There is a dire need today to create spaces in which people can make meaning of their existence in the world, abiding by cultural frameworks and practices that acknowledge and validate a meaningful existence for all. People are not just isolated individuals but are connected in diverse ways with other persons within our natural and social environment which is part of the whole universe. The African philosophy of uBuntu or humaneness is re-emerging for its timely relevance and potential as indispensable (...) in our quest for global citizenship, peace, and mutual understanding in securing sustainable human development in the broader ecosystem. Comparative educationists have the challenge to devise theoretical frameworks, epistemological and pedagogical constructs as well as pragmatic, useful and effective ways of promoting the virtues of compassion and recognition of our common humanity in eliminating the ills of domination and control that are guided by greed, hatred, jealousy, and intolerance. Comparative Education for Global Citizenship, Peace and Shared Living through Ubuntu paves the way for a better understanding of the critical importance of the collective search and endeavor towards achieving the virtues of nonviolence, peace, shared values of living together, global citizenship, improved quality of life for all and a better appreciation of the positive implications of interdependence. (shrink)

_Comparative Education: A Field in Discussion_ is a personal reflection on the field of comparative education from the perspective of one scholar who has been active in the field since the 1980s.

Comparative Education examines the common problems facing education systems around the world as the result of global economic, social, and cultural forces. Issues related to the governance, financing, provision, processes, and outcomes of education systems for differently situated social groups are described and analyzed in specific regional, national, and local contexts.

This paper examines some of the problems of periodisation that arise in attempts to compare historical developments in the education systems of two or more countries.

Sparked by global capitalism’s demand for new knowledge and new commodities, as well as new logistical systems to deliver them, the nature of education has changed significantly. Universities, in striving to become a part of this knowledge society, have focused on responding to these demands, at the expense of the humanities and social sciences. The dominance of this way of thinking, primarily a product of Western educational thought, has clearly affected approaches to education in the East. The originalities, (...) authenticities, and unique perspectives of the East have failed to get enough attention, subsumed by the focus on science and technology. However many education systems are still endeavouring to capture some of the indigenous and authentic culture of their home countries, incorporating national cultural ideals, even in subjects with a primarily vocational focus. Although the drive for scientific knowledge has led to a degree of standardisation and convergence, cultural differences still play a role in the education theory and policy of different countries. This book examines these cultural differences between different East Asian and South Asian countries, with chapters ranging from historical educational analysis to contemporary re-interpretations of the construction of society and education in the East. This book was originally published as a special issue of _Comparative Education. _. (shrink)

By its nature, comparative education values diversity. Respectfully studying how different groups pursue education provides opportunities to learn about the variety of human experience, expand the boundaries of the field, and ultimately re-understand ourselves. At its core, the field leverages the dynamic space between life as culturally located and being human. This chapter contributes value to comparative education from an Oceanic viewpoint. Oceania is the world region with more water and languages than any other. Because (...) of its diversity and colonial histories, Oceania is a site of creative tension between regionalism and self-determination. Unsurprisingly, conflict exists in the region. However, a key need in our ‘sea of islands’ for sustainability is to live well together. Faced with the uncertainties of the future such as climate change, mutual understanding and support is at a premium. The collaboration of writers; Solomon Islander, Tongan, and Anglo-Welsh, embodies this, as does the chapter’s woven mat-based structure. The thrust of this chapter is that through walking backwards into the future and embracing solidarity through diversity, we can promote a sustainable educational journey that offers the hope of continuity in the face of the challenges ahead. (shrink)

Background Ensuring morally competent nurses depends on many factors, such as environmental, social, political, and cultural. However, several inadequacies in nursing education have been documented, and no common framework has been established for how nursing ethics should be taught in undergraduate education. Research questions What are the different approaches across nursing programmes established in teaching ethics? What are the main similarities and differences across programmes facilitating a common understanding in developing a curriculum capable of preparing a morally competent (...) nurse? Research design International comparative education study in five steps: (1) formulating the initial question; (2) defining the units of comparison; (3) determining the variables of comparison; (4) describing the findings; (5) interpreting the findings. The comparative variables were identified, extracted, and populated in a piloted grid. Participants Six universities were purposefully selected by the Promoting a Morally Competent Nurse project partners for their nursing education curricula as delivered in 2022–2023. Ethical considerations No ethical approval was required, given no human participants and public data regarding nursing curricula. Findings Variability emerged in the terminologies used in naming the courses, the numbers of credits and hours devoted to teaching ethics, when the courses are delivered (since the initial semesters of nursing education or concentrated in the final years), and their main modes of delivery (a single or separate module or integrated across the curriculum). Contents have some similarities, whereas the teaching methods varied and included (or not) explicit connections with clinical practice. Attendance is mandatory in all courses. The assessment methods used varied from knowledge-based to more competence-based approaches involving multidimensional strategies. Conclusions This comparative study explored similarities and differences across nursing programmes in six different European countries. The reviewed ethics curricula lack significant clarity, and they offer important areas to consider for future development. Issues emerged regarding terminologies, learning workloads, when to deliver, how to deliver, the main contents, and the teaching and assessment methods that merit further discussion. (shrink)

This paper describes a 'structural typology' to assist in the analysis of ways in which policy-makers in one country explore educational provision in another and seek to 'borrow' from it. In this analysis we look specifically at England's 'cross-national attraction' to education in Germany over the past 200 years. The paper aims to provide an analytical programme to use in comparative education and to facilitate exploration of the importance of context in shaping educational phenomena.

