The European Union represents a transnational level of polity where education policies are constructed in parallel to those of nation states, and where equality is framed both in legal frameworks and in policies around citizenship and inclusion. This chapter focuses attention on the interplay between the legal and the policy landscapes around equality and their relation to education policy, and explores these ideas in relation to the Roma minority, and the efforts of the EU to address their experience of multiple inequalities across the continent. The process of developing an education and social policy, and the refinement of equality and anti-discrimination legislation, contribute to a reframing of equality beyond the borders of national policies, and open up new opportunities for their negotiation. The case of Roma EU policies suggests that a combination of legal and policy processes is necessary to address issues of inequalities in education. But there are political risks with the EU taking over such policy work especially when the equality definitions used are narrow in their remit, and when national governments lack the political will to implement EU policies.

The issue of privatisation is not new. It has been debated since the end of the 1970s following a major financial crisis and the subsequent ‘crisis’ of the public sector. The once celebrated welfare state that has been a core institution in many industrialised European countries has been under various forms of pressure: financial, social, managerial, but also of political legitimacy. Ideologically, the welfare state has been challenged by (neo)liberals who have seen it as not only financially unsustainable, but also antithetical to the goals of economic efficiency and the pursuit of personal liberties. Its operations have also been attacked by political pragmatists who have seen its cumbersome bureaucratic nature as increasingly problematic. The answer for this latter group was not (necessarily) privatisation but the increased diversity of providers (often all state providers) competing for resources in order to increase the state’s responsiveness and effectiveness.

This paper discusses the significance of international and transnational developments for education policy research, with a focus on the European Union. The rise of policy projects at the EU level since 2000, has altered the relationships between the state, EU institutions and education policy, in terms of the definition of values, purposes, and mechanisms of education change, in what is often referred to as the europeanisation of education policy and governance. In a time of financial crisis and extensive population migrations to and within the European space, the paper argues for further critical research on the EU institutions and their relationship to national education systems, as well as on the social justice dimensions and implications of considering both national and EU sites of policy for addressing young and vulnerable peoples’ education and social futures.

This paper explores questions of citizenship and the role of universities in the context of the policy changes in the UK and in Europe over the last two decades. Twenty five years after the political transitions in Eastern Europe, and 70 years since the end of the Second World War, Europe is more united than ever before. New political, social and economic configurations across the continent are bringing expectations and pressures to its citizens and institutions, with universities at the front of many economic and social projects. What do these new conditions mean for citizenship in the context of European universities, and how do member states respond to this changing context? The article will use England as a national case study within the EU to illustrate the tensions between the humanistic visions still carried out by many universities, although interpreted differently across the sector, and the pressures for the creation of the ‘knowledge economy’ that are shared at the national and transnational levels.

This article examines how education policies developed in the European Union (EU) through the open method of co-ordination (OMC) are received at the member state level of the United Kingdom (UK). We argue that the UK’s response to the education OMC can be understood mainly in terms of deflecting EU influence on the process and in particular content of national education policy-making. We focus on three manifestations of deflecting EU influence on national education policies. On a level of institutional structures, first, few organizational resources are made available for responding to the education OMC. Second, there is limited communication between domestic policy teams and UK civil servants involved in international work. Third, on a level of discourse UK education policy makers have retained a commitment to the continued sovereignty of the UK over education policy and its role as a potential leader of education policy agendas in the EU. Deflecting the education OMC involves here constructing images of ‘fit’ between UK and EU OMC education policies.

This article examines the reception of the education Open Method of Coordination (OMC) in the UK as an aspect of Europeanization of national administrations. It addresses relationships between political and administrative actors in the process of responding to the education OMC. We argue that despite progress with institutionalization of the education OMC at the EU level, there is limited institutionalization of the education OMC at the national level. Against the backdrop of UK skepticism about engaging with the EU integration project, the interesting finding is the administrative strategies employed for deflecting EU influence on the national education space.

