Conservativism has gained significant influence on education-policy making and debates about education in many Anglophone countries. While conservative educational governments have advanced some neoliberal governance trends, they have also introduced characteristic neoconservative education elements, notably in the area of curricular content. This…

Despite a growing chorus among conservatives about the problem of politics in the classroom, those on the right have struggled to advance long-term solutions to it. Indeed, up to now, state lawmakers concerned about politics in the classroom have typically faced a binary choice. The following three options to protect students from radical politics…

It has become increasingly clear that education is a site of conflict. This essay examines the ideological positions that now dominate educational reforms and suggests a number of roles that critically democratic educators should play in confronting these reforms. It then details the contributions that the authors included in this special issue…

Background: Local control has historically been a prominent principle in education policymaking and governance. Culminating with the passage of No Child Left Behind (NCLB), however, the politics of education have been nationalized to an unprecedented degree, and local control has all but disappeared as a principle framing education policymaking.…

Since the 1990s, Chile has participated in all major international large-scale assessment studies (ILSAs) of the IEA and OECD, as well as the regional ones conducted by UNESCO in Latin America, after it had been involved in the very first international Science Study in 1970-1971. This article examines the various ways in which these studies have…

AJK (Azad Jammu & Kashmir) government is a small administrative unit under overall sovereignty of Pakistan. It has a total area of 13297 sq kilometers with a population of about 3.8 million. This study critically examines the problems of primary education system in AJK State specifically in govt. primary schools in Pakistan administrative…

The purpose of "A Better Future for our Schools" is to contribute to the debate about what a new government after 2015 should seek to achieve. It identifies 10 areas where current policies are clearly inadequate and damaging and identifies a range of actions to address each area. The manifesto is the outcome of debates organised by the…

New Zealand has an internationally unique approach to early childhood education, which includes a bicultural early childhood curriculum, a robust infrastructure of organisation and management overseen by the New Zealand Ministry of Education, and a growing reputation for innovation in early childhood teaching and learning. This paper examines how…

Background: Teacher education in Scotland has developed its own trajectory for many years and this distinctiveness appears to have increased since the creation of the Scottish Parliament in 1999. Teachers' pay and conditions were addressed in 2001 by the agreement "A teaching profession for the 21st century." This agreement led to a…

This article addresses accountability issues that affect music education policy and implementation in the neoliberal education system. Using examples from education reform in Ontario, Canada, the author argues that two forms of accountability imbalances fostered by the neoliberal state--hierarchical answerability over communicative reason and…

This article comments on international consequences of performativity cultures and curriculum standardization, focusing particularly on the situation in England. It highlights the divide between youth culture and school learning, and the particular damage for poorer students. It argues the impact of the English performativity regime on teacher…

Schools and teachers in England have found themselves coerced into a situation where high-stakes testing, scrutiny of "performance" and the generation of data for competitive league tables have dominated the educational experience of young people. There is a growing recognition from all quarters that this model is failing and that…

The purpose of the study is to thoroughly examine a school district's plan for developing, implementing, and monitoring a strategic plan for adequately preparing students with twenty-first century skills or the marketable skills students will need in order to contribute to the dynamic twenty-first century workplace while meeting federal and state…

This article argues that public education needs to be reclaimed to fulfill its role as a "democratising force" to address social and economic inequality and to respect and recognise diversity and difference. By analysing historical developments in federal policy, funding and economic contexts a case is developed to demonstrate that the…

This article examines the impact of the Cross thematic approach on Greek and Greek Cypriot secondary education. The major argument put forward is that the Cross thematic approach (CTA) affects not only pedagogy and educational knowledge but teacher professionalism as well. In justifying this argument, the Cross thematic approach is considered as a…