This study focuses on the state and effectiveness of national funding systems of Higher Education to support the European Universities Initiative. Its focus lies on the mechanisms employed by Member States for the core funding of higher education institutions, in particular the mechanisms that include performance elements. More specifically, the…

This book offers an original contribution to the area of international research on comparative education policies and the influence of transnational agencies on national school policy and reform. With a focus on grasping what "the Nordic model" or "the Nordic dimension" means in school and educational policy, the book explores…

This article presents a co-constructive narrative inquiry into the subjectivities of three female graduate student researchers (GSRs) from China, Vietnam, and Finland pursuing academic career paths in comparative and international education (CIE). Two American teacher researchers and their GSRs came to this research committed to collaborative…

Higher education helps learners acquire the knowledge and skills they need to lead productive working lives, and it sparks the innovation that fosters economic growth and social progress. However, creating higher education systems that operate at a high level of research and teaching quality, with responsiveness to social and labour market…

This open access book presents an in-depth analysis of data from ICCS. An international group of scholars critically address the state of civic and citizenship education in the four Nordic countries that participated in the IEA International Civic and Citizenship Education Study (ICCS) in 2009 and 2016. The findings are of particular relevance to…

In this study, international research collaboration (IRC) and international research orientation (IRO) have been studied at the micro-level of individual academics from the university sector (N = 8,466, 11 European systems). Both were studied cross-nationally, cross-disciplinarily, and cross-generationally. This study differs from most existing…

In 2013 five universities from across Europe undertook an innovative project "Media Culture 2020", combining skills and forces to develop new practices that would face the challenge of the convergence of digital media, taking full advantage of social media and cloud-based technologies. The aim of the Media Culture 2020 project was to…

In a highly competitive global landscape, occupations are transformed, new jobs are created and the skills needed for the labour market are constantly changing. European countries are looking at redefining VET [vocational education and training] to respond promptly to such challenges and take advantage of the opportunities ahead. They are…

Professional learning communities (PLC) have been widely accepted as effective with respect to good atmosphere, adequate leadership practices, and functional working practices. However, the outcomes for school improvement depend on case-specific issues. To identify less culturally and contextually bound issues in 3 PLC settings in Canada, Finland,…

This paper sheds light on the role of tertiary or higher education in economic development across two successful OECD case studies: Finland and South Korea. A number of key aspects are discussed, from the nature of the social contract between higher education and the economy to the endogenous characteristics of domestic higher education to the…

An international comparative research project was carried out in the Netherlands, Wales, Germany and Finland to understand how trainee teachers reflect upon play. Data was collected among 31 Dutch, 37 Welsh, 40 German and 19 Finnish teacher trainees. They watched four videotaped sequences of preschoolers engaged in an activity. Next, they answered…

In this article, we address whether international student comparisons have changed the dynamics of French secondary education policy. We focus on the increasingly significant impact of the Organization for Economic Cooperation Development (OECD)'s "Programme for International Student Assessment" (PISA) on France, a country previously…

This article presents a comparative study of innovation in vocational education and training (VET) in three innovative European countries: England, Finland and Germany. The focus is on innovation emerging from VET practitioners' (directors, teachers, project coordinators, etc.) participation in inter-organisational networks with local, regional,…

This article reports the development and results of a project within the Comenius program to promote teachers' occupational well-being, in which Finnish, Irish, Italian, and German school communities participated between 2003 and 2006. The project made use of participatory action research, in which the occupational well-being of staff was…

During the Bologna process, from 2003 to 2006, degree programmes, including teacher education curricula, were developed in line with the two-tier system--the European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System (ECTS) and modularization. The purpose of the present study is to contribute to the development of teacher education profiling measures by…