The aim of the study was to improve understanding of how upper secondary school acknowledge and adjust support and guidance for gifted students regarding their future academic and professional career. The study examined school pricipals and career counselors approach to guidance work with gifted students and how the above mentioned professionals received information about gifted students. It was further examined what measures were applied to adjust the upper secondary school to the needs of gifted students. Qualitative interviews were conducted and the results showed that in cases where the informants were told it took place in conjunctions with seminars about the class, through grades or through a teacher or the students themselves who contacted the career counselor or principal at the upper secondary school.The giftedness was connected to the school curriculum and various course topics in the secondary programs. School principals viewed the career counselor as an important resource to provide motivational support, individualize and survey future plans. Career counselors experienced that gifted students were ahead in their maturity process and often arrived earlier than other students with ideas and questions for the career counselor. The upper secondary school tried to the extent resources were available, to provide stimulus and motivation for the gifted students in different ways - through acceleration, enrichment and motivational activities.

Based on ethnographic fieldwork in six different types of rural area and their schools in different parts of Sweden, this article identifies how rural schools relate to the local place and discusses some of the educational implications from this. Recurrent references to the local community were present in some schools and people there explicitly positioned themselves in the local rural context and valorised rurality positively in education exchanges, content and interactions, with positive effects on young people's experiences of participation and inclusion. These factors tended to occur in sparsely populated areas. An emphasis on nature and its value as materially vital in people's lives was present as was a critique of middle-class metrocentricity. Such values and critique seemed to be absent in other areas, where rurality was instead often represented along the metrocentric lines of a residual space in modernizing societies.

Vilka förväntningar och erfarenheter av studie- och yrkesvägledning har elever i årskurs 3 på gymnasiet?

SammanfattningSyftet med studien var att få mer kunskap om gymnasieelevers syn på studie- och yrkesvägledares arbete i årskurs tre, speciellt i relation till deras tidigare erfarenheter. Studien ville även undersöka om faktorer som kön och programtillhörighet påverkar studenternas uppfattning. Uppsatsen bygger på en kvantitativ enkätundersökning och urvalet är 47 elever från årskurs tre på gymnasiet i en stad i Mellansverige. Eleverna deltog i undersökningen både före och efter ett möte med studie- och yrkesvägledare. Resultatet visar att bland de deltagande eleverna från olika program var det flickorna som träffat studie- och yrkesvägledare flest gånger under gymnasietiden medan drygt en femtedel av pojkarna hade sitt första samtal med studie- och yrkesvägledare på vårterminen i årskurs tre. När elever uttryckte hur de ville ha hjälp angav eleverna på studieförberedande program i hög grad frågor om vidare studier, det gjorde också många flickor på yrkesförberedande program. Endast en pojke från yrkesförberedande program nämner vidare studier. Av eleverna i undersökningen hade nästan alla en positiv förväntan på att få den vägledning de sökte. De var också nöjda med vägledningssamtalet och tyckte de fått svar på sina frågor. Elever från studieförberedande program, i synnerhet flickor, uttrycker i högre grad än eleverna från yrkesförberedande program att de känner osäkerhet inför framtiden. Tidigare forskning som redovisas i uppsatsen pekar också på könsstyrda förväntningar på vägledning och att elever från yrkesförberedande program i lägre grad söker sig till studie- och yrkesvägledning.

Nyckelord: Studie- och yrkesvägledning, erfarenheter, förväntningar, studieförberedande, yrkesförberedande. 

En ny gymnasiereform har trätt i kraft under hösten 2011och syftet med den nya gymnasiereformen var att öka statusen och kvaliteten på de yrkesförberedande programmen. Det har också skett en förändring i behörighetskraven vilket betyder att det är större skillnader mellan högskole- och yrkesförberedande program. Valet mellan högskole- och yrkesförberedandeprogram kan därmed bli avgörande för framtida universitetsstudier. Vi har undersökt betydelsen av studie- och yrkesvägledningen där faktorer som styr utfallet av den direkta kontakten av studie- och yrkesvägledningen redovisas. Vårt resultat visar att den nya gymnasiereformen 2011 har påverkat elevernas val mellan högskole- och yrkesförberedande program. Eleverna tänker emellertid inte på samma sätt som regeringen utan är mer strategiska i sitt gymnasieval. De väljer hellre ett högskoleförberedande program för att inte begränsa sina framtida studie- och yrkesmöjligheter. Dessutom visar studien att flickor och pojkar väljer efter olika kriterier. Faktorer som socioekonomisk bakgrund, omgivning, stöd av föräldrar, skolans personal och studie- och yrkesvägledningen är några påverkansfaktorer som vi presenterar i vårt resultat. I jämförelse med tidigare forskning ser vi flera samband i vårt resultat.