Since Eugen Weber’s (1976) classic work Peasants into Frenchmen, the role of mass education in nation-building has been repeatedly discussed in the literature on nationalism. However, the specific...

In recent years, comparative education and comparative music education became important fields of research. Due to globalization, but also to international student assessments, it is most common to compare the outcomes of entire school systems or specific subject areas. The main goal is to identify the most successful systems and their best practices in order to help struggling countries to improve. While the notion of borrowing from successful systems might at first glance seem convincing, it has (...) its clear downsides: it fosters a kind of “cargo culture,” where the export and import of educational models and successful practices is undertaken without taking into account critical aspects of this procedure. This paper examines critically borrowing foreign educational practices as a goal of comparative music education, in the context of globalization. It takes an interdisciplinary perspective, using results from comparative education research and utilizing it for music education and music education philosophy. (shrink)

An accelerating rate of systemic, structural and institutional convergences leads to the transformation of world educational space. A comparative study makes possible to analyse at a systems level both philosophy of education as systematic scientific knowledge and education as a system. Philosophy attempts not only to comprehend the existing system and to formulate values for the educational system of the future, but also to generalize and compare existing experience. But “experience” has different meanings. First, it indicates the (...) concrete, urgent experience of reality and contains the components of sensory receptions and sensations, their spiritualizing senses, an entire conceptual complex, and also accumulated habits, skills, and knowledge. From the other side, it is understood as a component of social-historical existence, including the storage, creation and transfer of cultural senses, objectified in the standards and values, in lingual and objective forms; this means that an educational experience is the axiological basis of education, its value-purposeful characteristics. Philosophy of education is an independent specific field of knowledge adequately reflecting conceptual, theoretic-methodological and practical trends of education. It has global, national and local level of its reflection. Comparative investigation in philosophy of education is a comparison of such levels and explanation of their interaction. Themain methodological question is the extent to which it is expedient to use the achievements of foreign experience in educational theory and practice in another country. Comparative study makes it possible to pass from descriptions to the answer to more fundamental questions: to explanation and development of reasons. (shrink)

This study compared the effects of three education models, namely, the bag-of-virtues, values clarification, and virtue ethics models, through qualitative and quantitative approaches. In the quantitative study, a between-subjects design was adopted in sampling 120 freshman cadets from a Taiwanese military academy. For the qualitative study, focus group interviews were conducted with 10 freshman cadets. The results show that the VC model was the most effective among the three moral education models, followed by the VE and BV models.

This paper analyses the way in which discourse and argumentation may vary depending on participants’ educational level and gender. Men and women from three different educational levels (literacy, advanced level and university students) participated in discussion groups that debated about women and work, the sharing of housework and the way in which girls and boys are educated. The results showed important differences depending on participants’ educational level and gender. In general, the main differences were related to educational level, while gender (...) tended to interact with educational level, as a moderating factor. (shrink)

This paper aims to explore the ideals of culture and moral education in Matthew Arnold (1822-1888) and John Dewey (1859-1952). The concept of culture in Arnold and that of democracy in Dewey resemble each other. Firstly, they emphasize the importance of individual activities in the context of practical, social and cultural lives. Even though they have each different spirit of their own time and society, it would be as the individual as well as social improvement in the course of (...) culture that they try to establish an ideal by education. In that sense, their aspect of education in cultural missions is the same as that of moral development based on organic relations among many individuals and societies of the world. Secondly, they would establish the democratic society of good citizen who can see the nature of things and conduct and develop social lives. In the course of education, democracy makes it possible for all to participate into individual activities within the common good. For both, it is never a notion of abstractive idea, regardless of practical lives. The ideal of democracy is justified as the persistent course of human development only if education let us go toward culture. Finally, there are some implications of moral education from their ideals: self-constitutive principle and movement, the relationship of individuals to others in the network of interconnection of a whole community and humanity, culture as moral activities and experiences, and all students’ participation to social affairs based on democracy. (shrink)

This paper develops the arguments in a previous paper on periodisation in comparative historical contexts by the same author in BJES (vol.42, no.3, September 1994, pp. 261-272).

