Blockchain Papers

Gerald W. Fry

No abstract is available for this record.

Litao Zhao, Ling Li, Chen Huang

The tension between mobilizing resources to meet education-related growth targets and regularizing educational funding for a more stable and sustainable growth is structurally rooted in China’s educational system, which features growth-oriented, centralized mandates and county-based, decentralized financing. It was manifested in 2012, when China experienced a ‘great leap’ in educational expenditure. Based on interviews and school-level data from a province in western China, this article suggests that the ‘great leap’ was real rather than fabricated. Local governments have demonstrated remarkable capacity in resource mobilization involving both formal and informal strategies. It also shows the scarring effects of too much mobilization. The ‘great leap’ has clearly stressed and strained local governments to the extent that there is clear evidence of policy non-compliance and greater irregularity in government funding for education in the aftermath.

Po Yang, Yunbo Liu

In the rapid development of Chinese higher vocational education, large gaps have appeared in the scale of development and resource generation among the provinces, among regions in the provinces, and among higher education institutions in the provinces. Balanced regional development and provincial-level coordination have become policy focal points, but a discussion of the relationship between the two has been lacking in the academic world. Based on 2009 data on vocational colleges in China, the quantitative analysis in this paper shows that there is a tension between the governance models of higher vocational education and balanced development of vocational colleges within provinces. Research findings show that school affiliation is related to the ability to attract public funding, appropriations for public schools are significantly higher than for private schools, and tuition for private schools is significantly higher than for public schools; school affiliation is related to output, and the new student registration rate and number of cooperating enterprises is higher for public schools than private schools; and there is a significant positive correlation between the ratio of prefecture-level city schools and the average number of cooperating enterprises for schools in a province, and a significant positive correlation between the ratio of private schools and the average tuition of schools in a province. This paper suggests that to achieve the dual objectives of balance and development, provincial-level governments should adjust their administrations and financing for higher vocational education and decentralize their authority to local governments, in order to build a diverse and flexible new model for higher vocational education governance.

Tao Li

Using a new enrollment dataset of Shanghai public colleges for 2009, we investigate whether the increase in the stratification of Chinese higher education is attributed to the decentralization of higher education finance. We discover that colleges in Shanghai not only admit significantly more in-province students (which we refer to as quantity bias), but also quietly place more out-of-province students, especially those from poor provinces, in low-paying majors (which we refer to as quality bias) when tuition is regulated by the central government. Both types of biases are more obvious in local colleges funded primarily by the Shanghai municipal government than in national colleges jointly funded by central and municipal governments. Our findings provide suggestive evidence that the decentralization of higher education finance in China deeply exacerbates the inequality of higher education opportunities.

Yisu Zhou, Dan Wang

The right to education for children from rural migrant families in urban areas has sparked heated debates in China. While there are increasing indications of policy changes to bring public education to all citizens regardless of their residency, it is less clear what kinds of resources are needed to create an education supply to serve this constantly moving and ever-growing population. Using archival and interview data on a large urban district in Shanghai, the authors analyze the constraints faced by local government in providing full-scale free education to migrant children. The authors find that the public finance scheme, teacher staffing policy and land use policy are the three factors that constrain the supply of public education in large metropolitan areas. This analysis also shows that under the current decentralized management scheme, local government alone does not have the capacity to resolve these constraints. This finding calls for coordination among various state branches at the national level.

Henry M. Healey, Rafik Hanna, Hany Attalla

Over the period 2007–2013, a series of undertakings were made to introduce fundamental elements of decentralized education finance to Egypt. In 2009, 8.4M Egyptian pounds (EGP) of the Government of Egypt’s (GOE) budget was decentralized to every primary school in three pilot governorates. By 2013, EGP 1.2B of the GOE’s money had been decentralized nationwide. This paper describes what these undertakings strived to achieve, what specifically was done to achieve these objectives, the degree to which these objectives were achieved, the reasons why they were achieved to the degree they were with particular attention paid to the institutional and political context within which these undertakings unfolded. The account of the technical work that was undertaken to decentralize these funds is important, but more important is the account of the interplay between the technical work, the fact that this work supported a GOE-led initiative, and the volatile political environment—pre-revolution, revolution, and post-revolution Egypt—in which the work was done for it is here where important lessons about reform emerge.

