Human Rights and ‘Free and Fair Competition'; the significance of European education legislation for girls in the UK

UK law on education and sex discrimination does not protect the right of girls to equality in education. The European Convention on Human Rights and the Treaty of Rome offer better protection. The Convention provides for the right to education and the right of parents to have their philosophical convictions considered in the education of their child. The European Court of Human Rights’ interpretation of these rights is relevant to those seeking a remedy for sexism in education. The Treaty of Rome has stronger and faster enforcement procedures than the Convention but it makes little provision for education except in vocational training and recognition of qualifications. The form and structure of the EEC legal system nevertheless make it hospitable to a reforming education policy. Educationists need to make sure that the focus on education within the EEC extends beyond vocational training, that the context of the discussion and the definition of education are similar to those of the European Convention and the European Court of Human Rights.     

Education and the rights of the child in Europe

This article analyses the situation of the right to education in Europe, based on a comparative study of the recommendations made by the Committee on the Rights of the Child with respect to the reports submitted to the Committee by the European States Parties. The primary sources used are the Committee’s concluding observations and the individual reports of the States Parties. The article analyses some of the educational aspects underlying the Convention on the Rights of the Child, such as obstacles to the enjoyment of the right to education, access to that right, discrimination in education, school discipline and human rights-based education. The conclusions suggest consideration of a European map, highlighting certain difficulties in such areas as access to education, discrimination against particular groups and a certain ambivalence in relation to the use of corporal punishment.     

THE NEW CONVENTION ‐ PROTOCOL ON INTENTIONS OR WORKING AGREEMENT?

A Joint Council of Europe/UNESCO Convention on the Recognition of Qualifications Concerning Higher Education in the European Region is a necessary evolution that takes into account the increased political and economic integration of Europe, the mobility of academic staff members and students, and the diversification of higher education. The latter tendency, indeed, explains the stress on general principles, particularly on recognition, in the draft Joint Convention, rather than on equivalence and attempts at formulating detailed equivalence procedures. However, along with the stress on recognition must come common agreement as to the guarantee of quality and on procedures for accreditation, on the one hand, and access to information on one another's education programmes and their quality ratings, on the other hand. The Joint Council of Europe/UNESCO Convention will be backed by the excellent European National Information Centres on Academic Recognition and Mobility (ENIC).     

RECOGNITION INSTRUMENTS IN EUROPE

The various academic recognition instruments in use in Europe are presented and described. These include the oldest ones, the Council of Europe Conventions and then the so‐called Prague Convention, the two UNESCO Conventions concerning Europe, particularly the UNESCO European Convention, and most recently, the General Directives of the European Union for recognition with regard to regulated professions. Because Europe has undergone major political and social changes since the first of these conventions was signed, and higher education itself has undergone great diversification, the time has come to seriously consider the establishment of a joint Council of Europe‐UNESCO Convention. Whereas the Council of Europe Conventions con‐centrated on outcomes and the UNESCO European Convention focussed on recognition processes within the framework of a divided Europe, a combined Convention should be oriented toward acceptance for given purposes. It should include the establishment of a code of conduct and involve the participation of subject‐oriented networks and a system of intermediate classification. It should also rely on a combined system of information networks.     

EUROPEAN HIGHER EDUCATION AND THE ISSUES OF TRADITION,TRANSFER‐CREDIT,AND CREDIBILITY

This article discusses the possibilities and pitfalls of international credit transfer among higher education institutions. Credit transfer is skewed by varying definitions of what education actually is and even more so by the overwhelming power of one of the Anglo‐Saxon players, the United States of America, the cultural and educational traditions of which are so difficult to resist as to be a form of cultural imperialism. Thus, the overwhelming use of English as the principal international language of education presents a threat to the educational diversity of Europe as does the adoption of such measures of credit transfer as the European Community Course Credit Transfer Scheme (ECTS), a surface Americanization that fails to appreciate the realities of European, specifically Austrian, course programmes. The author would prefer a qualification recognition system based on a refinement of the concepts underlying the so‐called diploma supplement that would give essential information about what the given credential means and what was required to earn it.     

Educational accountability tests,social and legal inclusion approaches to discrimination for students with disability: a national case study from Australia

The UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disability promotes equal and full participation by children in education. Equity of educational access for all students, including students with disability, free from discrimination, is the first-stated national goal of Australian education. Australian federal disability discrimination law, the Disability Discrimination Act 1992, follows the Convention, with the federal Disability Standards for Education 2005 enacting specific requirements for education. This article discusses equity of processes for inclusion of students with disability in Australian educational accountability testing, including international tests in which many countries participate. The conclusion drawn is that equitable inclusion of students with disability in current Australian educational accountability testing is not occurring from a social perspective and is not in principle compliant with law. However, given the reluctance of courts to intervene in education matters and the uncertainty of an outcome in any court consideration, the discussion shows that equitable inclusion in accountability systems is available through policy change rather than expensive, and possibly unsuccessful, legal challenges.     

