There is an increasing requirement in higher education (HE) worldwide to deliver excellence. Benchmarking is widely used for this purpose, but methodological approaches to the creation of benchmark metrics vary greatly. Approaches require selection of factors for inclusion and subsequent calculation of benchmarks for comparison. We describe an…

The collection of data by government authorities has a complex history. In Australia, this began with the establishment of British government settlements as a way to account for fiscal viability and social prospects. As the colonies became self-governing entities, the collection of social and economic data increased in importance, and included…

This non-affirmative, bridging research program sees education as deliberation-based activity. Non-affirmative education is critical regarding policies and cultural practices, yet being mindful that education preparing for life, work and agency in democratic societies must create spaces for growth that are not only socialization or transformation…

The centrality of education in the pursuit of better economic and social prosperity is now well established. The dominance of human capital theory, which provides a strong argument for better education as a key factor in fuelling economic growth, has encouraged policy makers, in various countries, to focus on education reform as a key priority and…

This case was written to help prepare building-level and central office administrators who are expected to effectively lead schools and systems in an often tumultuous world of educational accountability and reform. The intent of this case study is to allow educators to examine the impact data management has on the types of thinking required when…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to discuss the role of principals in light of public management reforms taking place in the German educational system and in reference to the empirical patterns uncovered by the papers contained in the Special Issue. Policy makers have created new expectations and new technologies that seem to suggest to…

The conditions required for a reform of the educational finance system as the foundation of compulsory education are 1) devolution to schools and introduction of national standards in order to deal with "individual equality" while compensating for the insufficiency of "aspectual equality," and 2) dealing with educational needs…

Amid unprecedented novelty, complexity, turbulence, and conflict, it is apparent that a new education system is needed. Focused on a new outcome--postsecondary education completion with advanced competence--heretofore separate systems for early childhood, K-12 schools, and postsecondary education are being joined in P-16 pipelines and…

This article provides a synthesizing overview of the roles of students in higher education governance in Europe. We first review the existing literature on student involvement in higher education governance in order to locate the contribution of this special issue of "Tertiary Education and Management." Second, we summarize the key…

Drawing on the University of Massachusetts experience in developing successful blended local programs, this paper suggests guiding principles that include mission-driven responsiveness to local contexts and partnerships; using low-cost marketing strategies available through local relationships and brand; attending to students' preferences for…

This article discusses academic entrepreneurship in the context of ongoing changes in university management and governance in European universities. The comparative perspective is provided by the European Union (EU) research project "European Universities for Entrepreneurship: Their Role in the Europe of Knowledge" (EUEREK) comprising…

Compares Russian and United States definitions and content of educational leadership and management. Draws implications for collaboration between the United States and Russia in the area of educational leadership preparation and practice. (Contains 12 references.) (PKP)

Strategic planning and quality management have been developed independently of each other, but they meet in practice in many kinds of organisations. Strategic planning and quality assurance integrate different aspects of higher education institutions (HEIs) to ensure high-quality educational outcomes. This paper investigates the role of these two…

This document was prepared in response to a comparative study tour undertaken as part of the European Communities Commission's Community Education Programme. It describes the educational structures of Belgium, Denmark, the Federal Republic of German, France, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxemborg, Netherlands, and the United Kingdom. Each country's…

Since the early 1950s, the axis "centralisation-decentralisation", especially as thematised in the work of Isaac Kandel, has represented a major focus of comparative studies in education. Kandel argued that issues relating to the internal conduct of the classroom (interna) should, so far as possible, be decentralised, while issues…