Description:
This book provides an international review of the current state of teacher education, with chapters from an international group of teacher educators. It focuses on major issues that are confronting teacher educators now and in the next decade. These include the impact of globalization on the profession of teaching, and how teacher education must deal with changing accountability requirements from governments and establish a set of minimum standards acceptable to enable a person to teach. The work also considers aspects of the three major phases of teacher education: the period prior to commencing in the profession, successful induction into the profession, and the ongoing professional development of teachers. Finally, it identifies ways in which new technologies can be used to improve the training and ongoing development of teachers. Cases from different countries are used to provide a rich base of data to help us understand how the profession is moving onwards.
Description:
In 2003, the International Federation of Accountants (IFAC) issued a set of International Education Standards (IES). IES 4 Professional Values, Ethics and Attitudes aims to equip candidates for membership of an IFAC member body with the appropriate professional values, ethics and attitudes to function as professional accountants. This paper explores the implications of IES 4 and analyses some of the challenges arising from an international professional accounting body prescribing ethics education. It concludes with an overview of considerations to be addressed to ensure that the implementation of IES 4 is successful.
Description:
The educational landscape is changing dramatically and profoundly for schools and communities across Australia and other western countries. It is no longer the case that children automatically do not attend their local neighbourhood school, nor can it be assumed that within public schools that there is a heterogenous social mix. What we have is an increasingly segregated, stratified and residualised system of education in Australia as neo-liberal policies of so-called 'choice' do their pock-marking with those who can afford it 'opting out' to private education, leaving behind those without the resources to exercise choice.
Description:
This paper reports on the results of a study of the learning preferences of adult males in small, rural Australian towns. The researcher employed a survey of men in each of ten towns in 2004 to explore and compare their learning experiences and preferences-in adult and community education (ACE) programs on one hand, and in community-based volunteer organisations (fire services, landcare senior citizens and football clubs) on the other. The research confirms the considerable importance for men of regular learning experienced in less formal learning contexts as community volunteers, and highlights the barriers ICT poses for older men.
Description:
This paper reports on the results of a study of the learning preferences of adult males in small, rural Australian towns. The researcher employed a survey of men in each of ten towns in 2004 to explore and compare their learning experiences and preferences-in adult and community education (ACE) programs on one hand, and in community-based volunteer organisations (fire services, landcare senior citizens and football clubs) on the other. The research confirms the considerable importance for men of regular learning experienced in less formal learning contexts as community volunteers, and highlights the barriers ICT poses for older men.
Description:
This paper argues that we are currently experiencing a debilitating overload of political interference and media hyperbole in respect of teaching and teacher education, and that much of this blitzkrieg amounts to a 'political spectacle' and blatant neo-liberal ideology dressed up as rational analysis. The politics of disparagement being unleashed on public education, and by association teacher education, is intended to laminate over the real issue, which is a cultural war over what is officially allowed to constitute teaching and learning.
Description:
As an experienced social welfare practitioner, two years spent living and working as a volunteer in Botswana forced me to reflect critically on my practice, but it was not until I returned that I recognised the pervasive power of our culture to oppress, most visibly, Indigenous Australians. That realisation has led me to focus on issues of power, racism and oppression in my social and community welfare teaching and I am endeavouring to develop a model of teaching that not only raises these issues and strategies to address them for practice but provides an educational environment that enables students to experience such a model. This paper examines the process of integrating my personal experience with my professional teaching and welfare practice and offers some ideas about how social and community welfare students might learn to be genuinely inclusive professional workers through their educational experience.
Description:
Considerable research has been undertaken into the issue of Sino foreign strategic alliances in the area of higher education, particularly since the late 1990s, when universities in China signed an increasing large number of alliance agreements with foreign universities (Willis 2000, 2005a). Although there has been considerable research regarding various aspects of these alliances, including the types of activities undertaken, and the levels of alliances formed in this sector (Hayhoe 1989, 1996; Willis 2000), there has been less evaluation of the factors which have motivated the majority of Chinese universities to actively seek suitable foreign partners for collaboration particularly in regard to the delivery of activities and programs within China. This research identifies a range of factors driving the Chinese desire to form alliances with foreign universities. These in general relate to the special and somewhat idiosyncratic role of universities as agents of social and economic change in China. To effect this change they have often sought foreign partners who are able to assist China to develop a market economy. Universities within the Chinese top 100 university system have become increasingly selective in their choice of foreign universities and are requiring far higher levels of commitment than hitherto. It is now not unusual for foreign universities to deliver degree programs in China, and not just via study abroad and distance means. Gradually, over time, Chinese universities have become more discerning, particular and careful in the selection of foreign university partners. To this end, this paper identifies three distinct phases of Chinese university selection of foreign partners, dating back to 1978. The current phase, which emerged around 2000-2001 underscores the growing desire on the part of Chinese universities to select better quality, more committed and longer-term foreign partners-partly an issue of signing agreements with fewer, but better universities than in the past when a more “scattergun” approach was utilised.
Description:
The social work and welfare profession has experienced change and challenge from a number of sources in the late 20th Century. In Western countries, changing government ideology and policy about welfare provision has fundamentally altered the landscape in which social and welfare workers are employed. The role and purpose of the social welfare profession has been interrogated, with a resulting perceived 'crisis' for the profession. Government policies have also affected the provision of education for students, and this, too, has had an impact on the shape and structure of courses, and the work of academics. In addition, broader changes in society have created a challenging environment, for example, there is a general distrust of professionals together with the speaking out by marginalised groups about their place and treatment within society and by professional groups such as social welfare. Such a context affects the profession, and recruitment of students. Within this milieu, social work and welfare education must equip graduates to work effectively in a changing and sometimes hostile world. This paper broadly examines the context affecting provision of education for social work and education in the 21st century. These issues are similar across Western countries, and affect many other professional groups.
Description:
The social work and welfare profession has experienced change and challenge from a number of sources in the late 20th Century. In Western countries, changing government ideology and policy about welfare provision has fundamentally altered the landscape in which social and welfare workers are employed. The role and purpose of the social welfare profession has been interrogated, with a resulting perceived 'crisis' for the profession. Government policies have also affected the provision of education for students, and this, too, has had an impact on the shape and structure of courses, and the work of academics. In addition, broader changes in society have created a challenging environment, for example, there is a general distrust of professionals together with the speaking out by marginalised groups about their place and treatment within society and by professional groups such as social welfare. Such a context affects the profession, and recruitment of students. Within this milieu, social work and welfare education must equip graduates to work effectively in a changing and sometimes hostile world. This paper broadly examines the context affecting provision of education for social work and education in the 21st century. These issues are similar across Western countries, and affect many other professional groups.
Description:
The overall aim of this portfolio is to discuss [...] understanding of the curriculum process surrounding the development of the Health and Physical Education Curriculum and Standards Framework II (HPE CSFII) and its implementation in a Victorian secondary school. The unit of analysis was a group of physical educators from Newviews Secondary College. Throughout 2002, interviews, surveys and document analysis were used to see how 'how and if' the HPE CSFII was being adopted and 'implemented' by the group.