Cooperative Work Experience Education Program

Community colleges face a laundry list of challenges. In the forefront is the lack of bachelor's degree attainment of community college transfer students. Community colleges are taking a variety of steps to aid transfer. One of the newer trends focuses on the benefits of collaborative partnerships between a community college and four-year institutions. The impact of collaborative partnerships is especially significant to students in rural areas where access to higher education has been limited for several reasons. Nine years ago, Hazard Community and Technical College (HCTC) partnered with several public and private four-year institutions to provide students with increased access to bachelor degree programs. The resulting concurrent use partnership model, the University Center of the Mountains (UCM; http://www.ucmky.net), may be viewed as an example of the advantages offered by this particular step. UCM is a response to critics of the community college baccalaureate who point to a variety of potential problems when the community college mission is extended in this fashion.     

Equal Educational Opportunity: A Definition

Abstract

Efforts aimed at the development of a European dimension to the general education curricula offered in the different European countries have been stepped up in recent years, both within the countries of the current European Union and within the wider range of European countries belonging to the Council of Europe and subscribing to its Cultural Convention. The immediate importance of these efforts is seen to lie in the desirability of offering an education to young people that helps them make the most of their opportunities not only within their own national borders but also in the wider European Community to which they now belong and in which they have new rights and responsibilities. More generally, these efforts are also seen to be important in consolidating a Europe in which past animosities can finally be abandoned and replaced by a firm pan‐European attachment to ideals of freedom and cooperation between European nations, dedicated to the defence of democracy, human rights, freedom and tolerance. But, how successful have these efforts been? What are the problems encountered? What are the prospects for the future? How far is it proving possible to develop the European dimension across the curriculum? How successful is the European dimension, or might it be, in achieving its intended objectives? These questions, all of which are more puzzling than they might at first appear to be, are touched on in this paper.     

Education or training? A comparative perspective on apprenticeships in England

This paper examines the expansive–restrictive continuum of apprenticeship learning in the context of different education and training systems. It compares the English state-funded apprenticeship programme for young people with the Finnish and the French programmes with a specific focus on access to learning through the programmes. These three countries represent three types of Western and Northern European education and training systems. The paper argues that there are country-specific meanings of apprenticeship that influence how access to learning along the expansive–restrictive continuum is typically characterised. These country-specific meanings of apprenticeship arise from their context in differing education and training systems. The paper concludes that the English conceptualisation of apprenticeship as training lends itself to more restrictive approaches to apprenticeship than the Finnish and the French programmes in terms of access to learning.     

欧洲人权法院视野中的“当场击毙”及其启示

《欧洲人权公约》中有关生命权的规定包含有＂当场击毙＂的内容,即依照＂绝对必需＂标准,在法定情形下,执法人员有权使用武力乃至剥夺他人的生命。欧洲人权法院在一系列案件裁判中认为：使用武力要综合考虑所有情况;各缔约国的国内立法的替代性规定要切实有效;对＂绝对必需＂标准的审查要严格贯彻比例性要求;对相关案件要设立足够的调查程序并且要形成机制。欧洲人权法院的裁判体现了平等适用法律的原则,原则性与灵活性相结合的原则以及公正与效率相结合的原则。这些有益经验对我国的＂当场击毙＂法律规制具有借鉴意义。     

论限制豁免主义的商业交易规则

《联合国国家及其财产管辖豁免公约》明确宣告了绝对豁免主义的终结,其第三部分“不得援引国家豁免的诉讼”列举了不得援引管辖豁免的八种情形,其中商业交易是限制豁免原则的核心问题之一。《公约》规定了商业交易以“性质标准为主,目的标准为辅”的判定规则,并对商业交易界定中的国际私法问题及国家与国有企业行为的责任关系作出了规定。本文在对上述问题进行分析的基础上,指出《公约》在确立相对豁免原则及建立框架以协调各国在执行该原则的实践方面有重要意义。     

Language of Instruction and Research in Higher Education in Europe: Highlights from the Current Debate in Norway and Sweden

This article examines some of the problems concerning the language of instruction in higher education within Europe and relates them to the African context. The author argues that there is reason to be worried about the spread of the use of English as a language of instruction in higher education, to the detriment of the smaller European languages in particular. The article gives an insight into the Norwegian and Swedish debate on the issue of domain loss to English in higher education. Towards the end, the article examines the language situation within the European Union. Here politicians publicly stress the need to maintain all the languages of the EU as part of the community’s wealth, but the reality appears to be different, as the EU is marked by the ever greater predominance of just one language, English.     