The article highlights similarities in the politics and practices linked to gender equality in education in Finland and Sweden from the 1970s to the 2010s, with special consideration given to the alliance between heteronormativity and marketisation as well as their influence. State and gender equality project documentation is analysed. In both countries, the main focus of attention has, in line with heteronormativity, been on the labour market and the directing of the girls towards science and technology, along with publicly funded, short-term projects. The results indicate that the alliance between heteronormativity and marketisation has increasingly reproduced the genders as competing dichotomous categories with one sex losing to the benefit of the other.

Utifrån vårt formulerade syfte har vi undersökt vilken dokumentation och information som

överförs och under vilka former den överlämnas när elever byter skola. Vi har även avsett

synliggöra pedagogers tankar kring dokumentation och information samt formerna för

överlämningen.

Den information och dokumentation som förs vidare och den information och dokumentation

som önskas av mottagande skola överensstämmer till största delen. Resultatet kan

sammanfattas med att överlämnande och mottagande personal i stort är eniga om att IUP med

skriftliga omdömen och åtgärdsprogram är dokumentationsformer som alltid används. Man är

även överens om att muntlig information är viktig vid överlämningen. Det finns dock viss

skillnad i synen på dokumentationens och informationens relevans mellan överlämnande och

mottagande lärare.

Formerna för överlämnandet visar större diskrepanser mellan överlämnande skolors och

mottagande skolas uppfattningar. Det verkar som om strukturen för överlämningsproceduren

förändras från år till år. Några anger att klasslärare/mentor, rektor och specialpedagog deltar

och andra anger att endast rektorer och specialpedagoger deltar. Man är eniga om att

överlämningskonferenserna sker på mottagande skola men kan vara av olika åsikt om var den

borde ske. Det går ej att finna något regelverk som styr formerna vare sig på nationell eller

kommunal nivå, utan det är upp till varje skoldistrikt eller ett antal rektorer inom ett

skolområde att skapa strukturen för överlämningen.

En önskan om ökad tydlighet kring överlämning uttrycks där pedagogernas tankar efterfrågas.

Elevers lärande ses som det primära i den elevinformation som överlämnas och med stöd av

aktuell forskning bör informationen och dokumentationen vid överlämningar främja goda

förutsättningar för elever som byter skola mellan år fem och sex.

För att förbättra strukturen kring överlämningsförfarandet bör tydliga riktlinjer som anger en

hållbar struktur utarbetas av ledningen i samarbete med pedagogerna på berörda skolor.

Ledningen bör säkerställa att överlämningsformerna blir formella och utgår från aktuell

forskning om elevers lärandeprocess, våra styrdokument och pedagogers beprövade

erfarenhet.

This thesis is the result of a study that considers children’s encounters with others; participation and influence in a pedagogical outdoor environment in three different preschool playgrounds. More specifically, a study is under-taken of how children’s encounters are shaped in the pedagogically adapted outdoor environment of the preschool with the focus on how children’s par-ticipation and influence finds expression in the preschool playground’s dif-ferent facilities. The physical environment is seen as meaningful and the focus is on which affordances arise in the physical environment related to facility. The study’s theoretical approach is based mainly on G. H. Mead’s social psychological theory and the meeting with the other which is com-bined with theories that call attention to the significance of the facility. An ethnographic method has been applied. By way of two years’ field studies, with a total of 78 days spent in the three different environments, data has been collected through observations and photography and by listening to, and talking with, children and preschool teachers. To participate in the chil-dren’s everyday life has been a precondition for understanding children’s different encounters and meeting places in the preschool playgrounds. On the basis of the analysed results, the study shows that all three preschool playgrounds had pedagogical outdoor environments which were designed so that the majority of the facilities gave a variety of offerings, something that contributed to different children being able to relate to, and find, their own affordances in different facilities. The results of the study also show that the majority of preschool children in the studied activities were socially compe-tent and good negotiators. Thereby, they were shown to have good precondi-tions for participating and exercising influence in the day-to-day outdoor activities. At the same time, the study results demonstrate that the children’s agency and interaction at all three preschool playgrounds are determined on the basis of the level of recognition they received in their encounter with other children and in the encounter with teachers.

