In the past few decades, the number of students attending segregated special schools in the Netherlands has risen considerably. In 1975, 2.2% of all students between 4 and 11 years old attended a special school, and this percentage almost doubled to 4.3% over the next 20 years. In order to stop further growth, two new education policies came into…

The severity of the global economic crisis has put the spotlight firmly on measuring academic and research performance and productivity and assessing its contribution, value, impact and benefit. While, traditionally, research output and impact were measured by peer-publications and citations, there is increased emphasis on a "market-driven…

This paper uses national data on 450 Dutch bachelor programs to measure the effect of the introduction of academic dismissal policies on study progress and first-year drop-out. Our results show that these policies increase first-year drop-out on average by 6-7%. They also have the effect of improving the study progress of first-year survivors by…

Vocational education and training (VET) is a major policy topic for countries all over the world, who are eager to learn from the best examples where participation in VET is high and youth unemployment is low. Policymakers want to know how strong VET systems manage challenges like rapid technological change, matching labor market demand for…

Europe's knowledge economies need high-level skills, the capacity to innovate and to support democratic societies. In this perspective, the main objective of this study is to provide a comprehensive analysis of the relevance of higher education and how this is promoted in various countries in Europe and beyond. The evidence, conclusions and…

It is recognised that educational environments influence learning experiences, so it is important to ensure that educational buildings are designed to be fit for purpose. In order to ensure that educational buildings meet the needs of those who use them, all relevant stakeholders should be involved in the design process. However, this is not…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to review and synthesize published studies and practice in the "integration" of ethnic and religious minorities in Britain and The Netherlands, 1965-2015, drawing out implications for current policy and practice. Design/methodology/approach: This paper is an evaluative review and report of results of…

Europe's knowledge economies need high-level skills, the capacity to innovate and to support democratic societies. In this perspective, the main objective of this study is to provide a comprehensive analysis of the relevance of higher education and how this is promoted in various countries in Europe and beyond. The evidence, conclusions and…

Recent research calls for a re-structuring of higher education (HE) beyond English medium orientations by acknowledging the plurilingual resources of students and lecturers. In the Netherlands there is a rapid rise in plurilingual lecturers. The central question is to what extent these lecturers make use of their plurilingual resources for…

This paper analyses the relationship between the public funding systems of higher education in Italy and the Netherlands and their universities' performances. Empirically, an efficiency analysis on 13 Dutch and 58 Italian public universities is conducted. The findings show that the relative efficiency of Italian and Dutch universities is strongly…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the reasons of the success of the Netherlands in knowledge valorisation: what are the actors that participate in knowledge valorisation process and what are their functions; what is the route of knowledge in valorisation; what "surplus value" does knowledge gain in the valorisation…

In VET systems, connectivity with the world of work has been on the agenda for many years: for Western and Southern European countries, since the 1980s as a consequence of the 1973 oil crisis, and then for Central and Eastern European countries, since the early 1990s. In the last few decades, awareness has grown that European prosperity depended…

The country case studies are part of the empirical data collected for the "Promoting the Relevance of Higher Education" project. Before presenting the case studies, this introductory chapter describes how the 8 case studies were selected, the case study methodology, and provides an overview of the interviewed organisations and experts.…

The paper investigates two -- often disconnected -- policy questions: how can we scale the use of evidence in teaching practice, and how can we generate and scale innovation? Both questions necessitate understanding how teachers and schools connect with each other, and with other organisations and professionals. The paper thus explores the role of…

To better understand the status of the teaching profession, we present a conceptual framework outlining the 4 domains of knowledge-worker professionals: professional benchmarks, professional discretion, room for promotion, and workplace conditions and use the TALIS 2013 survey data to show that these domains exist globally and vary within…