In 2010, alcohol was once again the substance of choice among American youth. In fact, a greater proportion of American young people use alcohol than use other drugs or tobacco, and this use of alcohol by youth under the legal drinking age of 21 has profound negative consequences not just for underage drinkers, but also for their families, their…

The U.S. Department of Education's Race to the Top competition has provided an unprecedented opportunity for states to advance public elementary and secondary education reform. The competition's requirements encompass reforms ranging from overhauling teacher assessment to adopting common educational standards to eliminating restrictions on the…

Purpose: The aim of this article is to challenge the concept of "the learning organization" as unproblematic and inherently good. Design/methodology/approach: The research looked at how teachers--as an example of public sector professionals in a work organization that claims to be a learning organization--view their conditions for…

For many involved in further education (FE), the focus on employers' needs, in the wake of the Leitch Review of Skills, may feel a bit frustrating. In exploring what employers need from FE today, the author describes what he and his staff have achieved at Merseytravel, the priorities he, as an employer, has in mind for FE, and the challenges they…

The public history museum holds an inherent pedagogical purpose to define the nation through a history considered collectively supported by its citizenry. Widely acknowledged criticism often accompanies such exhibits and prompts calls for a more critical examination of the narratives advanced through the affirmed educational intent held by…

The purpose of this paper is to identify common patterns in central authorities' steering of universities and the institutional power in neo-liberal higher education regimes. The paper examines the regulatory mechanisms of England and Japan through Foucault's idea of "governmentality" and utilises the concept of autonomy to identify the…

The author analyzes the growth and nature of internal evaluation from the 1960s to the present and suggests that internal evaluation has been on the increase because of its perceived importance. Although the 1960s were characterized by a rich intellectual development of evaluation theory and practice, the fiscal conservatism of the 1980s ushered…

The purpose of the paper is to explore students' perception of university teaching behaviours in Pakistan. Three hundred and fifty students from the six public sector Pakistani universities returned questionnaires. Assessment framework, learning activities and instructional strategies emerged from factor analysis as common factors. Students' views…

Although increasingly recognized as a future skills issue, the use of information in the workplace is a little studied area within library and information research. A substantial "pedagogic" literature of learning in the workplace exists, however, and this was critically reviewed to generate a repertoire of issues which could in turn be…

To achieve effective intervention of engineers in the public sector, engineers should develop skills to comprehend their ethical and professional responsibility, and they should gain the necessary education to understand the possible impact of engineering solutions in a global and social context. An active learning process has been conceived,…

The current economic climate in the United States and the difficulty employers face in hiring and maintaining a skilled workforce in an increasingly competitive and global economy have generated interest in developing and promoting policies and programs that can most effectively help low-skill individuals gain job skills and move up the economic…

This paper draws attention to the political economy of embodiment: how, as symbolic and economic capital intersect, particular characteristics, forms and expressions of corporeality are "produced", nurtured, resourced and subsequently ascribed value as "ability", in and outside schools. The analyses suggest that increasing…

Objective: To evaluate a health improvement initiative aimed at enhancing the health of men in deprived areas. Design: A healthy lifestyle programme was undertaken with men to increase their health knowledge, and encourage behaviour modification and access to health improvement services. A peer mentoring programme was implemented and a training…

This article explores the impact of Hong Kong's transition from British colony to Chinese Special Administrative Region on patterns of language use in the domain of professional employment. In particular, it presents the findings of a large-scale multifaceted investigation into the roles of Putonghua, Cantonese, written Chinese and English in the…

New public management (NPM) approaches have informed policy in the public sector in advanced countries in the last decade. Some authors suggest that the main objective of NPM at the organisational level is to change the traditional way professionals are regulated. This study examines the impact of NPM on the working conditions of Portuguese higher…