What it means to be a "student" varies within and between countries. Apart from the wide variety of school types and school quality that is experienced by young people, there also is, accompanying increased rates of school participation, a growing population of students who work part-time. The theoretical and actual consequences of student work…

This article attempts to explore how parents are involved in their daughters' decision-making around their higher education path. It draws on qualitative research that investigated the process through which young women from the UK and Saudi Arabia reached a decision about a subject or an institution for higher educational study. The paper…

This study aimed at comparing administrative processes in two schools, one in the United States and one in Turkey, in light of the two distinct administrative paradigms: the Anglo-Saxon and Napoleonic traditions. The study showed that in the Turkish school, which is thought to be an example of the Napoleonic administrative tradition, school…

In recent decades, the People's Republic of China (PRC) has instigated language policies in education ostensibly designed to foster trilingualism in ethnic minority groups. The policies, which, as this paper shows, vary from region to region, encompass the minority group's home language, Chinese, and English. Based on data arising from interviews,…

Using data from the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), the size of the literacy achievement gap between 15-year-old students from two-parent and those from single-mother households were compared across 18 industrialized nations. This study found that cross-national differences exist in the association between single motherhood…

The intent of capacity building in international development cooperation is to enable people to control their own development. Important premises are ownership, choice and self-esteem. The authors analyse the dynamics of the enabling process in practice, based on their own experiences working for several years in universities in developing…

This paper discusses what cultural values should be imparted to Kenyan students in the post-colonial era. Traditionalists had argued that an education based on Western culture, i.e. colonial culture, was the root cause of the present social and political problems, and therefore it should be de-emphasised. Such an argument, however, is criticised…

As the world settles in to the reality of globalization, it becomes clear that many incongruous facets of human existence have been forced together into a giant tumbler--economy, information systems, finance and people--giving rise to contradictory but also generative responses. Previously excluded and excised "objects" are now occupying intimate…

Much of the "internationalisation" that is currently observed in English universities is driven, whether directly or not, by economic and financial rationales associated with a particular neo-liberal discourse of globalisation into which higher education has been subsumed. This is particularly true for the recruitment of international students…

Providing a richer understanding of why the populations of economically underdeveloped countries are less literate than those who live in wealthier nations is the goal of this paper. Our analysis relies primarily on insights from our own research: ethnographic studies concerning literacy learning and use among unschooled and under-schooled women…

This paper explores literacy and communicative practices among English Gypsies and Irish Travellers in the south of England. It suggests that despite few opportunities for formal schooling in the past, members are actively involved in debates and decisions affecting their future. It suggests that the theoretical concepts of New Literacy Studies,…

This article explores the extent to which participation in alternative human values education affects students' conceptions of agency amidst the economic and HIV/AIDS crises in Ndola, Zambia. Drawing on the concept of transformative agency as developed by critical research in education, this study examines conceptions of agency based on data…

While the importance of attending early learning programmes is increasingly evident, the provision of early learning programmes in developing countries has not grown in parallel. In this paper we examine how attendance in early learning programmes for children aged 3-6 years, the recommended period, differs within and across 52 developing…

This paper focuses on the World Bank/IMF (International Monetary Fund), the OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development) and the WTO (World Trade Organisation) as institutions of transnational policy making. They are all at present making education policies which are decisively shaping current directions and developments in…

Efforts to improve the "quality" of education for all in government primary schools in India have seen a shift towards child-centred teaching. This paper examines the "Joyful Learning" programme, an example of a pedagogic reform implemented in rural primary schools in the southern Indian state of Karnataka. Through an empirical analysis of…