The purpose of this study is to analyze how China has strived to develop its world-class research universities and what are distinguishing characteristics of China's efforts to form these universities for the last decades. This study begins with a review of literature and research questions. It then touches on the background and rationale of…

The generational approach to conceptualising first-year student learning behaviour has made a useful contribution to understanding student engagement. It has an explicit focus on student behaviour and we suggest that a Capability Maturity Model interpretation may provide a complementary extension of that understanding as it builds on the…

The opening-up of the market for education and training, including vocational education and training (VET), has increased the importance of regulation and quality assurance mechanisms in ensuring the integrity of qualifications. This report investigates approaches to the regulation and quality assurance of vocational education and training in a…

ETS has recently instituted the Cognitively Based Assessments of, for, and as Learning (CBAL) research initiative to create a new generation of assessment designed from the ground up to enhance learning. It is intended as a general approach, covering multiple subject areas including reading, writing, and math. This paper is concerned with the…

Bioinformatics education can be broadly defined as the teaching and learning of the use of computer and information technology, along with mathematical and statistical analysis for gathering, storing, analyzing, interpreting, and integrating data to solve biological problems. The recent surge of genomics, proteomics, and structural biology in the…

Assessment for Learning practices with students such as feedback, and self- and peer assessment are opportunities for teachers and students to develop a shared understanding of how to create quality learning performances. Quality is often represented through achievement standards. This paper explores how primary school teachers in Australia used…

The Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA) adopted recognition standards in 2006 requiring regional and professional accreditors such as the Council on Accreditation of Park, Recreation, Tourism, and Related Professions (COAPRT) to adopt standards and practices advancing academic quality, demonstrating accountability, and encouraging…

Background: The paper plots some shifts in educational policy between 1988 and 2009 in England that launched the rhetoric of a "gender gap" as a key political and social concern. The rhetoric was fuelled by a rise in the importance of quantification in technologies of accountability and global comparisons of achievement. A focus on boys…

In 2014, Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) are expected to witness a phenomenal growth in student registration compared to the previous years (Lee, Stewart, & Claugar-Pop, 2014). As MOOCs continue to grow in number, there has been an increasing focus on assessment and evaluation. Because of the huge enrollments in a MOOC, it is impossible…

Today, almost a century after gaining access to the country's most prestigious secondary schools, determining the academic achievement of African Trinidadian students remains a challenge as neither Trinidad and Tobago's Ministry of Education nor the Caribbean Examination Council, the regional agency responsible for administering standardized…

Within the current standards-based framework of early primary education, teachers must negotiate the integration of assessment with traditional, developmental orientations to teaching and learning. The purpose of this qualitative study was to examine teachers' approaches to early primary assessment within five different school contexts: public,…

This article evaluates the curriculum reform implemented in Turkey in 2004 by the Justice and Development Party (AKP). The curriculum reform targeted primary school education and reorganized the curriculum for several primary school courses. The AKP declared that renewed curricula would replace the former behaviorist approach, which had been…

More than 40 states plan to assess student performance with new tests tied to the Common Core State Standards. In summer 2013, results from Common Core-aligned tests in New York showed a steep decline in outcomes. Common Core advocates hailed the scores as an honest accounting of school and student performance, while others worried that they…

Twenty-four pre-service teachers participated in a workshop designed to provide explicit opportunities to learn what spatial thinking is and how to incorporate it into teaching practice. The objectives of this paper are to: (1) examine the educational effect of the workshop on pre-service teachers' pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) and (2)…

During 2012/13 academics from the Department of Education, University of Oxford, were commissioned by CfBT to conduct an independent evaluation of the CfBT Brunei English teaching programme. The evaluation sought to document the various processes of change and improvement within the Bruneian education system between 1996 and 2012, in particular…