首届中国小学国际教育研讨会在北京召开

(2012年7月18日《光明日报》)小学,是学校教育的起点,将为孩子一生的发展奠定重要基础。重视并加强对小学阶段学校教育的目标、使命及其实现过程的研究,始终是世界各国教育的热点问题。日前,首届中国小学国际教育研讨会在京举办。谁能以明天的视角培养今天的孩子,谁就意味着交给了孩子一把适应未来的金钥匙。"而问题的关键是:要养成哪些习惯?要培养哪些核心素养?哪些核心素养是发展所必需的核心素养……这些问题的回答其实就决定了小学教育的主要任务,决定了小学教育的目标和方向。随     

学校治理现代化进程中的挑战及其超越

学校治理现代化进程中学校办学面临很多挑战,主要体现为以下四个方面的不平衡问题:教育智能化带来的教与学深层次变革对人提出的高要求与学校智教深融准备不足之间不平衡;立德树人对学生全面发展的要求与校长办学中对教育本质理解不足的矛盾;办学自主权进一步下放对学校办学能力的要求与校长办学中增能提质能力不足的矛盾;百年未有之大变局对校长洞悉事物本质的要求与其理论素养不足的矛盾。这些矛盾可能阻碍教育高质量发展目标的实现。澄清和深入探讨这些矛盾的本质和内在原因,是未来学校克服学校治理现代化进程中诸多挑战的重要基础。     

全纳教育——21世纪国际教育新趋势

作为21世纪全球教育发展过程中的最新思潮,全纳教育(Inclusive Education)已逐渐被赋予了更多内涵。如何理解全纳教育、全纳教育要关注哪些群体、世界各国是如何开展全纳教育的、我国实施全纳教育还面临哪些挑战和机遇?我们愿从多个角度来探讨这些问题。     

培养21世纪的教师和学校领导——来自OECD国家的经验

当前,世界各国正在进行广泛的改革以为儿童提供更高程度的教育。在这个飞速变革的时代,哪些技能是年轻人所需要的?教师需要具备哪些能力才能有效传授这些技能?教师的培养和专业发展如何才能达到在21世纪课堂上应付自如的要求?21世纪的学校领导有什么不同的作用与责任,各国如何才能成功培养这些领导?为了回答这些问题,我们需要反思教育系统的方方面面:招募机制的质量;教师如何被监督并获得哪些教育和支持;教师的报酬如何构成;如何提高表现不佳的教师的绩效;如何发掘最好的教师。     

后4%时代在考验着什么

正自1993年《中国教育改革与发展纲要》提出国家财政性教育经费占国内生产总值比例应达到4%的目标以来,我国教育投入水平于去年首次"达标",从此,中国教育投入进入后4%时代。在后4%时代,教育面临着新的形势与任务,教育投入也面临着新的压力与挑战,教育投入如何更有效率地使用?长效保障机制又该如何建立?这些重要而又紧迫的问题摆在了人们面前,不能不引     

国际

联合国教科文组织职业技术教育和培训国际中心 根据面临的新形势、新挑战，促进对职业教育与培训前瞻理念的探索和争鸣，引起世界各国的关注，以使各国的职业教育与培训系统更加适应社会、经济的发展需求，一直是联合国教科文组织职业技术教育和培训国际中心（UNESCO—UNEVOC）的重要目标。     

社会转型期高校艺术教育的意识形态功能

为了实现高校艺术教育的可持续发展,针对社会转型期高校艺术教育面临的主要现实问题与挑战,指出高校艺术教育实现意识形态功能的主要目标与重要意义。为了继续体现其意识形态功能,高校艺术教育应遵循的原则是:坚持关注人的自由全面的发展;坚守马克思主义意识形态的主阵地;坚持与时俱进的马克思主义;坚守艺术教育的社会责任。     

