Reviews

Vivienne Gross, Hackney Child and Family Consultation Service, Child Abuse and the School's Response: A Workshop for Professionals Involved with Ghildren/Young People from Nursery to Further Education by Eve Brock. Harlow, Essex: Longman, 1992. 22pp. ISBN 0 58210060 7, £25.00

Louise O'Connor, Roehampton Institute, Social Education and Personal Development Studies in Primary Education by Delwyn and Eva Tattum. London: David Fulton, 1992. 194pp. pb ISBN 185346 110 5, £12.99

Sue Smedley, Froebel Institute College, Stress in Teaching by Jack Dunham. London and New York: Routledge, 1992. 200pp. hb ISBN 0 415 06634 4, £35, pb ISBN 0 415 06635 2, £12.99

David Thomas, Department of Education University of Liverpool, Learning Support for Young People in Transition: Leaving School for Further Education and Work by Jean McGinfy and John Fish. Milton Keynes: Open University Press. 116pp. pb ISBN 0 335 09765 0, n.p.     

A Comprehensive Approach to Handling Sensitive Issues in Schools,with Special Reference to Loss and Grief

The School Watch initiative is centred in South Wales and involves police liaison officers, primary schools and their pupils. In each interested school, the scheme is explained and the pupils then decide if they want to take part. A pupils' committee is elected which is given support and guidance by the liaison officer. A key element of the scheme is the involvement of the pupils themselves and the way the pupils' committee plays a major part in the choice and running of activities. The scheme benefits pupils both in terms of their personal and social development and in their attitudes to the police. The paper ends with a number of examples of the type of work that schools have undertaken within this scheme.     

Subjected to review: engendering quality and power in higher education

Both feminism and quality assurance movements have attempted to deconstruct and reconstruct the academy. Both have called for more transparency in procedures, accountability from elite professional groups and the privileging of the student experience. Both are globalized systems calling for transformation. However, it is questionable as to whether these two forces for change can form strategic alliances, or whether indeed they are in oppositional relationship. As a dominant regime of power in the UK academy today, quality assurance both exposes the micropolitics of gendered power in organizations and creates its own structures and systems of power. Quality assurance is part of the modernization process of the public services. However, gender equity is not a performance indicator in UK quality audits. In this paper, I interrogate the gendered implications of quality assurance, with particular reference to the assessment of teaching and learning in the UK (the Quality Assurance Agency's Subject Review). Drawing on empirical data and conceptual critiques, I will argue that quality assurance, as a regime of power, is gendered in its conception and practice.