Effective leadership and management are increasingly recognised as vital components of successful schooling. This paper examines how they are practiced in England, where there is a high degree of centralization, notably in respect of finance and staffing, but within a tightly constrained curriculum and inspection framework. The paper discusses…

This contribution is an edited version of the "Alumni Lecture" organised by the Department of Education of the University of Oxford at Lady Margaret Hall on 15th September 2011. The article reviews the drift towards the centralisation of power in the way the schooling system is run, the conflict between a desire for equity in education…

The governing bodies of publicly funded schools in England are currently facing a number of substantive challenges of various kinds. Many of the challenges are long-standing, while others relate to the current context for governing wrought by recent education policy developments initiated by central government. A number of the challenges are…

This article reports the findings from an ongoing evaluation of a new model for collaboration among secondary schools: the Birmingham Collegiate Academies. The claims the authors make in this article are based on two years' field work and draw on individual interviews and more informal discussions, attendance at meetings of headteachers and other…

A recently announced government initiative for educational reform in Cyprus has set school autonomy high on the agenda. This article aims to throw more light into this effort, while localizing the intention for decentralization within the context and peculiarities of the Cyprus educational system. In particular, this article outlines the…

Our focus in this article is on the lessons learned about effective change from international experience with large-scale reform over the last 20 years. The central lesson now evident is that sustained improvement in student outcomes requires a sustained effort to change teaching and learning practices in thousands and thousands of classrooms, and…

While university programs for preparing educational leaders in the U.S. have come under fire, England's recently established National College for School Leadership has been held up as a model to emulate. Tony Bush reports from England on the perceptions there of this highly influential new player. (Contains 21 endnotes.)

This article reflects on the historic tensions of education under capitalism, arguing that they have been exacerbated in our era of neo-liberal globalisation. Government drives for greater "accountability" and "effectiveness" are a blinkered response to the threefold global crisis we face: poverty and debt; a collapse of the…

This paper analyzes the implications of the Education Reform Act of 1988 on further education in Great Britain. The six major sections of the paper examine the following: (1) the sections of the act; (2) major proposals in the Education Reform Act 1988; (3) other general information about the act; (4) summary of further education clauses of the…

In this article, we ask "how can we judge whether a policy initiative produces innovation?". We focus first on the concept of innovation, touching on some aspects of its recent development, noting a resurgence of interest in it over the past few years in the schools policy field in England and proposing a tentative definition. We, then,…

Case study data from six primary schools are drawn upon to examine the reality of primary headteacher leadership. Three alternative theoretical models of leadership are used to analyse the ways in which it has changed since the Education Reform Act (1988) and the implications of these changes for leading teaching and learning. Prior to 1988…

In this article, the author discusses how England refines its accountability reforms. When the Conservative government crafted the Education Reform Act of 1988, which mandates a national curriculum for England, Wales, and Northern Ireland, as well as national-curriculum tests at ages 7, 11, and 14, schools in England were permitted to secede from…

Music service teachers' biographies and occupational stages are discussed in this article. The life histories of 28 instrumental and vocal teachers, aged between 22 and 60 years, are explored. These individuals work for a Local Education Authority music service in the United Kingdom. Their occupation entails travelling between various state…

Despite evidence of ineffectiveness, the American educational system remains tied to the child-centered, Piagetian approach to educating children. Based on the romantic notions of Rousseau, this approach maintains that children should not be viewed as receptacles of information that is dispensed by teachers but as active discoverers in a learning…