走进OECD教育公平政策的视野

对OECD关于教育公平问题的政策进行分析可以发现,当前教育公平面临着一系列挑战,主要体现在两个方面:一方面是来自历史与现实的挑战,如社会经济背景、性别、少数民族等;另一方面是来自当前及未来的新型挑战,如数字化、终身学习等给教育公平带来的新挑战。实现教育公平是一个世界性难题。在数据分析的基础上,OECD提出了一些实现教育公平的政策路径,以推动教育公平美好愿景的实现。这些也为分析和研究我国的教育公平问题带来了许多新的认识和思考。     

试析习近平总书记关于教育价值观的论述

教育价值观作为教育理论和实践中的一个重要问题,主要回答“为谁办教育”、“为谁培养人”的根本问题。党的十八大以来,习近平总书记围绕这一问题发表了一系列重要论述,形成了关于教育价值观的系统理论。习近平总书记关于教育价值观的论述,是新时代社会各项事业发展的实践要求,反映了人民群众对教育事业的更高期盼,回应了新时代教育发展面临的新挑战,内含着教育价值立场、教育价值取向、教育价值追求、教育价值目标、教育价值标准和教育价值原则六方面内容,构成一个系统的教育价值观念体系。系统学习和深入领会习近平总书记关于教育价值观的论述,对准确把握新时代我国教育改革的根本方向、引领各类教育价值思潮、落实各项教育改革重大决策、推动中国式教育现代化和教育强国建设具有重要意义。     

国际智慧教育发展战略及其对我国的启示

智慧教育代表了技术变革教育的未来发展方向。如何发展智慧教育,是世界各国面临的共同挑战和重要机遇。该文重点剖析了新加坡、韩国以及美国的国家智慧教育发展战略,剖析了三个国家发展智慧教育的优势与不足,进而探讨了对我国发展智慧教育的有益启示,即正确认识国际智慧教育发展形势,构建适合信息时代特点的教育理论,建设以学习者为中心的智慧教育环境,以实现教与学方式的根本性变革为核心目标,多方参与加速实现智慧教育生态系统的构建。     

Searching for the public: school funding and shifting meanings of ‘the public’ in Australian education

School funding is a principal site of policy reform and contestation in the context of broad global shifts towards private- and market-based funding models. These shifts are transforming not only how schools are funded but also the meanings and practices of public education: that is, shifts in what is ‘public’ about schooling. In this paper, we examine the ways in which different articulations of ‘the public’ are brought to bear in contemporary debates surrounding school funding. Taking the Australian Review of Funding for Schooling (the Gonski Report) as our case, we analyse the policy report and its subsequent media coverage to consider what meanings are made concerning the ‘publicness’ of schooling. Our analysis reveals three broad themes of debate in the report and related media coverage: (1) the primacy of ‘procedural politics’ (i.e. the political imperatives and processes associated with public policy negotiations in the Australian federation); (2) changing relations between what is considered public and private; and (3) a connection of government schooling to concerns surrounding equity and a ‘public in need’. We suggest these three themes contour the debates and understandings that surround the ‘publicness’ of education generally, and school funding more specifically.     

Academic quality,league tables,and public policy: A cross-national analysis of university ranking systems

The global expansion of access to higher education has increased demand for information on academic quality and has led to the development of university ranking systems or league tables in many countries of the world. A recent UNESCO/CEPES conference on higher education indicators concluded that cross-national research on these ranking systems could make an important contribution to improving the international market for higher education. The comparison and analysis of national university ranking systems can help address a number of important policy questions. First, is there an emerging international consensus on the measurement of academic quality as reflected in these ranking systems? Second, what impact are the different ranking systems having on university and academic behavior in their respective countries? Finally, are there important public interests that are thus far not reflected in these rankings? If so, is there a needed and appropriate role for public policy in the development and distribution of university ranking systems and what might that role be? This paper explores these questions through a comparative analysis of university rankings in Australia, Canada, the UK, and the US.     