The education systems can be analysed by using the distinction along different types of welfare regimes. Esping-Andersen (1990) described the Scandinavian universalistic, Continental corporatist, and Anglo-Saxon liberal models. The purpose of the paper is a comparative analysis of the development of educational systems in the Baltic states. We used the PISA 2012 survey data and compared the Baltic countries with three “old” EU member states: UK representing the Anglo-Saxon liberal model, Germany for the Continental corporatist model and Finland (...) as an example of the Scandina­vian model. PISA 2003, 2006 and 2009 data were used for a retrospective analysis of countries’ performance. We considered four aspects of the organization of the national school systems: human and material resources in schools, leadership and the level of school autonomy, assessment, school selectivity and ability grouping. We found that three Baltic states do not represent a single Central and Eastern European model. (shrink)

The urgency of the topic is due to the lack of research on the problem of the school curriculum with regard to the special elective course "Fundamentals of Christian ethics", its curriculum, the professionalism of teachers, the role of students in education, certain religious uniqueness in polyconfessional Ukraine, and comparison with religious studies in public, private or church schools of some Western European countries.

The responses of a convenience sample of 83 secondary preservice and preeducation students in three university classes were compared to each other and to a national sample of 1,492 adults on a national poll of science knowledge. The results of the data analyses using simple ANOVA and two-tailed t tests indicated that preservice secondary science teachers in a secondary science methods class are significantly more science literate than preeducation majors and the na tional sample. They were not significantly more science (...) literate than preservice and in-service science teachers in an environmental science methods class. Chemistry majors were significantly more science lit erate than other science and health majors. Additional comparisons between males and females, graduates and undergraduates, and older and younger (younger than 28) students indicated males, graduates, and older students are significantly more science literate than females, undergraduates, and younger students. (shrink)

본 연구의 목적은 전통 도덕교육론과 현대 도덕교육론의 구도를 비교하여 양자 간의 소통가능성을 탐색하는데 있다. 탐구 대상으로는 전통 도덕교육론에서는 율곡과 다산을, 현대 도덕교육론에서는 특정 인물의 이론이 아니라 7차 도덕과 교육과정(2007년 개정 도덕과 교육과정 포함)을 선정하였다. 이론들 간의 비교 기준은 ‘현실에 대한 문제의식’, ‘선악의 근원’, ‘선악의 의미’, ‘이상적 인간의 모습’, ‘이상적 인간으로 향하게 하는 방법론’이라는 다섯 가지 요소로 설정하였다. 이러한 요소들을 따라 개별 이론들을 탐구하여 율곡의 도덕교육론은 ‘회귀(回歸)의 구도’로, 다산의 도덕교육론은 ‘확충(擴充)의 구도’로, 7차 도덕과 교육과정은 ‘작위(作爲)의 구도’로 그 성격을 규정하였다. 결론 부분에서는 (...) 이처럼 각각 성격을 달리하는 구도들을 비교하여 소통가능성에 대해 다음과 같은 의견을 제시하였다. (1) 세 가지 구도 모두를 일관하는 공통점은 비도덕적인 현실을 도덕교육을 통해 교화할 필요가 있다는 실존적 문제의식과 악에 대한 비실체론적 관념이 보일 뿐이다. 이러한 결론은 도덕교육론이란 시대적 상황과 결부된 특수성을 지닐 뿐이기에 전통과 현대의 소통가능성은 기대할 수 없는 것처럼 보이게 한다. (2) 그렇지만 개별적인 두 가지 구도들 사이에서 다음과 같은 부분적 유사성을 발견할 수 있었는데, 이는 구도들 간의 소통가능성을 열어주는 단초들이 될 수 있다. 율곡의 형이상학적 리와 다산의 신학적 상제 개념은 매우 대조적이지만, 보다 큰 관점에서 보면 모두 도덕교육의 정당성을 확보해야 한다는 문제의식에서 비롯된 것이다. 다산이 성리학의 본연지성 대신 성기호설을 제시한 것이나 현대 도덕과 교육과정이 본성을 적극적으로 정의하지 않는 것은 모두 도덕교육이 내면의 공허한 관념에 매몰되지 말고 실질적인 행동으로 나타나야 한다는 문제의식에서 비롯된 것이다. 2007년 개정 도덕과 교육과정에서 자연과의 관계를 별도의 영역으로 설정하여 율곡의 일태극(一太極)의 세계관과 유사성이 드러나게 된 것은 도덕교육의 영역을 인간을 넘어서는 영역으로 확대하여 환경문제를 해결하고자 하는 문제의식에서 비롯된 것이다. 이처럼 도덕교육론들은 그 구도나 부분적인 요소들에 있어 차이점이 많지만 공통적인 문제의식을 공유할 때에는 유사한 해결 방안을 보이고 있다. (3) 이처럼 현대와 전통의 소통가능성은 우리가 어떤 문제의식을 지니고 있는가에 달려있다. 그런 점에서 개정 교육과정이 인간과 자연과의 관계에 대한 관점을 재정립할 필요성을 제기한 것은 현대 도덕교육론이 이 문제에 대해 깊은 통찰과 경험을 지닌 전통 도덕교육론과 소통할 수 있는 가능성을 보여주는 것이다. (shrink)

Disturbed by these acrimonious arguments, the authors - former colleagues and university-press board members - embarked on an ambitious project to reexamine a number of major literary and philosophical works dealing with the liberal arts and education. With their discussions ranging from Plato to Rousseau, from Cicero to Vico, from Erasmus to Matthew Arnold, Sousa and Weinsheimer offer not a history of education philosophy but an examination of the present.