Seeing that the culture and governance of competition determines relations among social actors, we turn to the concept of referentiality to investigate the institutional order of competition in higher education. Defining referentiality as the description of a model standard for comparison, this study explores how higher education organizations…

Purpose: Previous studies found that principals must be involved in both instructional leadership and organizational management, yet they did not explain how the former supports the latter. To narrow this gap in the available research-based knowledge, the current study explored the contribution of organizational management to instructional…

Academic practitioners are judged and evaluated by the different academic institutions and by government regulators associated with these institutions. There are various criteria for evaluating the work of faculty members in the areas of research, teaching, and contribution to the department, the academic institution and the community. In Israel,…

Instructional leadership demands educational leaders to become intensely involved in improving teaching and learning. While extensive research found this approach to be beneficial in school settings, it was insufficiently explored in higher education. Therefore, the current study explored how Israeli higher education leaders perceive their…

Excellent Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) employees are in constant demand worldwide. The current study explores Israeli students' choices to study and pursue careers in STEM fields, while students' level of excellence in mathematics in secondary school is explored as a predictor for choosing a STEM track in future study…

The article addresses the way in which characteristics of the education crisis in the postmodern era are manifested in parental deliberations when choosing to homeschool their children in Israel. Based on a review of the characteristics of the education crisis and examination of possible solutions, homeschooling is presented as an optional…

Education policies claiming to promote 'excellence' aim to improve outcomes in various quantitative measures of specific standards. However, excellence can also mean individual self-improvement. We analyse Israeli policies at the national, local, and school levels. We structure our argument based on sensemaking theory by applying qualitative…

This article is a commentary on the seven articles in this special issue of EJTE on teacher quality from international perspectives. In the article, Marilyn Cochran-Smith points to differences as well as common themes and details across the articles in the issue. The article discusses the emergence of teacher quality as a global concern, including…

This study examined the performance of superintendents and leaders of the Arab education system in Israel in reducing achievement gaps and promoting curricula that empower and advance students. In-depth interviews were conducted with school governance officials in an attempt to address these key issues: (1) The steps administrators in the Arab…

As part of a larger mixed-method study on teacher evaluation, this paper explores how cultural and socio-political contexts of the Israeli Arab public schools inform principals' high-stakes evaluation processes for attaining tenure. Concepts from micropolitical theory were used to analyse data from in-depth semi-structured interviews with twenty…