Education Reform as a Governmental Strategy

This paper reviews the crisis in Romanian universities since the country's political transition in 1989, and describes the government's strategy for revitalizing the higher education system. Attention is drawn to the expansion of access to higher education, the dramatic increase of enrollments in social science fields, the spontaneous establishment of private higher education institutions, and to the many difficulties institutions are experiencing in coping with these changes especially because of resource constraints. Comprehensive reform of the role of the state in the financing and governance of higher education are proposed. The government's reform strategy involves accreditation of public and private institutions, establishment of open transparent mechanisms for allocating institutional and research funding, as well as changes in the structure of academic employment. Successful implementation will require strengthening the fragile management capacity of the Ministry of Education and the higher education institutions.

This paper reviews the crisis in Romanian universities since the country's political transition in 1989 and describes the government's strategy for revitalizing the higher education system. Attention is drawn to the expansion of access to higher education, the dramatic increase of enrollments in social science fields, the spontaneous establishment of private higher education institutions, and the many difficulties institutions are experiencing in coping with these changes, especially because of resource constraints. Comprehensive reform of the role of the state in the financing and governance of higher education are proposed. The government's reform strategy involves accreditation of public and private institutions, establishment of open transparent mechanisms for allocating institutional and research funding, as well as changes in the structure of academic employment. Successful implementation will require strengthening the fragile management capacity of the Ministry of Education and the higher education institutions.

This paper takes the vigorous political debate unleashed in Germany by the results of the PISA study as a stimulus to take a closer look at the strategic aims and effects of the current education reforms, of which the PISA study is only one example. It shows that the reform measures underpin a powerful process of normalisation. In this context, the PISA study, along with other reform measures, can be seen as a ‘power stabiliser’. The paper indicates how techniques of political domination are linked with ‘technologies of the self’ and how the ‘discourse of self organization’ can be seen as the core of a governmental strategy to assimilate education more thoroughly than ever before into a network of disciplinary procedures and ‘voluntary self‐control’.

India's socio-economic diversity has spurred innovative solutions to address challenges like poverty, health disparities, education inequality, and environmental degradation. Initiatives such as Barefoot College, SEWA, and iCALL empower women, provide financial independence, and make mental health care accessible. Economic models like Amul and M-Pesa revolutionize rural livelihoods and financial inclusion, while environmental efforts by Goonj and Selco India promote sustainability. Digital Empowerment Foundation bridges the digital divide, and healthcare programs like Jeevan Dharani utilize telemedicine to improve rural access. Government schemes like Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana and educational reforms by Teach for India foster equity. These efforts exemplify India's commitment to sustainable development and inclusive growth.

Controlled Freedom - the Formation of the Control Society My analysis develops via the following five conceptual steps. The first step links up with Foucault's analysis of techniques of ‘soft’ discipline, which relates to ‘classical’ reform pedagogy, in the transition period from the 19th to the 20th century. The second step thematises the shifts in these disciplinary techniques in the context of the crisis of the so-called ‘environments of enclosure’. Here there is a particular focus on Deleuze's arguments concerning the emergence of a modern ‘society of control’. The third step considers the specific form of the ‘government of the social’, which Foucault approaches with the concept of ‘governmentality’. The fourth step aims to show that the current educational reforms can be understood as a ‘governmental strategy’. The fifth step, finally, thematises the inconsistency of governmental practices. It pursues the possibility that such practices advance, en passant or contrary to their aims, their own contradiction: the preparedness and capacity for critical opposition.

This article discusses the interaction between comprehensive state education reform and curricular services for special needs students—mainly economically disadvantaged students eligible for state and federal compensatory education services. The interaction between education reform and categorical programs fuses several central issues related to federal and state educational program implementation: (a) can top-down mandates for change work, (b) what rules and regulations are needed to insure faithful implementation of key programmatic goals, (c) what local discretion is needed to insure local commitment to substantive program elements, and (d) what central government strategies are needed to produce high program quality? California addressed these issues by adopting a mix of top-down and bottom-up tactics, regulations and assistance mechanisms as the key to education improvement for both regular and categorical program students. Data from eight schools in three California districts provide encouraging evidence that the strategies seem to be taking hold at the school level, including the intended services for students in compensatory education programs. Evidence suggests that excellence and equity are not necessarily incompatible. Whether student performance improves is as yet unclear.

This article discusses the interaction between comprehensive state education reform and curricular services for special needs students—mainly economically disadvantaged students eligible for state and federal compensatory education services. The interaction between education reform and categorical programs fuses several central issues related to federal and state educational program implementation: (a) can top-down mandates for change work, (b) what rules and regulations are needed to insure faithful implementation of key programmatic goals, (c) what local discretion is needed to insure local commitment to substantive program elements, and (d) what central government strategies are needed to produce high program quality? California addressed these issues by adopting a mix of top-down and bottom-up tactics, regulations and assistance mechanisms as the key to education improvement for both regular and categorical program students. Data from eight schools in three California districts provide encouraging evidence that the strategies seem to be taking hold at the school level, including the intended services for students in compensatory education programs. Evidence suggests that excellence and equity are not necessarily incompatible. Whether student performance improves is as yet unclear.

