This paper explores how civic engagement as an important dimension of public engagement in higher education has been slow to develop in the UK, despite an important history dating from the "civic universities" in the nineteenth century. I specifically consider the development of "service learning" as an important way in which…

Higher educational practices in post-Soviet Central Asia remain predicated on an authoritarian conception of expertise rooted in an objective and universal science. While the substance of such education has changed since the Soviet era, the form of education remains rooted in Soviet-era discursive ideological practices, practices that encourage…

This paper presents a historical perspective to the development of community music in Australia. Finding political support in Australia's progressive arts policies of the late 1970s, community music is discussed as embracing the principles of access and equity and supporting the development of musical skills in the context of social change and…

This paper presents the main developments in education and care for vulnerable groups of children and youth in Slovenia over the past twenty years. It describes the education system and provides an overview of the development of social pedagogy as a discipline and the practice of working with some groups of vulnerable young people. The trends can…

Having started early in the 1920s as a spontaneously launched educational activity by civil organisations under the influence of American audio-visual theory and practice, Chinese educational technology was later put under governmental management. This paper is composed of five parts covering mainly the historical development of educational…

In this paper, the author outlines what No Child Left Behind policy might mean first in personal then in philosophical terms. First, the author will trace a bit of Obama's own educational development: how he was first set on a personal educational journey and how, proceeding along with that journey, he eventually came to successfully elicit…

This volume begins its global tour with the case of Mexico. The Mexican case is significant because of its original importance in defining the primary types of private higher education. It shows trends that reflect rapid transformations in the country and tensions in developing countries at the intersection of resource constraints, relatively weak…

This article analyses the establishment of the "Instituto Nacional de Chile" between 1810 and 1830 as a crucial element of a political and cultural project advanced from an enlightened and republican elite. Its early inception in 1813 resulted from the necessity of consolidating a republican order, as shown by the different projects…

The focus of this article is the development of adult education. As Kjell Rubenson maintains, adult education has gone through three eras of development: the humanistic, the strong economic period and a softer version of the economic period. Based on this model, we examine whether the development of adult education has similarities across…

The purpose of this article is to share information about the Costa Rican Marine Education Programme in relation to the quality criteria for Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) Schools. We found that the application of these criteria is feasible, not only to the organisation and management of schools that are looking to become ESD Schools,…

This article traces the development of moral education (ME) in Botswana from pre-colonial times to the present day. It shows how during this time ME has undergone three distinct phases of development, each emphasising a particular ideology. In pre-colonial times ME was offered as part of indigenous education in the home and community, both…

In this set of two articles, the authors summarize the history of the practice of character instruction in Christian higher education. They examine character education beginning with the founding of Harvard in 1636 to contemporary times. They note that virtually every historian, theologian, and social scientist acknowledges that character…

The paper draws on critical discourse analysis to examine and discuss some of the key developments in the governing of education in Scotland since the election of the Scottish National Party (SNP) government in May 2007. It analyses these developments, drawing on a study of key policy texts and suggests that discourse analysis has much to…

This paper speculates on the possible contribution of the quality movement to higher education and the perceived dividends received from this, in general, over the past two decades but also, more specifically, with reference to the author's institution in South Africa. The first major quality contribution is a gradual broadening of higher…

Twenty years ago, the federal government in the US first required institutional accrediting organisations, America's principal mechanism for quality assurance in higher education, to review institutional practices with respect to the assessment of student learning outcomes. Much that affects quality assurance has changed in the ensuing two decades…