Recent UK policy has emphasised both the development of socially mixed communities and the creation of balanced school intakes. In this paper, we use a case study of an area of mixed tenure in eastern England to explore policy in practice and the extent to which mechanisms of segregation impact on both the creation of socially mixed neighbourhoods…

Self-regulation in the governance of higher education systems is often assumed to improve institutional performance, accountability, and responsiveness. Although studies of higher education governance have addressed the extent of self-regulation across national systems, there has been less investigation of the links between self-regulation and…

Internationally, "College for All" policies are creating new forms of vocational higher education (HE), and shifting relationships between HE and further education (FE) institutions. In this paper, we consider the way in which this is being implemented in England, drawing on a detailed qualitative case study of a regional HE-FE…

This article presents a sub-set of findings from a research project describing the experience of four case study schools which have implemented a competence-based curriculum (CBC) for students in their first year of secondary education. Secondary schools are highly departmentalised environments with organisational structures based primarily around…

Aims: This study investigated the commissioning and delivery of advocacy for problem drug users. We aimed to quantify provision, describe the commissioning of advocacy services in Drug Action Teams (DATs) and to identify factors influencing advocacy provision. Methods: A cross-sectional survey of a randomly selected sample of 50 English DATs. The…

This paper provides a contextualised and critical policy analysis of the Rudd government's national schooling agenda in Australia. The specific focus is on the introduction of national literacy and numeracy testing and the recent creation by the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority of the website "My School", which…

An important potential contribution to the efficient use of the health workforce, is the possibility of "skill mix" changes. "Skill mix" is a relatively broad term which can refer to the mix of staff in the workforce or the demarcation of roles and activities among different categories of staff. Most of the policy attention on…

This article explores issues raised in knowledge transformation processes through three separate, but related lenses. It starts with a discussion of the relationship between knowledge transformation and research outputs. In so doing, it encompasses both direct research outputs, that is research reports and papers in journals, and indirect outputs,…

Background: This paper outlines the findings from a research project carried out in the UK that explored the relationship between parental engagement and student achievement. Purpose: The 12-month research project was commissioned to explore the relationship between innovative work with parents and the subsequent impact upon student achievement. A…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to profile the characteristics and entrepreneurial motivations of graduate entrepreneurs from black and minority ethnic (BME) communities. Design/methodology/approach: To gather the data, the authors interviewed selected individuals from within the BME community (including current students and graduates from…

The Bruderhof communities in the United States have organized their own private schools with a distinctly Christian philosophy of education, adding to the interesting mix of American private and religious schools. Rooted in early 20th century German pedagogy, romanticism, and shared responsibility, Bruderhof schools represent the essence of a…

Data derived from "Raising Quality and Achievement" development projects, started in 1999 in more than 80 colleges in England led to conclusions about successful strategies to raise achievement and improve retention and about the meaning of college improvement. The projects were described in the form of case studies. A number of…

Commuting or re-location costs could be an in important influence on students' university choices and might even deter some from going to university. The barriers presented by these costs may be high for lower-income students, and students for whom there are cultural incentives to remain in or close to the parental home. If this is the case, then…

This document explores the United Kingdom's developing practice of recognizing adult students' achievement in ways that make flexible use of the learning outcomes methodology, provide a mix of accredited and non-credited work, and are sensitive to the ethos of adult learning. (That ethos is often characterized by adult students' desire for…