Hao Pu Lin

Fiscal decentralization is one of the fundamental paths to promote efficiency for governmental management,and the System Reform of Tax Distribution is an important portion of fiscal decentralization.Since the implication of the reform two decades ago,some problems have arisen,such as the mismatch between local governments'financial power and routine power,lack of or insufficient public services provided by local governments.As one of the basic public services,rural compulsory education relies to a large extent on tax system reform,especially on finance.For now,it is the county-level finance that supports rural compulsory education,which has posed many challenges related to accessibility,the efficiency and equality of the rural compulsory education.An optimized supplying system of rural compulsory education needs a continuously developed and guaranteed fiscal providing regime.

Yulya Yevdokymova

This paper explores school finance management in the context of two different organizational models, rather decentralized Norwegian school management and highly centralized school management in Ukraine. Based on the both cases, the paper analyzes the experience of the school leaders in Norway and Ukraine regarding their budget efforts, and challenges they have met within the framework of the national contexts. It is argued that greater budget autonomy in schools in Ukraine might provide resource and time efficiency. It is discussed that formula-based allocation of money might increase accountability and transparency to the Ukrainian customers of educational services. The study involves deliberations on the possibility to apply greater school autonomy on budget matters in socio-economic context of Ukraine, and a series of policies is proposed, aimed at decentralization of the educational sector.

Authors unavailable

Citation (2011), "International Perspectives on Education and Society", Huang, T. and Wiseman, A.W. (Ed.) The Impact and Transformation of Education Policy in China (International Perspectives on Education and Society, Vol. 15), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Bingley, p. iii. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1479-3679(2011)0000015021 Publisher: Emerald Group Publishing Limited Copyright © 2011, Emerald Group Publishing Limited Book Chapters The Impact and Transformation of Education Policy in China International Perspectives on Education and Society International Perspectives on Education and Society Copyright Page List of Contributors Preface The Development of Comparative Education Research on Chinese Educational Policy Reform: An Introduction Moving Toward Decentralization? Changing Education Governance in China After 1985 Interprovincial and Regional Inequity in the Financing of Compulsory Education in China Wearing New Shoes to Walk the Old Road: The Negotiation of Opposing Imperatives in High School New Curriculum Classes in China China's New Millennium Curriculum Reform in Mathematics and its Impact on Classroom Teaching and Learning The Landscape of Principal Leadership Development in Mainland China: An Analysis of Chinese and English Research Defining School Effectiveness in the Reform for Quality-Oriented Education The ‘Gap’ Between Policy Intent and Policy Effect: An Exploration of the Interpretations of School Principals in China Reforming the College Entrance Examination: Epicenter of Tension, Change, and Resistance Importance of Home Environment for Children's Schooling: From the Teacher's Perspective Educational Barriers for Migrant Children in China: A Mixed-Method Analysis Focused on Ethnic Minorities Education Technology as a Catalyst for Education Development in China: A Policy Perspective Quality Assurance in Undergraduate Education: Transformation of Higher Education Policy in China The Role of Private Higher Education in the Chinese Higher Education System About the Authors

