Based on a vertical case study in post-communist Albania, this article examines how three local experts become "in-betweens" who strategically mediate processes of social change. For example, they negotiate constructions of time and place, East and West, policy and practice, state and society. As they localise global educational models, the "in-betweens" concurrently engage in re-making cultural meaning. This analysis thus enhances our understanding of the cultural complexity of international educational policy transfer and localisation.