Canadians often assume that what is said about education south of the U.S. border applies north of it as well. However Canada's international rankings are consistently higher than those of the U.S., primarily because of different social conditions (less inequality, less child poverty, etc.) and different educational policies (more equitable…

Over the last few decades many efforts have been made to address education issues through policy at various levels. Looking at these efforts around the world suggests that they have often been motivated more by beliefs than by evidence of impact. Not only are the wrong policies often adopted, but effective implementation of education policy is…

Not long ago, public education in Ontario, Canada, was in deep trouble. Student achievement was stagnating, labor disruptions were rampant, and public satisfaction with the schools was low. In 2003, a new provincial government initiated a series of reforms that embodied a positive, outcome-focused agenda for public education. Today, student…

Government and the media are intimately connected in many ways though each distrusts the other. This paper, based on the author's experience in government, describes the ways that governments try to deal with the media and discusses three of the main complaints about media coverage--its tendency to simplify, to assign blame, and to be primarily…

Describes an ongoing three-year research project comparing the purposes, antecedents, and consequences of large-scale educational reforms in Alberta, Manitoba, Minnesota, England, and New Zealand. Comparative analysis focuses on policy origins and the role of ideology in reform proposals, codification of reform into law or regulation,…