Gender-Aware Supervision in Marriage and Family Counseling and Therapy: How Far Have We Actually Come?

A systemic cognitive-developmental framework is used to critique how the field of marriage and family counseling and therapy supervision currently integrates issues of gender.     

Big Policies/Small World: An introduction to international perspectives in education policy

In this paper the primary emphasis is upon the general and common elements in contemporary, international education policy, but nonetheless the discussion also considers the processes of translation and recontextualisation involved in the realisation or enactment of policy in specific national and local settings. A set of generic 'problems' which constitute the contemporary social, political and economic conditions for education and social policy making are adumbrated. The emergence of ideological and 'magical' solutions to these problems is identified and the means of the dissemination of these solutions are discussed. A relationship between the global market and the marketisation of education is suggested and explored.     

‘Wicked Problems’ and the Work of the School

As communities respond to challenges, threats and opportunities, organisations are changing in significant ways — new organisational designs, new communities of practice, new skills and new forms of human capital are sought. Yet K-12 school systems appear to be permanently failing organisations, not changing despite being shrouded by the rhetoric of change and entrapped in the competing expectations of different stakeholders. Using the idea of creative design and innovation as the cornerstone for learning and a focus on wicked problems for authentic audiences for the work of students and teachers, this article explores the opportunity of such a change and the barriers to enactment. Case examples are given of problem-based learning with design at the heart of the learning process and an analysis of schools as permanently failing organisations is provided. Since the human capital needs of the 21st century require different skills from those of the last century, this approach is seen as essential. It demands a transformation of our schools, not continuous improvement.