Purpose: So far, sustainability reporting in higher education is in a very early stage--partly, because of the lack of an established and widely recognized sustainability reporting framework for higher education institutions (HEIs). Therefore, a modification of the sustainability code for the use in the higher education context was recently…

School inspections have become an important instrument of quality assurance and quality development in many European countries. So far, the focus of empirical research on school inspections has been on the acceptance of the procedure among the school-internal actors, its influence for internal quality development and its effects on student…

The paper identifies three tools that support the administrative instrument of a state-based curriculum commission: compartmentalization, licensing, and segmentation. These tools channel the state's curriculum-making towards forms of symbolic rather than regulatory action. The state curriculum becomes a framework for the ideological governance of…

Governing multi-level education systems requires governance models that balance responsiveness to local diversity with the ability to ensure national objectives. This delicate equilibrium is difficult to achieve given the complexity of many education systems. Countries are therefore increasingly looking for examples of good practice and models of…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to discuss the role of principals in light of public management reforms taking place in the German educational system and in reference to the empirical patterns uncovered by the papers contained in the Special Issue. Policy makers have created new expectations and new technologies that seem to suggest to…

The Biennial Report presents a selection of UNESCO-UNEVOC's activities during 2014 and 2015. The activities contributed to UNESCO's sectoral priorities and programmatic objectives and assisted Member States to provide equitable, inclusive and quality education and promote lifelong learning for sustainable development. Importantly, the selected…

To achieve efficient and effective quality improvement, European universities have gradually adopted organizational strategies, structures, technologies, management instruments, and values that are commonly found in the private business sector. Whereas some studies have shown that such managerialism is beneficial to the quality of job performances…

New public governance emphasises less state, more market and more hierarchy as the cornerstones for effective steering of higher education institutions. Based on an explorative analysis of qualitative and quantitative data of fourteen German and European economics departments, we investigate the steering effects of six new public management…

In recent years there has been an overall lack of a clear and cohesive research funding policy for higher education which poses real risks in Australia's ability to sustain research excellence and is likely to lead to a decline in Australia's research performance at the international level. This could well lead to a decline in the reputation of…

Changing conditions of academic and scientific labour markets challenge the current conceptual thinking about the mechanisms of academic promotion, selection and recruitment. This paper explores the models of academic promotion and recruitment of professors in a comparative perspective using the examples of Poland and Germany, and addresses the…

Germany has recently gone through a fundamental process of reform of its higher education system. The last 15 years have been characterised by significant changes in virtually all aspects of the system. The impacts of the Bologna Process have been far reaching. The reform of the governance and funding systems in higher education has also been…

Whether to adopt national standards and tests has long been a subject of lively debate in the United States. With 47 states now participating in the Common Core State Standards Initiative, and a commitment from Education Secretary Arne Duncan to allocate hundreds of millions in stimulus funds to the development of common tests, the country is…

This essay considers recent implications of "new public management" (NPM) strategies for the universities of Germany. It argues that NPM poses a threat to the traditional values of the academic profession, and asks what the universities should do to restore public trust in their methods and management.