A university ranking with credibility may provide proper guidance to students and parents in university choice, lead to rational flow of educational resources, promote competition among universities and evaluation mechanism in society, and inform the government in decision making. However, there are quite some disputes and doubts from the public…

There appears to be a direct as well as an indirect link between the scholastic presence of the English language at any particular university and its respective Times Higher Education-Thomson Reuters 2010 World University Ranking, one of numerous world university rankings. Due to the author's familiarity and to some extent intimate relationship…

American research universities are arguably the world's most powerful engines of innovation and discovery. Yet they are widely misunderstood and in danger of losing their capacity to drive economic progress and improve our lives. Jonathan Cole, John Mitchell Mason University Professor at Columbia University, notes that the preeminence of American…

Processes of certification and evaluation are some of the most powerful institutional forces in organizational fields, and in the higher education field, rankings are a primary factor in assessing organizational performance. This article explores the institutional effects of the "U.S. News & World Report" undergraduate rankings on the reputational…

The technology education in Taiwan is prescribed in the national curriculum and provided to all students in grades 1-12. However, it faces the following challenges: (1) Lack of worthy image, (2) Inadequate teachers in elementary schools, (3) Deficient teaching vitality in secondary schools, and (4) Diluted technology teacher education programs. In…

A prestigious reputation is the primary success factor in higher education because it attracts resources necessary to sustain growth. Among research-intensive universities (RIUs), research performance is a key driver of institutional reputation. Achieving an accelerating rate of growth of research performance is the desired objective of all RIUs…

The article draws on findings from the "PhD Examination Project" at the SORTI Research Centre of The University of Newcastle, Australia. It focuses on an analysis of the roles of examiner and supervisor, in relation to the candidate, as seen through the lens of Habermas's "Ways of Knowing" theory. On the basis of this, it has…

In this article, the aim is to address different forms of relationship between deconstruction, as coined by Jacques Derrida, and research perspectives on music education. Deconstruction represents a radical departure from Western ontology from Plato onward and its essentialistic notions of the metaphysics of presence. Instead, Derrida claims that…

Rankings have become a widespread phenomenon in an increasingly competitive world of higher education. They differ with regard to their aims, objectives, target groups, and with regard to their relationship to quality and quality assessment. Generally, rankings are an external assessment of the performance of higher education institutions; they…

This article examines the relationship between community colleges and universities in Canada and the United States based on increased involvement of community colleges in offering baccalaureate programs. The article employs a theoretical framework borrowed from the study of jurisdictional conflict between professions. After considering the types…

This article critically examines the methodology of the Shanghai Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU) by generating raw scores for the "big five" South African research universities (Stellenbosch, Cape Town, Kwazulu-Natal, Pretoria and the Witwatersrand, henceforth referred to as SU, UCT, UKZN, UP and WITS) using the ARWU…

Whether intercollegiate athletics influence outside perceptions of institutional reputation and educational quality--and whether this translates into improvements in recruiting students and donors--is disputed in the research literature. Researchers have typically attempted to correlate success on the field or court with variables such as…

Many countries are challenged by the need to build both capacity and quality simultaneously in order to meet the accelerating needs of their society. Should what already exists be renovated, or should new institutions be created? Innovate from within or from without? Or perhaps some combination of both? In the U.S., postsecondary…

Starting from the present knowledge society with its social overvaluing of cognition and white-collar jobs at the expense of manual labour, this article examines whether school type--academic versus technical/vocational schools--relates to students' sense of futility. It assesses the schools' culture of futility and investigates the explanatory…

The purpose of this paper is to explore and analyze the leadership traits of Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune, an African-American woman of history, using the servant leadership theory developed by Robert K. Greenberg and the ten characteristics of servant leadership as conceived by Larry C. Spears. This exploration seeks to identify the significant…