This study aims to examine the perceptions of principles, assistant principals, teachers, and academicians on the applicability of the policies included in the 2023 Education Vision Blueprint (VB) published by the Ministry of National Education (MEB) to improve the quality of education. Conducting phenomenological method as one of the qualitative…

Although educational leaders may be optimistic about initiating change, lasting reforms are rare. The group polarization literature, although dated, provides an important explanation for a very current problem. The theory holds that when there are differences of opinion to begin with, a counter-conformity effect works among members of groups.…

Comments on how traditional education promotes conformity and stifles creativity, on the history of humans' relationship with nature, on depleted energy capital, and on solar power and other alternate energy resources. Includes a poem on youth, flowers, and learning. (MH)

During the mid-nineteenth century, Americans created the functional equivalent of earlier state religious establishments. Supported by mandatory taxation, purportedly inclusive, and vested with messianic promise, public schooling, like the earlier established churches, was touted as a bulwark of the Republic and as an essential agent of moral and…

Argues that advocates of content-based art education and other art educators attempting to move art to a central place in the school curriculum are struggling against unrecognized social realities. Concludes that competing value structures of creativity versus acquiescence and originality versus conformity are responsible. (CFR)

This paper discusses problematic issues related to teacher education in the Professional Development School (PDS) environment, noting the assumption that partnership between the academy and the public school via PDSs is the foundation of all teacher development. It cautions that while partnership is now deeply embedded in the United States, there…

School improvement involves more than just fitting different packages into existing structures. Though education should empower students to become skilled and vital, it often encourages obedience and conformity. There is a bureaucratization that distorts teaching and learning. Theory and cooperative planning are both crucial to educational…

Teaching conformity through coercion limits students' willingness to take risks and make decisions regarding their learning. In contrast, a Foxfire classroom environment that meets psychological needs empowers students to make choices about their learning, eliminates fear of failure, allows students to establish their own standards of achievement,…

Discusses educational reform movements as derived from changes in the world economy affecting public education in both developed and developing countries. Examines national reform movements in several countries, noting the shift to closer conformity with increasingly uniform international standards. Treats the politics of school reform and the…

Visionary leaders who take risks, transform schools, and initiate innovations will not emerge from current mentoring structures (comprised of selection, compatibility, sanctions, and conformity), unless these structures are altered. Discusses contradictions between the mentoring paradigm and the call for transformational leaders, and recommends…

Recent incorporation of a performance assessment in Arizona's test mandate provides an opportunity to examine the assumptions and beliefs underlying measurement-driven reform. Efforts to meld cognitive-constructivist beliefs about pupil learning and assessment contradict behaviorist beliefs about changing teachers and reforming schools. Mandates…

Statement 34 is the most significant change in the history of governmental accounting. It is a dramatic change in the way school districts report and present financial information. This new reporting model affects every public-school organization that issues financial statements in conformity with generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP).…

Charter schools elevate choice and competition to foster educational innovations. Indeed, these market-style mechanisms are intended to challenge standardized practices associated with district administration of schools. However, a comprehensive review of practices in charter schools indicates that, although some organizational innovations are…

Noting that education is viewed as the route to success in American society, the paper argues that education has not lived up to this promise. Emphasis on conformity and regimentation, fostering of competition and exclusion behaviors, classism, racism, and a microfocal perspecitive of social problems serve as barriers to full realization of the…

This article traces the demise of creativity in the national curriculum in England and Wales. It is argued that the creative dimension in the national curriculum has been purged by various government directives since the Ruskin speech in 1976, all aiming to introduce provisions of standardisation, centralisation, and vocationalisation of…