Social capital accrued via cross-racial/ethnic networks plays an important role in the adjustment, persistence and success for minority groups of university students. Yet, few studies offered insight into how intercultural social capital impacts learning and socialising experiences among minority students in non-Western contexts. Drawing on…

This study assesses the extent to which public high schools become more or less socially mixed after families are allowed to choose schools outside their designated catchment areas in a mid-sized Canadian city. We draw on settler-colonial theory, critical human geography, and critical social theory while applying a critical mapping of school…

This paper examines educational segregation in the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro through the lens of a multifaceted centreperiphery relationship involving geographical, racial and historical dimensions. The paper first situates Brazilian racial inequalities historically, drawing on decolonial theory, before examining student enrolment patterns…

Issues of transitional justice are central to countries moving away from identity-based conflict. Research tends to focus on the most well-known forms of transitional justice, like truth commissions. Far less attention has been given to education as a form of transitional justice, and even less to teacher professional development, even though…

At first sight, there is not much to compare, or any reason to compare, German and South African curricular frameworks. The history, nature of their respective transitions, level of development and educational legacies are very different. But the fall of the Berlin Wall and ending of apartheid brought both within a common neo-liberal global…

The article seeks to formulate a comparative framework that explains the uneven development of schooling in Cyprus and Singapore during the British colonial rule. It specifically focuses on the moment of transition to independence and on the role played by ideas and the interaction of ideas in the evolution of social institutions. The overall…

In spite of numerous definitions of quality, consensus on what constitutes quality is less clear and contested. Using South Africa as a case study, this paper explores the current conceptual thinking and debates about education quality. Specifically the paper reviews selected South African policy texts to identify how some of the global dimensions…

Drawing on empirical data from two recent research studies in post-Apartheid South Africa, this paper asks what it means to be poor, young and black, and belong in a society that has suffered debilitating and dehumanising racial subjugation, actively excluding people from citizenship, and how poverty serves to perpetuate this exclusion. It…

Previous studies on the role of the school in influencing attainment in South African schools have concluded that the inequalities which are known to exist in these are still largely due to the legacy of the Apartheid system. More recently, policy focus has been on narrowing the gap between the attainment of different socio-economic groups by…

The 10-year anniversary of the first democratic elections in South Africa in 2004 provoked much reflection and fuelled new policy debates on both the progress and failures of educational reform. While a myriad of achievements have been touted and are well-known to international audiences, a swelling critique from inside South Africa shows that…

Since Independence in 1963, Kenya has launched three Free Primary Education programmes: the first in 1974, the second in 1979 and the most recent in 2003. Using historical data, this paper first outlines each initiative in turn, and discusses why, in the case of the earlier initiatives, impressive initial gains in improved access proved difficult…

Examines the role of the state in South African university affairs during the apartheid era (1948-90). Suggests that interactions between the state and universities were more volatile than is generally portrayed in the literature and were especially so during the 1980s when the state struggled unsuccessfully to overcome popular challenges to White…

A more objective assessment of British colonial education policy calls for a deeper appreciation of the nature and limitations of colonial government, the difficulties associated with interpreting the trusteeship principle, and the influence of local conditions in determining educational policy and practice. (Author)

Challenges conventional views of colonial schooling and its outcomes through analysis of education on the Torres Straits Islands, 1873-1985. Argues that, despite racist educational policies, the schooling introduced social change to the community and that the schooling that Islanders actually got was influenced by local context and customs,…