Academic social cohesion within higher education

This article explores the theoretical foundations of social cohesion as it relates to higher education institutions. In so doing it seeks (a) to understand the core elements of social cohesion—social capital, human capital and ethical behavioural norms that serve a common good—and (b) to establish a flexible framework for understanding the combined contributions of higher education to society. Tertiary institutional phenomena (those occurring in higher education) that are involved in the creation of social cohesion are hereafter termed academic social cohesion. The particular emphasis is on higher education’s role in cultivating moral awareness as a vital product of institutions’ primary activities. These core functions of colleges and universities are discussed in relation to both academic social cohesion and the degree to which they should involve the creation of specific ethical norms.

高校管理制度合法性危机现象探析

高校管理制度中存在着合法性危机,其具体表现有：高校凝聚力低,＂离散现象＂普遍存在;教学对高校和教师来说,只是一种＂谋生手段＂,而不是一种＂生存方式＂;高校内个体＂原子化＂。合法性危机的起点就在于一些制度的程序不合法,高校内的正式制度表达与制度实践相背离加剧了制度的合法性危机,社会转型过程中,高校管理的＂合法性资源＂日益稀缺,管理理念相对滞后。     

欧洲高校分类新动向:大学图

大学图以利益相关者理论为基础,在五大高等教育利益主体的影响下确定了多维度多指标的分类标准,通过分类工具呈现了每所大学发展现状和特色,力图引导欧洲高等教育机构多样化发展。其以利益相关者理论为基础,侧重分类维度和指标的社会属性和分类结果的自然呈现,体现了欧洲高校分类新的动向,为我国高校分类理论和实践提供了新的思路。     

高等教育评估引导高校发展的现实路径与展望

新时代背景下我国经济社会发生着深层次的变革,使高校对社会的教育贡献度有了新的更高要求,而我国高等教育评估制度对高等教育的发展具有突出的引导和激励功能,从政策引领、专业指导和综合服务等多个方面引导高校实现其服务国家战略的核心价值。文章在回顾我国高等教育评估发展历程和实现路径的基础上,阐述了审核评估的特点与内涵,并以审核评估为例分析了教育评估通过引导高校合理确定目标定位、优化资源配置、建立质量保障体系和密切联系社会等方面促进高校提升办学质量,推动内涵发展的主要表现,并从完善教育评估工作,建立学校自我评估制度和树立高校职能协调发展的价值导向等三个方面展望了高等教育评估工作的发展方向。     

Seeking excellence in the move to a mass system: Institutional responses of key Chinese comprehensive universities

Since the late 1990s the Chinese government has implemented two key policies for the development of higher education. The first was launching Project 985, with the purpose of seeking excellence through creating internationally competitive universities. The second was a radical move to a mass system of higher education. In this context, China’s top universities have faced dual missions, each with their challenges: playing key roles in the revolutionary expansion process on the one hand and closing the gap between them and top universities around the world through the implementation of Project 985, on the other. It is thus important to know about how these institutions have transformed themselves for excellence through the implementation of these policies. With the three cases of Peking, Nanjing and Xiamen Universities, this paper aims to examine each institutional response and the broad changes that have come about in these top Chinese comprehensive universities. It looks especially at the divergent trajectories these institutions have followed in balancing their elite and mass education functions, their global, national and local missions, the pursuit of excellence alongside of a commitment to equity, efforts at curricular comprehensivization while preserving unique historical strengths, and finally globalization and localization. From two higher education frameworks, one based on epistemological considerations and the other on political philosophy, that are equally important in light of China’s traditions, the paper concludes that Chinese universities will continuously but selectively respond to the national expansion policy with various institutional models of seeking excellence that enable them to contribute to Chinese society and the global community in the future.     

Institutional Change in the Spanish Higher Education System

The article describes institutional change in the Spanish higher education system over the past two decades. It singles out four variables in explaining this change: (i) demography, (ii) economic environment (the so-called knowledge society), (iii) the role and interests of academics and politicians, and (iv) the supranational stimulus to converge (Bologna Process).
Although after Franquism each of these factors had notable consequences on tertiary education, at least initially it seems that supply-side factors were very important in sustaining institutional change in Spanish universities. Above all, politicians and regional governments boosted democratisation by opening new universities (which since 1980s have increased in number from 32 to 70), by lowering entrance requirements, and by keeping fees low. At the end of the 1990s, European declarations (Sorbonne, Bologna) increased the significance of Europe, with a twofold effect: they induced governments to introduce change in higher education systems (convergence), but they also highlighted the difficulty of combining the role of the state (as signatory to international declarations) and peripheral institutions ( Comunidades autónomas and autonomous universities).     

