O'Neill argues that the standard social democratic narrative of state schooling as a consensual, whole-of-society commitment to reduce educational inequalities across the system as a whole, for the collective well being of all, has been displaced by marketplace or commodity progressivism. He takes the position that reducing educational…

Data-driven decision making has become an essential component of educational practice across all levels, from chief state school officers to classroom teachers, and has received unprecedented attention in terms of policy and financial support. It was included as one of the four pillars in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (2009),…

The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) initiative continues to gather strength. But the evidence presented by its developers--the National Governors Association (NGA) and the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO)--seems lacking compared to the independent reviews and the available research on the topic that suggest otherwise. In this…

On June 1, 2009, the National Governors Association Center for Best Practices (NGA Center) and the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) issued a press release stating that 49 states and territories had joined the Common Core State Standards Initiative (CCSS). That initiative proposed that all states voluntarily adopt the same set of…

This article highlights how "turnen", the modernised form of earlier gymnastic exercises, emerged in Hungary in the second part of the nineteenth century. It is argued that although the advocates of the "turnen" movement are gradually squeezed from the spheres of modern competitive sports, their strategies of expansion are…

This article addresses the design and application of cost adjustments in state school finance policies intended to compensate local public school districts for differences in the costs of recruiting and retaining teachers. Broadly speaking, the state policy objective for including cost adjustments to state aid for such things as teacher cost…

The Freedom of Information Act (FOI) was used over a three-year period to investigate the curriculum of state schools and academies. The resulting data has shown that spectacular apparent school improvement, in terms of five or more A*-C GCSE /GNVQ passes has been largely brought about by the substitution of mainstream curriculum subjects by much…

Applied research and development activities at regional state colleges and universities bolster their primary mission of undergraduate education as well as contribute to local and statewide economic growth. As states boost efforts to fund and stimulate research as part of an integrated economic development strategy, they should seek to fully…

Use of appropriate measurement methods and the Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium (INTASC) Principles to assess teacher dispositions provides a safety net against legal and political challenges while also providing useful information for outcomes assessment. NCATE (2002) requires the measurement of dispositions as part of its…

Subtractive education through the medium of a dominant language often transfers Indigenous and minority (IM) children to the dominant group linguistically and culturally within one or two generations. It may lead to the extinction of Indigenous languages, thus contributing to the disappearance of the world's linguistic diversity. A partial result…

The last three decades have seen an intensification of commercialization throughout the public sector in general and state schools in particular. Policies designed to introduce business ideologies, structures and practices have operated in tandem with a push to include the corporate world in the running, governance and provision of educational…

This paper argues that key education policy initiatives since the introduction of the National Curriculum in the UK are Government-mediated responses to pressures in the global knowledge economy. Successful implementation of these policies has required a change in the way in which education institutions and professionals are controlled and…

This article critically examines two sets of ideas that have influenced educational reform in the recent past: managerialism and market approaches. It is argued that while each can be demonstrated to have led to useful change, neither provides a basis for future improvement in education. A recent example of change within the State School sector of…

To substantially raise student achievement, the U.S. must address serious problems in educational leadership. Most analysts support proposals for the initial training and professional development of all principals and superintendents across the board. This type of widespread help is needed, but in the author's view, it is important to concentrate…

Contends that organizations such as the ACLU ignore basic structural features of the U.S. public schools and make incorrect assumptions about the nature of values and religion in arguing against recent censorship efforts, thereby promoting secular humanism at the expense of other religious beliefs and strengthening the censorship role of the…