In January 2002, Ireland's minister of state announced the establishment of the National Adult Learning Council to take effect in March 2002. One of the council's priorities will be to establish local adult learning boards (LALBs) to oversee development and delivery of adult education. An Irish government white paper recommended that LALBs'…

This document is a questionnaire designed for work-based learning providers. It is a diagnostic benchmarking tool developed to give organizations a snapshot of their current state. Following a brief introduction, there are instructions for filling in the questionnaire, which includes both open-ended response and scoring according to a…

Talk of accountability (or the lack thereof ) dominates current Canadian education debates. We're not alone in this regard. Mawhinney (1998) observes that "the educational reform agenda in many industrialized nations today is driven by a perceived crisis in accountability" (p. 98). Unfortunately, as Earl (2001) also reminds us,…

Education in both England and the United States has undergone a profound change over the last two decades as part of neo-liberal and neoconservative political reforms. The reforms have been characterized by efforts to standardize the curriculum, to implement standardized tests in order to hold students, teachers, and schools accountable, to…

England's preregistration undergraduate degree in nursing and midwifery programs were subjected to a comprehensive evaluation that included the following data collection activities: in-depth field studies of 26 of 32 three- and four-year undergraduate nursing and midwifery programs; individual interviews with 129 lecturers, 54 students, 52…

Papers from the 1978 conference of the Higher Education Research and Development Society of Australasia are presented. A large part of the conference was devoted to a general symposium on accountability in higher education, while other topics were organization and administration of higher education, curriculum development and evaluation, staff…

Auspicing in Australia's vocational education and training (VET) sector involves organizations entering into partnerships with registered training organizations (RTOs) to have the training and assessment they undertake recognized under the National Training Framework. RTOs bear responsibility for assuring the quality of the assessments conducted…

This book explores key ethical and professional issues related to the ethical bias of teaching that must be solved before it is possible to establish a General Teaching Council. The chapters discuss "The Professions in the 1990s"; "What Are Professional Ethics?""The Role of the Professional Community"; "Are…

Since 1997, the Canadian federal government has introduced a variety of new incentives to enhance significantly the funding of university research in this country. While these funding initiatives have been welcomed by Canadian universities, they are accompanied by a heightened emphasis on accountability which dictates new eligibility conditions…

These minutes summarize the New Brunswick Forum for Action on Leadership in Career Development, which was the third in a series of provincial forums being conducted throughout Canada to stimulate dialogue among a spectrum of labor market partners and develop an action plan to support career development in Canada's provinces. The following items…

This book speaks to three challenges that face higher education in its quest to redefine the academic community: (1) beliefs about ourselves, our circumstances, our relationships, and our problems; (2) beliefs about personal and organizational change; and (3) beliefs about academic life, about reform and revolution, competition and cooperation,…

The objectives, curriculum, and role of higher education and key policy and practice issues were reassessed against the backdrop of recent and predicted demographic, economic, and political changes and trends in Great Britain. Special consideration was given to the fact that "mature" learners now constitute the majority of entrants into…

Five articles on the development of higher education in Southeast Asia are presented. In "Philosophy and Objectives for Higher Education in Southeast Asia," William B. Relf discusses the historical background of education in Southeast Asia, three general purposes for a university, education and national development, future needs,…

The management of universities in Austria, Germany, and the Netherlands was studied as part of a 1979 survey of the present and future trends of university management in Europe. The survey addressed the organization of the university and its administration, the structure and process of decision-making, and the opinions of students, teachers, and…

These four papers are from a symposium on evaluation in human resource development (HRD). "Assessing Organizational Readiness for Learning through Evaluative Inquiry" (Hallie Preskill, Rosalie T. Torres) reviews how evaluative inquiry can facilitate organizational learning; argues HRD evaluation should be reconceptualized as a process…