论高等学校定位

高等学校定位 ,包括高等学校在整个社会大系统中的定位 ,一所学校在整个高等教育系统中的定位 ,学校内部各要素在学校发展中的定位三个层面。当前应重点研究的是高等学校在高等教育系统中的定位 ,其实质是高等教育系统的分层。在对高等学校进行定位时 ,应综合考虑社会发展的需求、相关学校的状况以及自身具备的优势等各方面的因素 ,展其所长 ,要有大视野、大智慧和大手笔     

Japanese flagship universities at a crossroads

The increasing pace and scope of global structural change has left Japanese flagship universities at a crossroads. Reflecting upon historical trends, current policy changes and respective institutional strategies for global marketing among Japanese top research universities, the author discusses possible future directions for these institutions and how key decisions may be influenced by selected national policies. By taking a more active role in building flagship universities and making use of higher education for social and economic development, the Japanese government has already taken concrete measures to keep apace with higher education policies of neighboring Asian countries. However, in the author’s view, whether or not Japan can truly develop and maintain world-class universities ultimately depends on an overall improvement in the status of East Asian higher education.     

高校自愿性社会责任信息披露的实践问题研究

高校自愿性社会责任信息披露制度具有总结、指导、监督等功能,能促进高校提升办学质量、回应社会问责,有利于增进高等教育的社会参与,有利于各类高校履行社会责任的动态均衡。建议由高校自主设置的院校研究机构或委托第三方专业机构展开报告编制,召开发布会或在庆典类、论坛类专题活动届时发布,通过第三方机构评价、师生评议、专家评议等形式展开审核评价。     

和谐社会:维护高校稳定的社会激励机制构建

高校稳定是社会稳定的重要组成部分,是和谐社会题中应有之义;在和谐社会的语境下维护和实现高校稳定,必须建立相应的社会激励机制,从而实现高校持续、快速而健康的发展。     

教育公平——中国古代科举制度“机会均等”之启迪

教育公平是整合社会各阶层利益、实现社会平等的“最伟大的工具”,教育公平程度与政治认同情感成正比例相关。“机会均等”的科举“穷人教育”是中国古代官僚政治得以绵延数千年的制度因素。以史为鉴,深入发掘中国古代科举制度蕴藏的“公平公正”、“知识本位”教育理念,理性审视当今中国教育产业化、重点大学招生地方化等教育制度,切实贯彻温家宝总理的“穷人教育学”,有利于促进当今中国社会的长治久安。     

The power of institutional isomorphism: an analysis of the institutionalization of performance-based pay systems in Korean National Universities

The purpose of this study was to analyze the introduction of the performance-based pay system (PPS) in Korean national universities through the perspective of institutional isomorphism. Using three isomorphism concepts of coercive, mimetic, and normative, and further framing the PPS within the overarching theoretical frameworks of governmentality, neoliberalism, myth, and policy convergence, this study explored the historical and social background of the PPS, the reason the Korean government pursued the PPS form used in the US higher education, and the main factors that affected its introduction in Korean national universities. The result of this analysis shows that while the institutionalization of the PPS in Korean national universities seemed closely associated with the radical political, economic change in Korean society, it was in fact an exemplar of isomorphism from the US model of public and private higher education. This isomorphic activity functioned simultaneously as a norm, social order, and myth within Korean higher education while faculty displayed an anti-isomorphic tendency against the power of the institutional isomorphism of PPS in national universities.     

Institutional Uses of Twitter in U.S. Higher Education

This study employed data mining and quantitative methods to collect and analyze the available histories of primary Twitter accounts of institutions of higher education in the U.S. (n?=?2411). The study comprises a sample of 5.7 million tweets, representing 62 % of all tweets created by these accounts and the entire population of U.S. colleges and universities. With this large, generalizable dataset, researchers were able to determine that the preponderance of institutional tweets are 1) monologic, 2) disseminate information (vs. eliciting action), 3) link to a relatively limited and insular ecosystem of web resources, and 4) express neutral or positive sentiment. While prior research suggests that social media can serve as a vehicle for institutions to extend their reach and further demonstrate their value to society, this article provides empirical and generalizable evidence to suggest that such innovation, in the context of institutional social media use, is limited.     