This article explores discourses of research in the ‘academisation' of Swedish teacher education. It takes as its theoretical framework Foucauldian concepts of power and knowledge to analyse the moves to incorporate teacher education in the university. The study draws on a case study of teacher education in Sweden which used documentary and interview analyses to explore institutional history, and structures and shifts in teacher education and research from the 1950s onwards. The study shows how struggles over power and knowledge were constitutive of the development of a research-oriented teacher education that emerged in a multilayered process involving a variety of actors at different levels. It also shows the tensions in the emergence and construction of a new research discipline. The article should be understood in the context of current international discourses where there is a need for a research base for teacher education.

Evaluation has expanded at all levels of governance as part of the broad doctrine of New Public Management (NPM) (Hood 1991; Pollitt and Bouckaert 2011). According to this doctrine, market mechanisms should be introduced to enhance efficiency and, in the context of school governance, to support competition between schools, free school choice, improved educational quality, and school effectiveness (Lubienski, 2009; Lundahl, 2013 et al; Merki 2011; NAE 2012). Education systems guided by NPM and characterized by results-based management and local autonomy increasingly rely on evaluation at all levels (Andersen et al. 2009; Elstad 2009; Merki 2011; Mintrop and Trujillo 2007; OECD 2013). It is assumed that evaluation and strengthened accountability will improve quality in education and schooling (OECD 2011), but there is a lack of knowledge if, and if so which evaluations and under what conditions they can contribute to this function (Levin 2010, Ravitch 2010). Recent research and a growing number of scholars question the need for and value of some prevailing evaluations and evaluation systems, and of focusing on performance and measureable results. It is also recognized that teachers are subjected to too much accountability which can have negative effects on professionals and education (Green 2011; Koretz 2009; Lingard and Sellar, 2013; Hargreaves 1994, Day 2002, Ball 2003, Mausethagen 2013a, 2013b). However, could evaluation be a useful tool in local school governance under certain conditions?

Although evaluation is a cornerstone in local school governance it has not been studied much in this context. Local school governance refers to all the public and private school actors’ and institutions’ (e.g. education committees, opposition parties, school principals, teachers and parents) steering of local schools and education.

This article explores local safety policy (LSP) developed to resolve urgent safety problemsin two Swedish municipalities. It shows that local safety actors conceive and constructsafety problems in ways that make them manageable, and that LSP evolves as aweb of interactions between safety actors in the public and private sectors. The actorsuse established safety solutions and routines while exploring new ways of managing theproblems. The municipalities’ problem-solving structures differ mainly in that differentactors and institutions are involved. The policy process and features of LSP correspondwell to how policy is portrayed in other cross-sectoral policy domains. Local safetypolicy development cannot easily be separated from policy implementation, nor cansafety policy be separated from safety work, for they evolve together. The implication ofthis study for governance is that policy workers at different levels and from differentorganisations create LSP. Although LSP is partly initiated and legitimised at the political–administrative level, it is not from this level that it evolves.

