This paper focuses on the diaspora Chinese community in Limerick--an Irish county town in the southwest of the Republic of Ireland--and examines how Chinese parents have responded to the education policy shift resulting from the 2017 Irish foreign language strategy, which added Chinese to the official educational curriculum. A semi-structured…

Schools are ideal settings to promote adolescent physical activity (PA), yet school-based interventions have shown limited long-term impact. This position paper presents key issues surrounding school-based PA interventions. Collaborative conceptual thinking drawing on multi-author expertise and available evidence advanced our understanding and…

This research examines the implementation of Ireland's higher education system performance framework (HESPF), through its first 3-year cycle 2014-2017, in a sample of Higher Education Institutions (HEIs). In particular, it examines the extent to which the HESPF aids or inhibits HEI planning towards the related national policy objectives. Integral…

The country case studies are part of the empirical data collected for the "Promoting the Relevance of Higher Education" project. Before presenting the case studies, this introductory chapter describes how the 8 case studies were selected, the case study methodology, and provides an overview of the interviewed organisations and experts.…

In 2008 Ireland found itself in the forefront of the Eurozone crisis. The impact on education has been profound. In this article it is suggested that Ireland's education problems long pre-date the economic crisis and current "reforms" are about long-term neoliberal restructuring, not short-term solutions to immediate economic problems.…

The overall aim of the study was to gather evidence on effective policy reforms for broad competence development in school education, including better achievement of basic skills. The six key objectives are: Objective 1: To understand the key features of policy design and implementation of reforms for broad competence development and achievement…

Over the last decade, teacher education in Ireland has experienced radical reconceptualization and restructuring at both initial teacher education [ITE] and induction levels, with reform of continuous professional development now in the planning phase. The establishment of the Teaching Council (2006) as a statutory, regulatory body, with a role in…

This paper examines the main rationales for and possible implications of the policy of increasing international student numbers in higher education (HE). Drawing on critical discourse analysis, we map key themes emerging from two sets of data--university strategy documents and interviews with staff--collected at eight universities in four national…

This article focuses upon Ireland's institute of technology sector, which has been transformed from a 1970s technical orientation to its broader current role of research and higher education provision. The transformational shifts experienced by institutes over the previous three decades have been profound: increased autonomy, new managerial and…

Hickey's (1991) article ["Leisure reading in a second language: An experiment with audio tapes." "Language, Culture and Curriculum," 4(2), 119-131. Retrieved from http://bibliotheek.ehb.be:2168/10.1080/07908319109525098] reported the benefits of audio-support for L2 reading of real books, showing gains in fluency and motivation among…

The article looks at two important documents in the context of education policy in Ireland: the Higher Education Authority's "Strategic Plan 2008-2010" and the Government's report, "Building Ireland's Smart Economy." It demonstrates how the entrepreneurial student is fabricated out of particular truths told about the present…

A strong VET system is increasingly seen as essential to overcoming the current economic crisis in Europe. VET is seen as a powerful tool to assist in balancing labour market inefficiencies, increasing youth employment possibilities, and reducing skills mismatch. Its inherent flexibility and closeness to the labour market place VET in a good…

This article considers the impact of the New Public Management culture on Irish education and calls for a debate in relation to the prevailing bureaucratic model of accountability. The influence of the Lisbon Agenda (2000) on education planning is identified and the 2005/7 Education Strategy Statement is analysed using the relevant OECD framework.…

The focus of this article is the Revised Programme of Instruction (1900), which was devised in the final years of the nineteenth century and implemented in Irish national schools between 1900 and 1922. It begins by analysing the societal and educational context for the Revised Programme. Second, the work of the Commission on Manual and Practical…

Analyzes recent developments in school development planning and whole-school evaluation in the Republic of Ireland; examines the outcomes of a recent national pilot project on whole-school evaluation conducted by the Department of Education and Science. (Contains 27 references.) (Authors/PKP)