The George Mason University (Mason) offices responsible for institutional reporting and assessment were merged to strengthen and solidify their functions and expertise. The organizational structure creating the Office of Institutional Effectiveness and Planning (OIEP) was intended to engineer a new paradigm where assessment would inform the…

Workforce development is one of the top issues for state higher education executives today. Employers are actively looking for ways to address skill gaps and labor shortages in their companies. To address these talent gaps, states are aligning their academic program approval process with state workforce needs. Minimal research has explored the…

In this article we share our learning experiences on the organizational design barriers we perceived to have encountered with scenario planning in higher education for program development. Our perceived barriers discussed include misalignment of culture and change intervention; constructing organizational reality and meaning making; knowledge…

It has been 20 years since the Bologna Process has been realized, and the present paper examines efforts made to harmonise higher education in Africa. Similar to other continents, the higher education reform in Africa is inspired by the Bologna Process. This is clearly reflected in the African Union strategy for harmonisation of higher education…

This study describes the development of a climate change SSIBL-STEAM program that was aligned to the Grade 6 elementary school national curriculum using the ADDIE model for design. The efficacy of the climate change SSIBL-STEAM program was investigated by measuring the impact of the program on cultivating elementary students' personalities…

This article examines program development in teacher education, with an emphasis on how teacher educators pursue coherence. The analysis contributes to existing literature by investigating how coherence is pursued as part of program development and by analytically situating coherence as an emergent achievement that requires the alignment of…

Recent national reports (e.g., Carnegie Corporation 2009; National Research Council 2012a) call for increased attention to Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) education to better prepare students for the demands of a scientific, technical, creative and critical thinking workforce (Honey, Pearson, & Schweingruber, 2014;…

As additional states embark on the process of implementing four-year degrees at community colleges, they can learn from others' experience for help navigating the legislative, regulatory, and program approval processes. This brief uses examples from states currently offering bachelor's degrees at their community colleges to provide guidance for…

In February 2020, the Ministry of Education asked the New Zealand Council for Educational Research (NZCER) to examine the curriculum-levelling construct that sits at the heart of The New Zealand Curriculum (Ministry of Education, 2007). A key goal of the research was to investigate, whether-- and if so, how--the construct helps (or hinders)…

This introduction to the discipline of education enterprise architecture, or EEA, explains briefly the needs that EEA addresses, its benefits, components and the essential elements of its governance and management. At its core, education enterprise architecture is the bridge connecting the business/ program side of the organization and information…

States in the midst of implementing evaluation reforms face a common dilemma: how to ensure that all your districts are implementing quality educator evaluation systems while still providing them with the flexibility to design systems best suited to their own unique needs. One answer is to create an equivalency process (also known as an approval…

The "Alliance for Excellent Education" presents this Fact Sheet of answers to key questions raised surrounding implementation of the Common Core State Standards. Questions raised include: (1) What Are the Common Core State Standards (CCSS)?; (2) How Were the CCSS Developed?; (3) How Were the CCSS Adopted?; (4) What Changes in Instruction…

By investigating the factors facilitating and hindering a small scale educational change, this study highlights the crucial role of leadership in designing and implementing an educational change at a transnational university in Vietnam. During its initiation stage, the programme leaders seemed to fail to (1) set up a clear schedule for changing,…

This brief summarizes efforts to reform developmental education at Zane State College and the Community College of Baltimore County (CCBC). Focused on accelerating student success and progress, the two schools pursued distinctive approaches to reform that aligned with their institutional missions and student populations. Recognizing that the…

The purpose of this issue brief is to provide a comprehensive overview of the policies behind the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) and to outline some of the initiatives now in place to address the needs of English language learners (ELLs) in relation to the CCSS. This issue brief contains the appendices: (1) Assessment Consortia Time Lines; and…