This article critically analyses the current Maltese educational reform process, which aimed to transform educational governance in Malta from a centralized system to a more decentralized one. This longitudinal study adopted a multi-site inquiry of a sample of the colleges involving different stakeholders, including key policy-makers, college…

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…

It is notoriously difficult to classify occupations as professions and to define professional work. Numerous authors have provided criteria for categorising occupations as professions but the judgement still remains a difficult one. Freidson (1991) is clear that professional work is Good Work. It has a moral purpose and arguably that sense of…

In the UK, and elsewhere in the world, schools with a higher level of pupil socio-economic disadvantage generally have lower levels of pupil attainment. However, some primary schools in Wales buck this trend. They have both high levels of disadvantage and high levels of attainment. The authors studied 18 of these schools to answer the questions:…

Since devolution in the UK in 1999, many aspects of social policy in Wales have been developed to respond more distinctively to the needs and requirements of those who live and work in Wales. In education and life-long learning, the Welsh Assembly Government has set out intended policy developments for the first ten years of devolved government in…

The provision of training and development for National Professional Qualifications for Headship (NPQH) and the assessment of the qualification in Wales differ in a number of ways from the provision and assessment in England. This article compares the Welsh and English systems, with a focus on application and selection, price of qualification, time…