A long tradition of both State and religious interest and support characterised provision for education on the island of Ireland from the 1700s. Following the partition of Ireland in the 1920s, the newly created political entities of the Irish Free State and Northern Ireland forged separate and distinct education policy trajectories that largely…

This paper reports a study of permanent secretaries who served at the Department for Education (DfE) from 1975 to 2011. Located within a context of theories that explain how government bureaucracies operate, it focuses on Michael Bichard. Appointed in July 1995 when attempts were being made to open Whitehall to non-career civil servants, he…

One neglected aspect of the Gorbachev perestroika era in Russia [1985-1991] was the remarkable "pedagogy of cooperation" (or pedagogika sotrudnichestva) movement, a renewal of the experimental tradition in education. Central to this was Edward Dneprov, a brilliant and forceful individual whose views and personality substantially shaped…

How can the individual preserve his identity within a crowd? How can he/she counter the threats and the temptations of the mass phenomenon? In the following, these questions are answered, correctly based on two contrasting and complementary situations and approaches: on the one hand, the beginnings of the Soviet Union in the 1920s as manifested in…

This paper examines a period in Scottish educational history when civil servants, not politicians, were in the ascendancy in the initiation of policy. The first three Secretaries of the Scotch/Scottish Education Department (SED) -- Henry Craik (1846-1927), John Struthers (1857-1925) and George Macdonald (1862-1940) -- enjoyed considerable…

This article examines the career of the educationalist, Conservative politician and published writer on education and politics, Rhodes Boyson (1925-2012). As an educationalist, Boyson established Highbury Grove Boys' Comprehensive School in Islington, North London: An inner-city school which was antithetical to the wave of progressivism in the…

This paper reports on part of an on-going interview-based study of the eight permanent secretaries who served at the Department for Education from 1976 to 2012. Following a discussion of the relevance of biography to the study of public sector administrators, it presents a portrait of Sir Tim Lankester. Based on his own account and that of…

This article presents a biographical overview of Minseok Ahn's career, specifically highlighting his role as a public sport sociologist. Notably, Ahn has spent time as a student activist, worked as a physical education teacher, served as a scholar with a university appointment, and held office in the South Korean National Assembly. Throughout his…

The educational theories and policies promoted by Ernest L. Boyer (1928-1995), who served as chancellor of the SUNY system, U.S. Commissioner (Secretary) of Education, and president of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, were significantly influenced by his affiliations with the Brethren in Christ Church and the Society of…

Michael Gove's personal tastes and priorities dominate the education landscape as he drives through reforms designed to ensure that every child has the opportunity to learn "the best that has been thought and said" as a foundation for upward social mobility. This article examines the coherence and progress of the government's reform…

In 1838 a child known as Mathinna was removed from the settlement for the remnant of the Tasmanian Aboriginal people on Flinders Island and taken to Hobart to live in the house of the lieutenant governor. Sir John and Lady Franklin, the historical record recounts, were impressed by her intelligence and wanted to bring her up as a companion to…

At the beginning of the 20th century, Tunali Hilmi Bey, who was not an educator, played an important part among the harsh debates on education surrounding Turkey. The current study analyzes Tunali Hilmi Bey's views on education that is a central point in his life and his sophisticated thoughts. Tunali Hilmi Bey launched a big effort to have social…

The 2013 Black History Month Programs at the U.S. Department of Education highlighted and celebrated emancipation, Civil Rights, the histories of key Black organizations and the contributions of Historically Black Colleges and Universities through a series of programs offered both in Barnard Auditorium at headquarters on Maryland Avenue, S.W,…

In the UK, and in many other countries, policy makers and funding bodies emphasise the importance of the STEM disciplines (science, technology, engineering and mathematics), as opposed to the HASS disciplines (humanities, arts and social sciences), in higher education. Yet an examination of the biographies of UK members of parliament (MPs)…

This article describes the influences of William Demmert's formative years growing up in Alaska and his years as an educator of Native American students upon his career in Native education policy. It focuses on Alaska Native education during a ten-year period between 1980 and 1990 during which time he served as the director of the Center for…