A School—University Collaborative Journey Toward Relevance and Meaning in an Urban High School Physical Education Program

The promise and potential for collaborative teams of school and university colleagues to address substantive issues in physical education were the focus of an international conference and a series of high-profile articles in the late 80s and early 90s. However, school-university partnerships have seldom focused on school reform. Few scholars address secondary school physical education, save for the occasional article describing its eminent demise. Successful implementation of innovative practices, such as curricular and instructional revisions, requires significant investments in teacher development. This paper details a specific collaborative effort in physical education that makes a case for systematic long-term commitments to improve young people's physical education experiences. Stories from a 4-year collaborative highlight the complexities and challenges faced by any subdisciplinary group that commits to connecting professional preparation and practice for the benefit of our respective constituencies.     

The Reflections of a Distance Learner 1977-1997

This paper explores one student's personal experience of the evolution of distance learning in the UK between 1977 and 1997. Reflecting on his experience, the author discusses the growth in opportunities available to the learner as more and more providers have entered the field; the changes in the nature of learning materials; differences in the assessment strategies adopted by the four different providers he studied with, and in learner support; and the extent to which the different providers exhibited degrees of openness. Based on this personal experience, the author discusses the changes that have taken place over 20 years: the increasing consumerism of the sector; the changes in the nature of the providers' response to the market, and in the nature of distance learners; and changes in the underpinning technology.     

The roles of professional and trade associations

Under the former Communist regimes, trade associations were often effectively instruments of government. They now have to acquire a new role in the emergent democracies. But trade associations have few resources, are difficult to manage, and are subject to legal restraints. Yet these groups have an enormous job: to act on behalf of their members, to represent them to the government and other groups, and to achieve what they as an industry want and need. This requires that members reach a common position and provide support and assistance. It also requires that the association delegate some activities to commercial operators. A variety of book trade associations is described. Clive Bradley has been chief executive of the British Publishers Association since 1976 and director of the Confederation of Information Communication Industries since 1984. A barrister who studied law at Cambridge and Yale Universities, he has made special studies of the laws of copyright and industrial relations and of European law. This article was adapted from a presentation given at the seminar “East Meets West: Copyright and the Publisher in a Market Economy”, held in Hamburg in March 1991.     

Regional Migration to and from Higher Education Institutions: Scale, Determinants and Outcomes

This paper examines patterns of movement to study by undergraduates and patterns of mobility into work by graduates. Using national data and a large-scale dataset, student movement across regions to Higher Education Institutions is described and modelled. The evidence points to a sizeable group of graduates who never move region and a significant proportion of graduates who move to study but then move back to their home region for work. Investigation is made of whether or not movement and mobility depend on the subject studied, the type of HE undertaken, the characteristics of the individual and the characteristics of the origin and destination regions. A hypothesis is proposed that the motive for movement is to secure greater rewards from Higher Education. However, those who move region to study report significantly lower satisfaction scores with their course of study. The implications of these findings for regional agencies, for institutions and for students are considered.     

School Design: A Classificatory Framework for a 21st-Century Approach to School Improvement

As attention turns from restructuring to school design as a means of securing school improvement, a bewildering range of design programmes/models are available. How are schools to make informed choices about their relative merits? This article suggests a classification, based on 10 criteria, by which to categorize their features, and to draw comparisons between them. The particular design adopted by the case school is described and analysed in terms of the classificatory framework, and its implementation by the perspective of the school leader/change agent. Finally, conclusions are drawn about the usefulness of the framework as a heuristic “device” for characterizing school design models (SDM) and their implementation. It is argued that refinement of the classificatory framework would result from similar case studies and the perspectives of others – besides the school leader/change agent – involved in their implementation.