University–School Partnerships in English Pre-service Teacher Education: A Dialogic Inquiry into a Co-teaching Initiative

Evidence has been accumulating for some time about the impact of standards-based education reforms on schools and schooling, but there has been little research investigating the influence of these reforms on university-based initial teacher education (ITE). This article critically inquiries into the effects of these reforms on an ITE co-teaching project where a secondary English teacher in a school was seconded to work for a year as a teacher educator in an Australian university in a praxis-based partnership. Using Cavarero’s framing of ‘who’ and ‘what’ narratives, and Bakhtinian discourse theory, the authors present three autobiographical narratives exploring different perspectives on their experiences in the co-teaching partnership. The article affirms the value of school–university praxis partnerships for speaking back to standards-based reforms, but acknowledges that this speaking back involves complex relational and dialogic work in grappling with institutional and system-wide policies and practices.     

Information processing by intellectually gifted pupils solving mathematical problems

What differences may be found in the way gifted pupils, as compared with average pupils from the second form of lower secondary education, process information while solving mathematical problems? Gifted pupils apparently solved the problems better, faster and needed less assistance than average pupils. A global distinction of the subprocesses orientation, execution and evaluation also allows for the conclusion that in most cases the gifted pupils processed information in a different fashion. The yield of this line of research should be the improvement of education in two respects. For one, the results may induce teachers to adapt their teaching to gifted pupils. Secondly they may try to teach average pupils to process information like gifted pupils typically would.     

Teacher Testing and Certification: An Historical Perspective from Ontario

Certification tests for elementary teachers in Ontario were introduced in 1871 and in 2002. Although the provincial government’s stated goals for the testing programs were similar, the 2002 program was opposed by the initial teacher education programs and the teachers’ associations, but the 1871 program was not. The authors argue that much of this difference can be attributed to the relationship of the tests to other requirements for certification and the process for determining the content of the tests.     

A Systematic Literature Review of Funding for Higher Education Institutions in Developed Countries

Resource allocation and funding in higher education is crucial to the success of reform and transformation of our higher education system. With a view to identifying trends and best practices in the area, utilizing a method of systematic literature review, we have critically reviewed relevant theories and practices from developed counties that are covered in the scholarly literature published in English in the past 10 years. Our review has revealed: (1) Several universal trends have exerted a decisive impact on resource allocation in higher education, for example, funding reduction and tuition fee increases, performancebased funding, privatization, corporatization, and internationalization; (2) Several theories underpin key research in the area, for example, new institutional economics, resource dependence theory, and political economy; (3) Several controversial issues have made their way into public debate, for example, higher education as a public good or private good, academic capitalism, educational equity, and the role of econometrics.     

Untangling the Grip of White Privilege in Education through Consultation and Systems Change: Introduction to the Special Issue

ABSTRACT

This article introduces the articles in the special issue, School consultation grounded in social justice: Dismantling white privilege in education. The authors first highlight salient aspects of each of the five articles. The article ends with a call to action for educators to use consultation to effect systems change that will interrupt white privilege and racist practices in education.