The Visegrad Group is an alliance of four Central European countries: Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia, founded by the Visegrad Declaration in 1991. The historical, political, and cultural similarities, highlighted by their shared experiences with economic transformation, make the Visegrad Group countries well suited for comparison.…

Comprehensive institutions (CIs) have long been characterized as middling universities with a confused identity and purpose. Yet, their historical origins demonstrate that they have served as an important point of access into higher education for marginalized student groups. Still, there remains little consensus over which institutions are CIs and…

What does the future hold for Doctoral Programs for Physical Education Teacher Education (D-PETE) programs, faculty, and doctoral students? What can D-PETE faculty prioritize and do to create a more desirable future for D-PETE, PETE, and school physical education programs? What are the main facilitators, constraints, and barriers? Framed by these…

This article was prepared for the Critical Media Literacy Conference in Savannah, Georgia in 2016. The central argument of the article is that Donald Trump's candidacy emerges from a new strategy: branding. The author explores the decade prior to Trump's rise and his political forebears, as well as consults critical marketing and television…

In this essay, Robbie McClintock argues that educational theorists have inflated John Dewey's deserved reputation beyond what the quality of his work can sustain. He briefly recounts how Dewey developed a program for reconstruction in philosophy, education, and social life with the aim of overcoming chronic dislocations in social life. McClintock…

In contemporary times, corporate philanthropy is positioned as an effective means to 'solve' a variety of social problems. Childhood obesity is one such 'problem' that has captured the interests of schools, corporations, industry groups and a number of 'not-for-profit' players. In this paper, I critically examine how the private sector uses the…

The policies, priorities, and productivity of postsecondary admission offices are under a great deal of scrutiny. The current realities range from the pressures of tuition-driven institutions to deliver the majority of the university budget each fall, to more selective institutions wrestling with standards of which applicants to accept amid…

As nations continue to use OECD data to ensure preparedness for global competitiveness, questions concerning how inequality is constructed and maintained in different nations are critical. Drawing on Bourdieu and Savage, I argue that social capital continues to perpetuate social inequality both prior to and during university attendance despite…

This paper examines the role of higher education and higher education providers, more specifically, regarding employability. The paper draws upon a three-year research project examining the key stakeholders in this process; from parents, to students, to teachers, to institutions, to employers. The paper offers critical insight and analysis into…

While it is clear that not all mergers and consolidations are a success story, and some collapse under backlash from students, faculty, and other community members, the University System of Georgia (USG) has completed an astounding number of successful mergers between its institutions. This case study provides an overview of the timeline of the…

This theoretical paper taps into Ball's view of the terrors of performativity in order to critique examination mafiarisation in Zimbabwe. Of late, the education system in this country has experienced a number of trajectories, characterised by examination leaks, cheating, and a decline in confidence in Zimbabwean education. I critique examination…

This article questions the existing understanding of how global university rankings work to coordinate higher education policy. Rankings are often analyzed as accelerators of reform processes while their differences are overlooked. We suggest studying the particular encounters between rankers and national policy contexts as occasions for friction…

Global university rankings and world-class universities have become buzzwords almost in every country. Both exercise positive and not-so-positive impact on higher education systems. Universities everywhere are trying hard to improve their status and global rankings. The article reviews some of the important issues related to these two strongly…

The issue of universities' reputations has been transformed by the development of international university rankings as well as by national publicly funded teaching-quality and research assessment exercises, and by independent discipline-based and institutional reviews and guides. Strictly speaking the attribution of reputational standing is not…

This paper examines the potential negative consequences of the internationalisation of American higher education from the perspective of positional competition theory. This analysis suggests that internationalisation efforts undertaken by colleges and universities contribute to positional competition between students vying for admission, between…