perceptions of the university legacy.     

Child-methods in secondary mathematics

An earlier research project, the Concepts in Secondary Mathematics and Science (Mathematics) project, identified both a hierarchy of levels of understanding in different areas of secondary mathematics, and a number of particular errors which were made by significant proportions of the children tested. Preliminary consideration of these errors and the strategies which appear to have given rise to them suggests that the use of informal naive methods which are limited in their applicability is widespread even at fourth-year level. The suggestion is made that there may be two systems of mathematics coexisting in the secondary school classroom: the formal taught system, and a system of child-methods which are based upon a counting, adding-on or building-up approach, and by which children attempt to solve mathematical problems within a human-sense framework. The difficulties which some children appear to experience in mathematics is suggested to be due in part to these children's non-initiation into the formal taught system. The implication of such a view for teaching and research are indicated.