MULTINATIONAL INTEGRATION AND NATIONAL EDUCATION SYSTEMS: THE CASE OF AUSTRIA

This article examines the question of European integration from the vantage point of national education systems. Taking Austria and its education system as examples, it argues that even if Austria should join the European Community, it does not follow that its education system should be merged into a common education system. Just as the European Community is not the same thing as a united Europe, education systems are so closely linked to their individual countries that they should not be turned into supranational organizations, even if other national institutions lend themselves to this kind of integration.     

Access to Higher Education for Disabled People: A Systematic Approach at Chelyabinsk State University in Russia

The results achieved by Chelyabinsk State University in terms of providing access to higher education for disabled people are analysed. The experience obtained through joint work with European Union partners and applied to the conditions of a Russian university is underlined.     

‘Asking for the moon’? a critical assessment of Australian disability discrimination laws in promoting inclusion for students with disabilities

The aim of this paper is to critique the dichotomy between the legal regulation of disability discrimination in Australia, particularly in the State of New South Wales, and inclusion policy as espoused by public education authorities. It is argued that the law and inclusion policy are aiming at different outcomes. As a result, through legal regulation, New South Wales undermines the human rights of individuals with disabilities by restricting their access to ‘mainstream’ education. Extracts from a variety of sources are used to enable the voices of students, parents, carers, advocates, teachers and members of the judiciary to be heard, a novel approach in a paper which is essentially concerned with the law. The paper begins with a consideration of the context in which disability discrimination in education laws operate, and the distinctions between policies and practice in that context. The paper then asks to what extent disability discrimination law is capable of expressing inclusive ideals. Finally, the paper suggests means by which international law norms could be incorporated into New South Wales law and policy, so as to achieve effective human rights protection. The paper concludes with Carla's story, which serves to demonstrate that inclusive ideals have not yet been appropriately incorporated into law or practice in New South Wales.     

Cooperation in Teacher Education in the European Community

During 1977, the Commission of the European Communities offered for the first time a limited number of grants for short study visits in member states. These grants were introduced to enable teaching and administrative staff and researchers to undertake studies of aspects of the organization and administration of European Community higher education institutions. The central intention was the promotion of cooperation. This paper describes the strategies adopted in operating a study visit programme involving one institution in the United Kingdom and fourteen institutions in six member states of the European Community, i.e. Belgium, Denmark, France, Holland, Italy and West Germany, and presents an interim evaluation of the outcomes of this project.     

Rights of the Child and Early Childhood Education and Care in Europe

‘Securing the rights articulated in the Convention is an effective approach to improving the quality of early experiences.’ 1 1 Early Childhood Rights Indicators, A guide for Monitoring the Convention on the Rights of the Child, http://earlylearning.ubc.ca/media/uploads/documents/internationalresearchbriefjan2012.pdf , p2
This article analyses early childhood education and care and child rights in early childhood and their relationship in the European Union. Both are primarily national competencies. The EU has limited access and tools to influence policies and practices, while there are many ways in which indirect interventions are not only possible, but greatly used, often in areas that do not seem to be closely related to the issues discussed here. Yet there is a strong desire and interest of the different EU institutions to encourage and support Member States to implement both ECEC targets and child rights. In this article, we show that, while ECEC has become an essential part of different policies at EU level, there have been efforts to implement and mainstream child rights, with special attention paid to specific dimensions in relation to early childhood policies and practices, but a child rights based approach is missing.     

Comparative glocal perspectives on European teacher education

This article reports the findings of a PhD study, which offers comparative perspectives on teacher education in a period of reforms, inquiring into stakeholders’ perceptions in English, French, Italian and Spanish contexts as case studies. The interaction of needs and constraints in European initial teacher education within higher education reforms, and the mediation between contrasting influences and diverse education cultures, are viewed as global phenomena: teacher education practices in different countries can be described as ‘translations’ of European policies, with innovative potential in glocal developments. This article explores some issues of the European dimension of teacher education, reporting the qualitative findings of the study, underpinned by a theoretical framework encompassing globalisation and social ecological studies. In the four case study contexts, the focus is on secondary teacher education; when a subject perspective is required, it concerns the area of modern languages, considering their transversal role in European education policies. Findings from the national case studies come from a limited empirical sample, but can be of interest in showing emerging tensions and trends.     

English: Half Way There

Sections 3 and 4 of the 1988 Education Reform Act include English as one of the compulsory core subjects in the National Curriculum and empower the Secretary of State to specify attainment targets, programmes of study, and assessment arrangements for English for children of compulsory school age. The English Working Group appointed to advise the Secretary of State on English for ages five to 11 reported in September and its recommendations for attainment targets, programmes of study and statements of attainment were published in November alongside the English proposals of the Secretary of State for Education and Science and for Wales. The English Working Group will be reporting on English from 11 to 16 at the end of next month. Dr Barrie Wade, senior lecturer in education, Birmingham University, discusses the report on English for Ages 5 to 11 .