Government investment in early childhood education and care (ECEC) supports children's ongoing development, learning and wellbeing, and delivers the skills and knowledge required for a thriving society and economy. Assessing the efficiency of this investment, as well as methods for ongoing monitoring are important steps in delivering effective…

The study examines attitudes, concerns, self-efficacy, and intentions of secondary school teachers from Australia (n = 140) and Switzerland (n = 221) to teach in inclusive classrooms. Australian educators had more positive attitudes towards inclusion, fewer concerns and higher self-efficacy to teach inclusively when compared to their Swiss…

This quantitative study investigates the role of satisfaction variables as predictors of institutional recommendation for over 45,000 international students at 96 different institutions globally. Using data from the International Student Barometer, it demonstrates which aspects of the university experience are most significant on students'…

Building active and informed citizens is a major part of civics and citizenship education in order to enhance and sustain democracies. Civic learning and civic action opportunities within school contexts are commonly claimed to promote an active and informed citizenry. In the present research, we examine the meaning of formal civics education and…

This article focuses on analysing the effect of educational differentiation policies of OECD educational systems on socioeconomically disadvantaged students, based on data from PISA 2009. The analysis is conducted on the basis of a definition of two subgroups of disadvantaged students: those that achieve high scores, and those obtaining scores…

PreschoolThis study investigated the nature of parent involvement and parent-educator communication in prior-to-school early childhood settings and school, to explore relations to social capital variables and consistencies and changes in practices over time. Parent interview and teacher questionnaire data from two waves of the Longitudinal Study…

Increasing participation in higher education for under-represented groups has been a goal of both the Australian Government and Australian universities. In particular, the government has invested in a wide range of programs to support the efforts of universities to increase the enrollment and completion rates of: (1) Aboriginal and Torres Strait…

Recent Australian government targets for higher education participation have produced a flurry of activity focused on raising the aspirations of students from low socioeconomic status (SES) backgrounds. In this paper we test two key assumptions underpinning much of this activity: that students from low-SES backgrounds hold lower career…

This paper reports the results of an international study examining pre-service teacher reports of teaching self-efficacy for inclusive education; principally focusing on the explanatory relationship between a scale designed to measure teaching self-efficacy in this area and key demographic variables within Canada, Australia, Hong Kong, and…

In this study, a comprehensive educational effectiveness model is tested in relation to student's civic knowledge. Multilevel analysis was applied on the dataset of the IEA Civic Education Study (CIVED; Torney-Purta, Lehmann, Oswald, & Schulz, 2001), which was conducted among junior secondary-school students (age 14), their schools, and their…

Taking a break between completing high school and entering university is common overseas, and is becoming more popular in Australia. There are many reasons why young people take a gap year. It may be to travel, to take a break, to study, or to work. The authors' definition of a "gapper" is a young person who commenced university one to…

This longitudinal quantitative study compared literacy achievement of students from second through sixth grade based on two organizational systems: graded (traditional) and nongraded (multiage) classrooms. The California Standards Test (CST) scaled and proficiency scores for English-Language Arts (ELA) were used as the study's independent variable…

The current main world university rankings broadly group the leading research universities of nations. Australia's Go8 universities are generally within the top 250 ranked universities, with several institutions in the top 50-100 on some measures. This recognition is commendable, however imperfect the individual rankings may be. Use is made of…

The extent to which students feel connected to their school is a powerful predictor of many health, social and academic outcomes. These outcomes are also influenced by other factors including characteristics of the school such as its size, policies and practices, but how do these characteristics modify the relationship between a student and his or…

Internationally, the attention being paid by governments to research education is growing in line with the increasing numbers of students undertaking research degrees. With this emphasis on research students it is, however, becoming clear that there is a specific category of research student that has been overlooked to the point that they are…