This paper explores the trend towards a decentred social organization of learning that has become evident over the last 30-40 years. This is illustrated by the shifting imagery of education, from the red brick school to dispersed learning networks, or "learning bubbles", that constitute new learning spaces. In the context of our large…

This article examines the way in which e-learning is transforming the nature of social interaction in higher education. In this new educational environment, radical societal transitions and the opportunities afforded by modern communication technologies together produce formidable challenges. Significant as these challenges may be, concentration…

Here we examine New Labour's education policy concerning social justice and the organisation of educational provision with reference to social capital as policy vocabulary. The central focus is on policy discourses and practices in relation to networking between schools and other partners. We identify three policy phases for reducing inequalities…

This paper presents a critical examination of the work of Christopher Lasch. The individual's growing sense of helplessness, the development of a "minimal self," the impact of mass culture on education, Lasch's proposals to resolve the culture crisis, and the relevance of Lasch's views to the reform of social education are addressed. (MT)

Purpose: The main research aim was to investigate relationships among teachers' occupational stress, coping, teacher self-efficacy and relevant teachers' perceptions of curriculum changes in a major educational reform. Design/methodology/approach: A theoretical framework that included the attribution of responsibility for stress model, aspects of…

Willard Waller fused social theory and field observation techniques. In work still relevant 55 years after its appearance, he viewed school in its societal context. This study develops a theory of schooling based on his work and that of his successors. (LHW)

This article concerns the usefulness of postmodernity for illuminating change in higher education associated with the new millennium. Overarching is the notion that history is not a smooth, rational, progressive unfolding of events but a series of ruptures and fragmenting disjunctures. This article asserts that when viewed in epochal terms, the…

For historians who seek to engage the educational past primarily as a record of the actions of individuals and groups within particular historical contexts, rather than primarily as a series of linguistic or discursive effects, research convention offers two principal alternatives. The first, and far older, tradition settles its sights upon the…

This paper examines similarities and differences between structuration theory, habitus and complexity theory, as theories of social change. The paper suggests that structuration theory and habitus can theorize change, but that complexity theory offers a more complete theory of change because it focuses on social production rather than…

Qualitative research methodologies comprise distinct traditions, each of which is based on its own assumptions and discrete methods for collecting, analyzing and reporting data. This paper examines a distinctive approach to qualitative research that was employed in a recent study to open a gateway to understanding the impact of the shootings at…

During the 1970s, the curriculum field underwent a "reconceptualization," shifting from commitment to developing curriculum toward interest in understanding curriculum. This article presents an alternative rationale: disillusionment with traditional institutions/preoccupation with private interests, fascination with "interesting…

This article endeavors to pull together various theoretical approaches to curricular reform using the queer student body and queer theory as its starting point. The authors outline the implications of naming, and the possibilities and polemics of citizenship. Offering the intersections of queer theory and critical race theory as a model of…

The paper examines teachers' emotions in the process of making sense of educational reforms. We draw upon concepts from sociological theory and education to inform our framework for understanding how emotions, as a social construct, directly and indirectly, influence teachers' understandings. Using qualitative data gathered in a study of…

This paper argues that the amorality evident among U.S. citizens may be the result of individuals and society's inability to understand the relationship between the public and private life of the citizen and the role and function of ethics in that relationship. The argument has three premises. First, U.S. citizens have developed a sort of cultural…

Although educational leaders may be optimistic about initiating change, lasting reforms are rare. The group polarization literature, although dated, provides an important explanation for a very current problem. The theory holds that when there are differences of opinion to begin with, a counter-conformity effect works among members of groups.…