Recent vocational education and training (VET) reforms in many countries have focused on reducing the number of VET qualifications available and restructuring qualifications so that they better meet the needs of working life. This literature review provides examples of how VET qualifications have been rationalised in various countries and briefly…

This article examines curricular development within compulsory science and mathematics education (grades k-9) in Denmark during a 20-year transition towards competency-oriented curricula. The article contains two main parts. In the first part, we describe the Danish case, emphasizing how international and national trends at the turn of the…

This article is based on qualitative and quantitative data collected from teachers and pupils in Danish schools in June 2020, as schools reopened following closures in the spring due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It investigates the transformations in school life that took place in this period in response to strict official guidelines to prevent the…

This paper explores the work of a particular document in issuing educational values. The document is the report "Embedding Values and Attitudes in Curriculum": "Shaping a Better Future", launched in 2021 and published by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). Inspired by a practice-oriented method of…

Taking a point of departure in the paradoxical fact that the increase in educational knowledge leads to an increase in uncertainty for educational organisations, this article explores how uncertainty and contingency have increasingly become an integral part of school governance. The article draws on Niklas Luhmann's theory of 'World Society' as a…

Reflects on cross-national differences in contemporary research, policy, implementation, and teaching practice in civic education across a wide range of countries in Europe, Latin America, North America and Asia Provides interdisciplinary perspectives on advances as well as enduring and emerging challenges for civic education in educational…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the expectations of and possible tensions in school leadership regarding the implementation of the 2014 Danish school reform and, by extension, to address emerging perspectives linking school leadership, learning and well-being. Design/methodology/approach: An analysis of central policy documents in…

Purpose: The article focuses on the emergence of a private tutoring industry in Denmark over the last decade. Specifically, it explores how private tutoring companies legitimize themselves in a social and cultural context where education has for long predominantly been understood in egalitarian terms. Design/Approach/Methods: The article takes…

The Nordic countries are often perceived as a coherent group representing the Nordic model of welfare states, with a strong emphasis on the public provision of universal welfare and a strong concern with social equality. But today we see a change in the Nordic model as part of a global knowledge economy. The aim of this article is to examine…

This article sheds light on the emergence of private tutoring in Denmark. Written from the perspective of a tutoring entrepreneur, it discusses the challenges and opportunities faced by a fledgling tutoring company in present-day Danish society. The article is a personal narrative of the author's experience with establishing the first major Danish…

In 2020, 1.5 billion students in 188 countries/economies were locked out of their schools. Students everywhere have been faced with schools that are open one day and closed the next, causing massive disruption to their learning. With the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic still raging, the disruption to education has extended into 2021 and many…

This article investigates why school choice is exercised to a limited degree by parents despite major government initiatives to enhance diversity, competition and choice in the Danish education system. Denmark has had 20 years of centre-right governments, promoting choice reforms perhaps even more vigorously than the other Nordic countries, yet…

This article analyses the sexuality education curriculum in primary and lower secondary schools in Denmark. Taking inspiration from the 'what is the problem represented to be?' approach to policy analysis, we explore how discourses of risk, health, quality of life, sexual diversity and critical pedagogy simultaneously permeate curriculum policy…

This paper develops informed assumptions on the potential loss of trust as an unintended side-effect of the measures in education to contain the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic. Well-founded concerns according to which the pandemic-induced closure of educational facilities and the shift to digitalized distance education are contributing to…

Strategic government interventions in public education have shifted and blurred the boundaries between state, market and civil society modes of governance. Within this matrix of interdependent relations, schools operate under increasingly hybrid accountability arrangements in which public accountability can both complement and compete with market…