Education - All titles

This comprehensive collection discusses topical issues that are essential to both scholarship and policy making in the realm of lifelong learning policies and how far they succeed in supporting young people across their life courses, rather than one-sidedly fostering human capital for the economy.

Ainley explains how English education is now driven by the economy and politics, having failed to deliver upward social mobility and a brighter future. Concludes with suggestions for positive change.

Education under siege considers the English education system as it is and as it might be. It identifies the current system’s strengths and weaknesses and proposes radical changes to ensure fair education for all.

Who are universities for? argues for a large-scale shake up of how we organise higher education. It includes radical proposals for reform of the curriculum and how we admit students to higher education. Offering concrete solutions, it provides a way forward for universities to become more responsive to challenges.

Pat Thomson takes on England’s muddled education system and exposes fraudulent and unethical practices, including the skewing of the curriculum and manipulation of results. She argues for an urgent review of current practices, leading to a revitalised education system that has the public good at its heart.

In 2014 the ‘Trojan Horse’ affair, an alleged plot to ‘Islamify’ several state schools in Birmingham, caused a previously highly successful school to be vilified. Holmwood and O’Toole challenge the accepted narrative and show how it was used to justify an intrusive counter extremism agenda.

This book brings Brian Jackson and Dennis Marsden’s pioneering Education and the Working Class from 1962 up to date for the 21st century and reveals what we can do to achieve a fairer education system.

How can we re-establish universities’ social purpose? The solution lies with asking not only ‘what are we good at?’, but also ‘what are we good for?’. Chris Brink shows how universities can – and should - promote positive social change.

Teachers in the UK are now required to promote ‘British values’ in schools to all pupils. This book draws on observations and teachers’ views to discuss issues of citizenship, social class, ethnicity, religion, counter-extremism and community cohesion, and the implications of this policy for teachers, students and society.

Adopting a political economy perspective, Viv Ellis, Lauren Gatti and Warwick Mansell present a unique and international analysis of teacher education policy in the US, England and Norway after the 2008 Global Financial Crisis.

Situating the cases of England and Australia within broader global policy trends, this book critically analyses what has gone wrong with education policy. Drawing on wide-ranging research, the authors issue a fundamental challenge to current policy orthodoxies, and identify policy alternatives to make education both better and fairer.

This extensively updated fourth edition by the key author in the field will maintain its place as the most important text on education policy and makes essential reading for all students and anyone interested in education policy more generally.