Purpose: This conceptual paper examines the need for viable theoretical models of international learning alliances in the light of cooperative games and complexity in two distinguished educational settings. Game theory is used to demonstrate the need for the top managerial executives to acquire a detailed understanding of decision makers'…

In European and global educational debates, performative or test-based accountability has become central to modernizing and raising the performance of education systems. However, despite the global popularity of performative accountability modalities, existing research finds contradictory evidence on its effects, which tend to be highly…

This article discusses common geopolitical issues, such as globalisation, decolonialisation, and economic pressure that affect the development of teacher education policy in England, Canada, South Africa, New Zealand, Russia, Israel, Jamaica, Portugal, Japan, Poland, and China. It goes on to describe these nations' responses to these pressures and…

This edited book provides a critical re-reading of the concept of teacher education, in addition to a re-thinking of the sole focus on Initial Teacher Education (ITE), with implications for education policy, theory, and practice. This book presents new investigations that explore the concept of teacher education from ITE to retirement and how this…

What is vocational excellence, why is it important, and how is it developed and for whom? This paper tries to: address the complexity of vocational excellence; explain the different types of centres of vocational excellence (CoVEs), which embody vocational excellence, their missions and functions; and identify good practices that work well in…

This cross-country analytical report addresses the European Training Foundation's (ETF) need to actively monitor vocational education and training (VET) reforms in its partner countries in terms of good multilevel governance. The period covered by the report is 2012-17. This report takes stock of trends and progress in vocational education…

The Republic of Moldova is located in a tense geopolitical environment between the European Union (EU) and the Russian Federation. As the EU and Russia have incorporated higher education in their foreign policy agendas, this article analyses (1) whether the higher education policies of the EU and Russia are in competition in Moldova and (2) how…

This article explores the significance of context within the process of contemporary education reform and policy-making. It draws upon evidence from a comparative study of educational change and transformation in seven education systems: Australia, England, Indonesia, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Russia, and Singapore. The article focuses on school…

According to globalisation theories, the importance of international organisations such as UNESCO and EU regarding processes of policy-making is increasing and it is no longer the nation state alone that is regulating policy. Focusing on equity and social justice as central topics of the global discourse, the article raises the question of how…

The article presents the results of legal monitoring and those of a sociological research on the efficiency of social mechanisms in Russian Federation education policy. The data obtained substantiates: the need for systematic improvement of Russian legislation in the education sector; revised notions and content of social mechanisms in Russian…

Background: Around the globe, education policy borrowing remains pervasive and prevalent. The strategies, interventions and innovations of education systems that perform well, in international assessments, are enthusiastically borrowed and copied in the anticipation of similar educational performance and outcomes. Purpose: This purpose of the…

Changes in educational research in the last years of the Soviet Union occurred because research could no longer serve as a branch of total planning in an engineered society. Researchers floundered when faced with new forms of political authority and social relations, but then addressed new questions of teaching and learning. This process may have…

Explains that every school system faces the challenge of how to manage staff more effectively, introducing several articles that focus on whether: large-city school systems are more bureaucratic, a system of family school choice is more efficient or effective, tuition is an answer to a reduction in public education finance, and there are common…

To help the New Independent States and Mongolia address central issues related to lifelong learning, the European Training Foundation organized a project on lifelong learning that involved the following countries: Armenia; Belarus; Georgia; Kazakhstan; Kyrgyzstan; Mongolia; the Russian Federation; Ukraine; and Uzbekistan. The project's principal…