Quality and Qualities: Tensions in Education Reforms PDF Download

Author: Clementina Acedo
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 9460919510
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 218

View

Book Description
Quality and Qualities: Tensions in Education Reforms is a provocative call for understanding and further exploring the elusive concept of quality in education. Although education quality has acquired high priority in the past few decades, the multiplicity of conceptualizations of quality also reflects the concerns and foci of multiple stakeholders. Coming to an understanding of quality education involves careful analysis of the context from which any particular reform or program emerges and of the continuing struggle to define and achieve it. Two main questions persist: who benefits from particular policies focused on quality? And what are the potential tradeoffs between a focus on quality, equitable distribution of education, and inclusion of various traditional expectations? This book explores notions of quality as understood within various systems of national, formal, and nonformal education. Also it considers the tensions that arise with the introduction of new standardized notions of quality in relation to international measures and educational reforms in developing countries. In all cases, specific national issues and concerns compete with global agendas.Challenges to quality that are given particular attention in the book chapters include changing definitions of quality, high expectations for education and issues with implementation, and the introduction of English as a means to achieve quality in a globalizing world. Special attention is also given to possible actions that support a more equitable education without ignoring the requisite of quality. The final chapter suggests three models/choices for seeking higher quality and guiding the educational future of nations.

Author: Brian Levy
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199363803
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 285

View

Book Description
The development discourse has long been dominated by best practices prescriptions for reform, but these are not a useful way of responding to the governance ambiguities of the early 21st century. Working with the Grain draws on both innovative scholarship and Brian Levy's quarter century of experience at the World Bank to lay out an alternative-a practical, analytically grounded, "with-the-grain" approach to reducing poverty and addressing weaknesses in governance. Best practice prescriptions confuse the goals of development with the journey of getting from here to there. A strong rule of law, capable and accountable governments, and a flexible, level playing field business environment are indeed desirable end points. But the ability to describe well-governed states does not conjure them into existence. If the only available actions are all or nothing, then efforts at change will almost certainly fall short, leading to disillusion and despair. By contrast, this book takes as its point of departure the realities of a country's economy, polity and society, and directs attention towards the challenges of initiating and sustaining forward development momentum. The book: -- distinguishes among four broad groups of countries, according to whether polities are dominant or competitive, and whether institutions are personalized or impersonal -- identifies alternative options for governance and policy reform-top down options which endeavor to strengthen formal institutions, and options supporting the emergence of "islands of effectiveness" -- explores how to identify entry points for change where there is a good fit between divergent country contexts and alternative options for reform. Sometimes the binding constraint to forward movement can be institutional, making governance reform the priority; at other times, the priority can better be on inclusive growth. Taking the decade-or-so time horizon of practitioners, the aim is to nudge things along-seeking gains that initially may seem quite modest but sometimes can give rise to a cascading sequence of change for the better.

Author: Keengwe, Jared
Publisher: IGI Global
ISBN: 1799895629
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 370

View

Book Description
Various pedagogies, such as the use of digital learning in education, have been used and researched for decades, but many schools have little to show for these initiatives. This contrasts starkly with technology-supported initiatives in other fields such as business and healthcare. Traditional pedagogies and general digital technology applications have yet to impact education in a significant way that transforms learning. A primary reason for this minimal impact on learning is that digital technologies have attempted to make traditional instructional processes more efficient rather than using a more appropriate paradigm for learning. As such, it is important to look at digital technology as a partner and use transformative applications to become partners with students (not teachers) to empower their learning process both in and out of school. The Handbook of Research on Transformative and Innovative Pedagogies in Education is a comprehensive reference that identifies and justifies the paradigm of transformative learning and pedagogies in education. It provides exemplars of existing transformative applications that, if used as partners to empower student learning, have the potential to dramatically engage students in a type of learning that better fits 21st century learners. Covering topics such as gamification, project-based learning, and professional development, this major reference work is an essential resource for pre-service and in-service teachers, educational technologists, instructional designers, educational administration and faculty, researchers, and academicians seeking pedagogical models that inspire students to learn meaningfully.