International assessments of student achievement and public confidence in education: evidence from a cross-national study

One of the overarching goals of international large-scale assessments (ILSA) is to inform public discourse about the quality of education in different countries. To fulfil this function, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), for example, raises awareness of the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) results through different forms of traditional and social media (e.g. press releases and other activities under the slogan PISA Day). Scholars have responded to the rapid growth of ILSA by examining public discourse through newspaper articles, policy documents, and other outlets. However, we know very little about whether and to what extent the general public is actually affected by PISA results. In order to address this gap, this study uses data regarding public trust in education from the 2011 wave of the International Social Survey Program (ISSP). Drawing on survey data from 30 countries and Hierarchical Linear Models (HLM), the study shows that PISA rankings have a significant effect on public perceptions. We find that in high performing countries the general public expresses higher levels of confidence in the education system. We discuss these patterns in the context of growing politicisation of education policy making and the use of ILSA as evidence.     

Rationality and rationalisation in teacher education policy discourse in New Zealand

Background:?A newly elected centre-right coalition government in New Zealand was forced to deal with the cumulative fiscal consequences of two unforeseen challenges: a global financial crisis in September 2008 and two major seismic events in the country's second largest city in 2009 and 2010. This paper examines the way in which policies for initial and continuing teacher education were reshaped thereafter and the justifications provided by government for these changes.

Purpose:?The paper examines the plausibility of the government's contemporary ‘crisis’ discourse and aims to show how ‘rational’ education policy changes also carry broader ideological and political agendas for teacher education. Thus, current changes to teacher education policy are located in the historical context of trends over the last two decades.

Sources of Evidence:?The paper uses official statements by government and officials to show how they justified the policy changes as the only possible responses to an external economic crisis. Secondary sources of statistical economic data and policy texts are used to demonstrate that equally plausible alternative responses were overlooked, rejected or ignored.

Main argument:?The paper construes teacher education policy as both text and discourse. It is argued that the media statements of politicians and officials are intended to secure popular approval for public education austerity measures, while at the same time masking an underlying political and ideological project and ignoring the informed policy rebuttals of some educationists.

Conclusions:?The steps taken in New Zealand to respond to a short- to medium-term national fiscal crisis have major long-term consequences for teacher education. Most apparent is the continued failure to acknowledge the major incremental reductions in public subsidies for initial teacher education that have occurred year on year since the early 1990s and, instead, to reiterate the new public management ideology of further public service efficiencies.     

You can lose what you never had

An often-used idiom states: you can't lose what you never had. Yet contrary to this expression, it is possible to lose what you never had – at least when special education support is concerned. In Ontario, as in other jurisdictions, special education exists as a codified system. An ever-changing nexus of discourses and documents – including normalisation, legislation, regulations, and memoranda – set out how special education is to function in the province. The documents themselves articulate how learners' needs are to be formally identified, as well as how students are to be supported. Within this network a phenomenon of non-identification has arisen whereby some students do not get identified and yet would have qualified for special education support had they gone through the process. Yet what leads to this phenomenon? To what does the phenomenon itself lead? Should Ontario's special education system be readjusted to address the phenomenon of non-identification, or is identification itself an inherently flawed practice? To explore these three questions, this paper will analyse Ontario's identification policy, examining what it allows, what it dictates, as well as the challenges it creates.     

The Spread of the Learning Outcomes Approaches across Countries,Sub‐systems and Levels: A special focus on teacher education

This article is based on the outcomes of the study entitled “The application of learning outcomes approaches across Europe”, which was funded by Cedefop and completed in 2015 (Wi?niewski et al, 2015 ). The study, aiming at exploring the implementation of the learning outcomes approach in European countries, addressed two major questions: (1) to what extent and how the shift to learning outcomes has been influencing education and training policies and strategies at macro (national) level and teaching practices at micro (institutional) level in EU and EFTA member countries, and (2) to what extent and how political priority given to learning outcomes has influenced institutional practices in the training of education and training professionals. The study, covering 33 EU and EFTA member countries and all sub‐systems of education, used empirical evidence from country case studies and also from a limited number of institutional case studies focusing on initial teacher education. The study demonstrated a significant progress in the use of the learning outcomes approach in most countries and in all sub‐systems, but also major implementation challenges. This article presents the outcomes of the study using an analytical framework combining three analytical perspectives: (1) curriculum development and delivery (2) European integration, and (3) governance and policy implementation.     

