Tracing Reform Patterns and Change in Higher Education

• In Event: Global Trends in Education Reform Amid Political Upheaval and Cultural Transformation

Proposal

Since the end of World War II, countries around the world have implemented a variety of education reforms. Reforms, such as revising curriculum, introducing new university departments, or strengthening research through greater provision for funding, can bring about systemic changes to universities, affecting undergraduate and graduate students. These reforms are often taken for granted as a necessary feature of school systems, representing “systems of values and symbolic systems” that propose ‘magical solutions’ (Ball, 1998). Countries have invested in higher education to create a stronger foundation for a knowledge-intensive economy (Buckner, 2019; Buckner, 2017). This is partly driven by the rapid internationalization in higher education and the rise in the number of higher education institutions around the world (Buckner, 2019). Countries have instituted reforms in higher education to improve human capital to strengthen the linkage between tertiary education and labor market outcomes. A study of higher education reforms in the Arab States finds that higher education reforms can be categorized into three types of reforms: neoliberal policies such as privatization in education, reforms that focus on quality assurance, and reforms that focus on internationalization of universities (Buckner, 2011). This study draws from these extant studies to understand patterns and types of national education reforms and to draw attention to the broader cultural forces that affect reforms around the world. We do so by examining the nature, pace, and effects of higher education reform, particularly in the changing social context of universities on a global scale. This study is guided by the following research question: how has the extent and substantive foci of education reforms related to higher education changed over time? This study will extend previous studies that focus on patterns of higher education reforms using the World Education Reform Database (WERD), the most recent and comprehensive database on national education reforms.

Authors

• Rie Kijima, University of Toronto

• Elizabeth Buckner, University of Toronto OISE