The aim of this study is to acquire knowledge regarding democratic education in upper secondary school programmes with different gender and social class profiles. It covers the teaching in and about democracy, pupils’ power-positions and their attempts to affect routine school activities. A particular focus of attention was processes of influence, through which the pupils themselves pursue issues in school. The analysis is based on theories and previous research focused on gender and class perspectives of fostering democracy. Basil Bernstein’s theories regarding power, control and pedagogic codes, in combination with feminist theories (principally those of Arnot, Reay, Skeggs, Gordon and Walkerdine), form the basis of the theoretical framework. Ethnographic methods have been applied, including participatory observations, conversations, interviews, and analysis of relevant documents over one academic year. Two Swedish upper secondary school classes were followed: one from the vocational Child and Recreation Programme and one from the academic Natural Science Programme. Teaching students about democracy and invitations for them to exert influence appeared generally to be unplanned and were marginalised in school. The few invitations that occurred had an individual stamp and focused on pupils’ choices, responsibilities and duties, rather than on their rights in school. Democracy was presented in the form of facts about formal democracy and formal participation in democracy in the future, while a more critical   attitude and possible influence strategies for youths were marginalised. Pupils in both classes wished and attempted to influence teaching, primarily through informal means. There were, however, significant differences between the classes in what they were able to influence. Analysis of pupils’ voices in relation to the pedagogic context revealed that the power relationships in these influence processes depend partly on the focal academic subject. More   importantly, they also differ between the upper secondary school programs, which differ in strength of classification (sensu Bernstein), demands, pace and difficulty levels. These   differences are related, in turn, to whether the programmes are intended to prepare the pupils for higher education and/or a vocation after school. Generally, the Child and Recreation pupils exerted influence more successfully when they wished to reduce the pace and difficulty of lessons than when they wished to get more out of their education, while the opposite applied to the Natural Science class. Who had influence over what was principally   related to the programmes’ gender and class profiles and the pupils’ expected positions in society.

Syftet med studien är att undersöka pedagogernas attityder och förhållningssätt när det gäller den fria leken för barn på fritidshem i åldrarna 6-9 år. Studien är en kvalitativ undersökning där intervjuer av fritidspedagogers inställning och förhållningssätt till den fria leken utgör empirin. Genom intervjuerna studeras också hur pedagogerna stöttar de barn som har svårigheter i den fria leken. Resultatet visar att fritidspedagogerna ser den fria leken som väldigt viktig och att den får stort utrymme på fritidshemmen. Studien visar också att pedagogerna agerar i den fria leken genom att vara närvarande och befinna sig i bakgrunden för att kunna gå in och påverka de gånger det behövs. Därtill även finnas i närheten av barnen för att kunna hjälpa och stötta de barn som har svårigheter i den fria leken. Pedagogernas inställning är att lära barn en av de viktigaste färdigheterna, det sociala samspelet, för att de ska utvecklas som personer och ha nytta av det i framtiden.       

This article emanates from a research project analyzing school-to-work transitions in a biographical perspective. 52 young unemployed adults (25-29 years) from three Swedish municipalities with highly varying socioeconomic/demographic conditions (a rural area, a well-situated and a vulnerable suburb) were interviewed. It is highlighted how the local context (and gender) influences their journeys through education, working life and career guidance.

Four different career patterns are identified (yoyo-transitions, staying and moving mainly within either education, work or exclusion), which shape their past experiences, present situation and hopes for the future. These patterns are locally influenced. Young people in the rural area are over-represented in the yoyo-transition pattern, while those in the well-situated suburb more often can be found on the educational road. Finally exclusion (permanent unemployment or absence of a stable job) mainly emerges among those living in the vulnerable suburb.

Rural interviewees feel restricted regarding local possibilities in education and working life, and demonstrate distinctive strategies. Respondents in the vulnerable suburb identify social capital as crucial to make one´s way, while education has particularly high value in the well-situated suburb. The young adults´ narratives illustrate that locality and gender are interwoven. For example, in suggesting future career goals some of them address critical problems in their community that differs between men and women.

Interventions when young people choose upper secondary school and varying unemployment schemes illustrate that public career guidance is shaped by, and reproduce, local structures. Young adults´ main counter-strategy towards career guidance which is perceived as endangering personal goals is to avoid institutions/officials; to “manage by oneself”. Other approaches differ due to local context and gender. Negotiation efforts are mostly done by men in the rural area and hardly at all by women living in the suburbs, while a misleading strategy is demonstrated by a few women in all three municipalities.    

Individuals develop responses to local possibilities and limitations depending on economic and institutional structures as well as cultural values. What is “marketable” for a young adult woman or man in the three contexts varies, and contributes to explain the differences in individual strategies.