Restrictive and expansive policy learning – challenges and strategies for knowledge exchange in upper secondary education across the four countries of the UK

Abstract

This article examines the challenges and possibilities for UK policy learning in relation to upper secondary education (USE) across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland (NI) within current national and global policy contexts. Drawing on a range of international literature, the article explores the concepts of ‘restrictive’ and ‘expansive’ policy learning and develops a framework of dimensions for examining what is taking place across the UK at a time of change for all four national USE systems. From an examination of recent national policy literatures and interviews with key policy actors within the ‘UK laboratory’, we found that the conditions for expansive policy learning had markedly deteriorated due to ‘accelerating divergence’ between the three smaller countries and a dominant England that has been pursuing an ‘extreme Anglo Saxon education model’. The article also notes that some aspects of policy learning continue to take place ‘beneath the radar’ between UK and wide civil society organisations. This activity is more prevalent across the three smaller countries although each, to differing degrees, is still constrained by its position in relation to the UK as a whole.     

Revolution or backlash? The mediatisation of education policy in Australia

Recent scholarship has identified the emergence of a new modality of policy work: the mediatisation of policy. This paper provides an Australian case study which reports on the tactics of an Australian Federal Minister of Education and a media commentator who both engaged in public pedagogical work for the purpose of spinning education policy. In particular, we argue that this example of the mediatisation of education policy has worked to stifle pedagogical innovation as advocates of middle schooling reform struggle against what appears to be a backlash to the social-democratic reforms of the post-World War II era. Such backlash politics is understood in terms of a struggle to maintain the role of teachers as curriculum designers and not be merely technicians; to sustain critically reflective learning communities of colleagues and friends; and not succumb to pedagogies of resentment that are driven by a logic of deficit views of students and their communities.     

Supporting inclusion in early childhood settings: some possibilities and problems for teacher education

Aotearoa New Zealand, like other countries, has legislation and policies that support inclusion and promote the participation of all children and families in early childhood education. We might expect therefore to see a culture of inclusion resonating through policy and practice in early childhood settings. There are early childhood teachers who support such legislative and policy goals, who are committed to inclusion, and who are developing more inclusive early childhood services. Yet, it is also evident that discrimination and exclusion is experienced by many. Teacher education plays an important role in supporting inclusion and assisting teachers’ development of knowledge, skills and attitudes that will support them to teach all children. In this paper, we write as a group of teacher educators and demonstrate the challenges we took up to move beyond traditional approaches to inclusive education and to open up theoretically and practically diverse possibilities for thinking and doing inclusion differently in early childhood teacher education.     

Resourcing inclusion: Introducing finance perspectives to inclusive education policy rhetoric

Across the Central Eastern European region, inclusive education has become a policy aim. Europeanization, influence of United Nations agencies, and shifts away from Soviet models of education have led to new policy aspirations for the inclusion of children with special education needs (SEN). At the same time, policies in many countries often lack the infrastructure or internal mechanisms required for successful implementation (such as funding, professional capacity, and public will). In this article, we examine one of these challenges: funding. Through simulations based on data collected by the authors in the Republic of Serbia, we examine approaches for funding children with SEN in inclusive classrooms without losing the supports provided to them in segregated settings. Our findings illustrate the possible approaches to adequate costing of inclusive education policies and potentially serve as a methodological reference beyond specific national contexts. They are, therefore, potentially applicable across Eastern European countries.