Are local students disadvantaged? Understanding institutional,local and national sense of belonging in higher education

Research on inequality in higher education (HE) is often dominated by class-based assumptions about traditional and non-traditional students. This binary distinction emphasising students’ socio-economic status tends to oversimply the complexity of educational inequality, neglecting crucial factors which affect the perception of social position. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the understanding of inequalities in HE with new data on the meaning of locality, using evidence from comparative studies of institutions. Locality is interpreted as an inclusive concept capturing place identity as well as local attachments based on language, culture and the natural environment. The qualitative and quantitative data were collected from 192 participants in three distinctly different HE institutions, which were deliberately selected according to their socio-economic, cultural, and institutional status. This mixed methods research confirms the importance of different types of belonging at institutional, local and national levels, and their different effects on student groups. The study captures to what extent geographical mobility is associated with social class, by examining students’ sense of belonging and their interpretation of locality in universities across Wales. It challenges the notion of disadvantaged background, and poses a critical question about cultural and geographical familiarity. This study therefore enriches the current debates about the impact of social inequality alongside social class on students’ belonging, success and retention in HE.     

Is There a Need for a European Institutional Research?

Recent changes in European higher education have accompanied a strong desire and need by national ministries to have comparable data across institutions and a growing recognition from campus leaders that effective planning and decision-making requires reliable institutional data and analyses. This has induced changes and restructuring of duties and roles of administration, administrative staff and academic staff. In North America, internal institutional data analysis is often referred to as institutional research. We examine the roles and functions of institutional research within North America and how the changes within European higher education have created a purpose for institutional research. Specifically, we explore the topical areas of institutional assessment, data management, institutional governance, as well asthe changing identity of academic professionals within European universities. Within our examination, we explore in-depth one European country’s higher education system to demonstrate how history, culture and legislative changes manifest into a need for institutional research.     

制度建设与社会公正

社会公正是和谐社会的基本特征之一,让全体人民共享社会发展成果是社会公正理念的核心追求和突出强调.基于制度是保障社会公正得以实现的关键环节,本文就保障社会公正的相关制度及其运行机制的建设进行了比较全面的讨论.前者主要讨论了转移支付制度、收入分配制度、税收调节制度、社会保障制度、社会互助制度的建设,后者主要讨论了民主参与机制、诉求反应机制、整合协调机制、评估调整机制的建设.     

高校合并的内在逻辑机制分析

在中国高等教育发展过程中出现过两次较大规模的院校合并,这种现象是特定历史时代的产物。高校合并从宏观到微观上都对高校的发展带来了影响,如规模扩张、体制改革、学科融合、学生事务管理等。文章从组织社会学视角对高校合并现象进行分析,认为大学合并是受组织的效率机制、制度环境和高校的社会网络关系的协同影响导致的。     

From Policy to Practice: Curriculum reform in South African education

An important development in the post-apartheid South Africa was a departure from apartheid education through an outcomes-based curriculum reform. This resulted in several structural and policy tensions within the system. This paper highlights how these tensions have played themselves out and shows how government and stakeholders have addressed the challenges emanating from them. The paper argues that the tensions that dominated the post-apartheid curriculum reform have resulted in a significant paradigm shift focused on reclaiming knowledge and cognition in the classroom as expressed in the new revisionism in curriculum debate. From a policy point of view, it argues that the South African experience demonstrates how the pursuit of grand philosophies and ideals such as OBE and curriculum 2005 requires, at both macro and micro, systemic and institutional levels, generally and at the level of detail, a great deal of technical and political skills that cannot be achieved overnight. This calls for realism and pragmatism in school reform by focusing attention not only on what schools in society stand for but also on what they can realistically do and achieve, given their legacies and the particular circumstances in which they operate.     

社会政策促进地方大学文化与区域文化融合共生研究

本研究从社会政策视角出发,将高等教育学、教育经济管理学与区域文化学作为理论依据,以社会政策的整合力、实现力与治理力功能为基点,着重探讨社会政策在促进地方大学文化与区域文化融合共生的路径选择、策略安排与机制设计,通过社会政策挖掘文化资源与交互渠道,促进文化互动与牵引;实现文化合作的社会化平台,创新产学研文化载体衔接;形成文化融合共生制度与机制,促进大学与区域文化的制度性双向交流与互补创新;促使发挥各自人文优势,提供人才支撑,促进大学与区域文化的深层人文融合,形成文化服务能力.     

Universities and the Development of Social Capital in Bulgaria: New Strategies for Change

This article offers some thoughts on the idea that universities can and should contribute to the development of social capital in countries undergoing profound social change, like Bulgaria. It discusses the role of universities in the transformation and development of civil society through an examination of institutional capacities for innovation and change. An analysis of the new responsibilities assumed through the social mission of universities reveals obstacles to the implementation of their strategies for the development of human capital. A consideration of the policy context identifies two different policy approaches to higher education that give rise to contrasting strategies for change. These are further explored in terms of institutional employment‐related strategies and policies for the transmission of cultural values.