Author:
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN: 0821375415
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 280

View

Book Description
Progress in literacy and learning, especially through universal primary education, has done more to advance human conditions than perhaps any other policy. Our generation has the possibility of becoming the first generation ever to offer all children access to good quality basic education. But it will only happen if we have the political commitment -- at the country as well as at the international level -- to give priority to achieve this first in human history. And it will only happen if also those who cannot afford to pay school fees can benefit from a complete cycle of good quality primary education. Investment in good quality fee-free primary education should be a cornerstone in any government's poverty reduction strategy.

Author: Ndeti Ndati
Publisher: African Books Collective
ISBN: 9966040285
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 92

View

Book Description
The study offers research into the efficacy of HIV and AIDS communication strategies for adolescents, especially with regards to selected secondary schools in Kenya. The study is a useful point of reference to both Kenyan researchers into HIV and AIDS as well as international scholars exploring Africanist perspectives of the socio-cultural dimensions of the pandemic.

Author: S. Nombuso Dlamini
Publisher: University of Calgary Press
ISBN: 1552382125
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 266

View

Book Description
A collection of essays which critically examines education in the African context and presents possible courses of action to reinvent its future.

Author: Michael Mwenda Kithinji
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781868888276
Category : Education, Higher
Languages : en
Pages : 237

View

Book Description
In The State and the University Experience in East Africa, Professor Kithinji explores the critical yet unacknowledged role that universities have played in the politics of statehood and nation building. He demonstrate how successive colonial and postcolonial governments have sought to use university education as a means to advance political and economic interests. He seeks to unravel the connection between universities and the state in East Africa, particularly in Kenya. Thorough narrative and analytical history of the policies and politics of university education in the past half-century and more explore the forces that have influenced the development of universities. This study identifies three major policy trends that have shaped university education. Beginning from 1949, when the British colonial government founded Makerere University College in Uganda as the first degree granting institution for East Africa, until 2002, when the second President of Kenya, Daniel arap Moi, retired from office and his Kenya African National Union (KANU) that had ruled since independence in 1963 lost power. By investigating the dynamics that have influenced higher-education policies in Kenya and the wider East African region, this study links the higher education discourse with the state-building narrative and conceives university policies as a product of the forces informing the historical trajectory of Kenya in particular and the wider East African region in general. The State and the University Experience in East Africa will be of great interest to scholars of the African continent, some of whom may be inspired to rewrite the story of tertiary education and state formation in other parts of Africa by an equally meticulous examination of primary sources as demonstrated in this work

Author: Martin Munyao
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1793650993
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 225

View

Book Description
The African Church and COVID-19: Human Security, the Church, and Society in Kenya is a bold and incisive look at the African Church in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. Throughout the book, contributors explore how the COVID-19 pandemic exposed the fragilities of African society as well as the weaknesses in the Church’s role in helping and serving African communities. The African Church and COVID-19 analyzes the question of how the Church in Kenya should move forward in a post-COVID-19 era to address the vulnerabilities of socio-economic and political structures in Africa.

Author: Sebastian Edwards
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022631619X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 370

View

Book Description
Studies of African economic development frequently focus on the daunting challenges the continent faces. From recurrent crises to ethnic conflicts and long-standing corruption, a raft of deep-rooted problems has led many to regard the continent as facing many hurdles to raise living standards. Yet Africa has made considerable progress in the past decade, with a GDP growth rate exceeding five percent in some regions. The African Successes series looks at recent improvements in living standards and other measures of development in many African countries with an eye toward identifying what shaped them and the extent to which lessons learned are transferable and can guide policy in other nations and at the international level. The second volume in the series, African Successes: Human Capital turns the focus toward Africa’s human capital deficit, measured in terms of health and schooling. It offers a close look at the continent’s biggest challenges, including tropical disease and the spread of HIV.

Author: Esther Mukewa Lisanza
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1793634939
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 151

View

Book Description
Gender and Education in Kenya explores the intersections of curriculum, pedagogy, policy, and gender. The contributors study depictions of gender in textbooks, the presence and roles of girls and women within classrooms in Kenya, and female leadership in education, arguing that, despite recent policies put in place by the Kenyan government to ensure gender parity in education, there is still a need to make curriculum more gender responsive. Gender and Education in Kenya examines the disparity between male and female representation in education and advocate for more training for teachers about gender-related educational policies and implementing gender-responsive objectives in classrooms. The collection concludes with a study of the intersection of gender and disability with a chapter that explores the additional challenges for a blind girl in school and the lack of policies in place to help disabled students.