ABSTRACTThis article examines how notions of health and citizenship have become entangled in US science education reforms targeting particular populations. Current science education policy assumes that marginalized groups have been historically ignored, and that new research is required to “make diversity visible” in order to adapt instruction for those students. This article questions that premise, asking instead how key practices of US science education emerged in response to the fabricated presence of racialized (non)citizens. Interweaving lines of inquiry from cultural studies and science & technology studies, I analyse a set of pedagogies that circulated across US science education, public health, and colonial projects in the early twentieth century. I explore how this pedagogical apparatus doubled as a strategy of governance, rendering citizenship into a biomedical status that had to be proven rather than assumed. Finally, I raise questions about recent reforms that hope to leverage public health concerns (e.g. obesity) to make science instruction more inclusive and culturally responsive. A danger is that efforts to respond to the needs of “diverse groups” may inadvertently reinscribe diversity as pathology. This can occur when reforms continue to rely on educational practices that mark exclusionary boundaries of biomedical citizenship.

Performance evaluation, as a multidimensional and comprehensive assessment tool, plays a pivotal role in accurately reflecting the quality of higher education and effectively promoting institutional governance. In the evolving landscape of educational reform, non-profit private universities in China face pressing challenges in leveraging performance evaluations to standardize internal operations, guide strategic development, and foster public trust. This paper focuses on these institutions and conducts an in-depth analysis of existing problems in performance evaluation practices. Drawing on contemporary theoretical frameworks and empirical experiences, it proposes feasible, targeted governance strategies. The aim is to offer both theoretical insights and practical guidelines to support the sustainable development of non-profit private universities and to help these institutions better integrate into the national education system while fulfilling their social missions.

Beginning with a reflection on the Participation and Equity Program (PEP) in Australia in the 1980s, this response describes the distinctive ideological shift from a social democratic to a market conception of equity in education over the past three decades. This shift has been accompanied by changes in the techniques of educational governance, from the collaborative approach of the PEP, which emphasised the importance of trust in teachers as professionals, to new managerialism focused on efficiency and accountability. Market reforms in education have continued to use such traditionally socially democratic notions as equity, but have been enormously successful in re-articulating their meaning. A commentary is provided on the papers in this Special Issue and their collective analysis of governmental strategies that have led to this re-articulation of equity; the extent to which these strategies have been successful; the consequences they have had on students and school communities, and for the work of teachers and schools; and possibilities for creating new approaches in education that undermine the seemingly hegemonic neo-liberal imaginary and work towards a more progressive democratic view of educational equity.

Culture, understood broadly, lay at the heart of contrasting right-wing strategies for government in France during the pivotal decade of 2002-2012. Looking at issues of political secularism, educational reform, televisual performance, public memory and nation-branding, Ahearne analyses how Presidents Chirac and Sarkozy sought to redefine contemporary French identity. The study extends prevailing conceptions of 'cultural policy', and shows how this constitutes a core dimension, alongside economic and social policies, of modern right-wing government. It traces, over the course of the decade in question, a dramatic hardening of the attitudes and values informing these programmes for cultural hegemony. These reflect enduring transformations in the political and symbolic landscape of contemporary France

Research on Inclusive Education offers pertinent background material, encompassing basic definitions, conceptual underpinnings, relevant legislation, and a detailed survey of national schemes and programs to promote educational opportunities for all children (ROSMIATI et al., 2019).The educational landscape mirrors society; therefore, educational reforms should also aim at building an equal society that appreciates, respects, and celebrates diversity.Characterized by the interaction of personal, social, and environmental factors, inclusivity extends from disability to gender, ethnic, and linguistic equity.The goal is to provide all children the opportunity to learn, grow, develop character, and realize their full potential.Institutions like schools, colleges, and universities should co-operate with family, communities, non-governmental organizations, and local administration to foster emotional and social intelligence.Education should continue after childhood, with individuals pursuing growth and development through self-learning and acquiring new skills, values, and knowledge.

The article provides an impact assessment of the current European higher education reform (Bologna process) in the context of German educational federalism. The goal is to come to grips with the puzzling observation that the reforms have had a large impact, even though the joint decision-making trap of German educational federalism has continuously impeded structural changes in previous decades. It suggests that the reason why the Bologna process has been so influential is its openness, ambiguity, and the complete absence of binding commitments. These characteristics of soft governance dovetail with the strategy of the central government and the federal states to protect their political autonomy against potential threats resulting from inter- and transnational political cooperation as well as the national reform of the constitutional principles of federalism at home. However, drawing on empirical examples of policy fragmentation, understood as the co-existence of partly incompatible reform islands, illustrates the costs of soft governance in the national implementation process.

This article examines how and why the US reconstructed Okinawa in Japan, with a focus on the theme of ‘self’ and ‘others’ in educational interaction. I argue that during the occupation of Okinawa, the US tried to detach Okinawa from Japan socio-culturally, using the historically based racial tensions between them by promoting the local ‘Ryukyuan’ identity. The US goal was to enhance its military and ideological presence in Okinawa, projecting its long-term role as a keystone in Cold War Asia. The US policy of transforming Okinawan identity is viewed in three ways: the transmission of political and socio-cultural values through foreign education reform and transfer of American models; the ideological rationales that legitimised the reform; and the political and historical context in which the reforms were enacted. The US educational intervention in Okinawa illuminates the scheme of global governance that the new ‘empire’ mapped out in the post-WWII geopolitical context.

Teaching management is the main content of comprehensively deepening the reform of higher education, and it is the guarantee for the realization of teaching tasks and teaching goals. At present, there are three major difficulties in the teaching management of colleges and universities in our country: insufficient credit system supporting planning, unbalanced status of scientific research and teaching, and insufficient humanistic care. In response to these difficulties, we need to continuously improve teaching management policies, improve credit-based teaching, coordinate the status of teaching and scientific research, promote the benign interaction between teaching, learning and management, provide new support conditions for teaching management reform, and improve colleges and universities. Teaching quality and teaching level.