How do unattached Jamaican youth regard their educational and employment prospects? We investigate perceptions by out-of-school, unattached youth, ages 14-24, who are neither employed nor attending training program. From a human capital theoretical perspective, and based on surveys of Jamaican youth, we explore the prevalence and variability of…

The Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) is a global network of 15 specialized centers employing around 2,000 international scientists and 6,000 national staff in over 100 countries. CGIAR educational approaches to environmental issues have varied amid conflicting perspectives. Inadequate policies, learning resources,…

This article connects world culture and local culture literatures to enhance understanding of educational globalization. Specifically, I examine the worldwide expansion of environmental education organizations (EEOs), which are important catalysts in promoting environmental education. I use a mixed-methods research design: (a) multivariate…

The low literacy rates in developing countries have been repeatedly problematized as a major constraint to socioeconomic development by education planners and policy makers. In the 1950s and 1960s, the dominant rationale for literacy development was one of promoting economic growth. In more recent years, by contrast, literacy has increasingly come…

In this article, the authors develop an argument about the global forces that have led to the explosive growth of national educational assessment and international testing. In particular, the authors argue that the international acceptance of testing comes from key ideological forces in the world polity that are associated with the accelerating…

Drawing on a critical theoretical paradigm and critically engaging with the externalization thesis that Gita Steiner-Khamsi and Jurgen Schriewer have developed, this article examines the politics of "Finnish education" in the ongoing Japanese education reform debate. More specifically, it examines the various discursive uses of "Finnish education…

An increasingly common approach to comparative education research, particularly with respect to mathematics education, has been the exploitation of video technology, not least because the use of video cameras offers several advantages over traditional methods such as direct observation. It is important to acknowledge, however, that video…

This article compares the changes in the determination of educational aspirations from the end of the communist period in 1989 to 2003, focusing on a single postcommunist country, the Czech Republic. The Czech case is particularly relevant for comparative research on educational inequality and aspirations, as previous studies have shown…

Donor and financial institutions, such as the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and others, often promote market-based solutions for the delivery of public services in developing countries. This article examines the use of such market approaches by the World Bank to hire for-profit and nonprofit nongovernmental organizations…

Since the events of September 11, 2001, Islamic institutions of learning have received much attention. Indonesia's "pesantren" (Islamic boarding schools) have been increasingly described as fostering radicalism and violent militancy, particularly in light of purported links between a few of the country's "pesantren" and some of the perpetrators of…