Authors unavailable

Citation (2011), "The Impact and Transformation of Education Policy in China", Huang, T. and Wiseman, A.W. (Ed.) The Impact and Transformation of Education Policy in China (International Perspectives on Education and Society, Vol. 15), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Bingley, p. i. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1479-3679(2011)0000015019 Publisher: Emerald Group Publishing Limited Copyright © 2011, Emerald Group Publishing Limited Book Chapters The Impact and Transformation of Education Policy in China International Perspectives on Education and Society International Perspectives on Education and Society Copyright Page List of Contributors Preface The Development of Comparative Education Research on Chinese Educational Policy Reform: An Introduction Moving Toward Decentralization? Changing Education Governance in China After 1985 Interprovincial and Regional Inequity in the Financing of Compulsory Education in China Wearing New Shoes to Walk the Old Road: The Negotiation of Opposing Imperatives in High School New Curriculum Classes in China China's New Millennium Curriculum Reform in Mathematics and its Impact on Classroom Teaching and Learning The Landscape of Principal Leadership Development in Mainland China: An Analysis of Chinese and English Research Defining School Effectiveness in the Reform for Quality-Oriented Education The ‘Gap’ Between Policy Intent and Policy Effect: An Exploration of the Interpretations of School Principals in China Reforming the College Entrance Examination: Epicenter of Tension, Change, and Resistance Importance of Home Environment for Children's Schooling: From the Teacher's Perspective Educational Barriers for Migrant Children in China: A Mixed-Method Analysis Focused on Ethnic Minorities Education Technology as a Catalyst for Education Development in China: A Policy Perspective Quality Assurance in Undergraduate Education: Transformation of Higher Education Policy in China The Role of Private Higher Education in the Chinese Higher Education System About the Authors

Tingting Qi

This chapter integrates current Chinese education reform into the unique socioeconomic context of China in a transitional time and explores the complexity of education decentralization in China through an in-depth analysis on changes in education finance, administration, and curriculum development. Mark Hanson's theory of education decentralization is cited to build a conceptual framework for examining education decentralization in China. Previous studies, government documents, laws, and regulations related to the current wave of Chinese education reform are reviewed to capture a true picture of education decentralization in China. In investigating the background, actual actions, and motive of the current Chinese education reform, the chapter demonstrates that the on-going Chinese education reform is moving toward a centralized decentralization. Linking education with the unified national goal of economic modernization, the paradoxical mixture of centralization and decentralization is a strategic means to avoid loss of centralized control. Literature on decentralization reform in Chinese education primarily concentrates on changed Chinese education policies in the reform. This chapter places the focus on the contextual factors that shape the decentralization trend in current reform.

Yu Zhang, Suguru Mizunoya, You You, Mun C. Tsang

This is a study of financial disparities in primary and secondary education in OECD countries that have a relatively large population and a school finance system with decentralized features. These countries include the United States, Britain, Australia, Spain, Canada, and Japan. There are two major research questions: What are the trends in disparities in per-student education spending during the 1990s and early 2000s period? What government policies or factors may explain these trends? Common statistics such as the coefficient of variation, the restricted range, the federal range ratio, and Gini coefficient are used to measure disparity in per-student spending. Sub-national data for this study are obtained from published government sources. There are three major findings: (1) there was a general trend towards a reduction in inequity in per-student education spending in these countries; (2) this equalization trend was associated with a variety of financing policies implemented in these countries; and (3) a larger share of regional government funding relative to the share of local government funding, intergovernmental transfer, and the design of school funding formulas are crucial factors for enhancing equity in education funding. The policy towards centralization in education finance system also appears to be an important factor in financial equalization.

Jan Herczyński

The present report provides a review of the financing of Macedonian education as the country comes close to completing the first phase of decentralization. Soon all municipalities will find themselves in the second phase of decentralization, so the natural question is, what has been accomplished and what should be the next steps. Is decentralization complete, and if not, what remains to be done. A more specific technical question concerns the financing of decentralized education in Macedonia, and in particular the functioning of per student allocation formulas, in use since 2006. Properly managed and updated, allocation formulas may be a strong policy instrument of the Government.

John C. Weidman, Brian Yoder

This article describes the social, economic, and political processes that have influenced educational reform in two countries of Central Asia since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. It compares and contrasts the various educational reform initiatives that have occurred in each country, including legal and policy frameworks, curriculum change, decentralization, privatization, finance, structure, and emphasis of educational systems, and the fit between what is taught in educational institutions and demands of the labor market. A sector-wide framework for education reform is presented to facilitate understanding of the very complex set of processes involved.

Authors unavailable

Establishment of international institutions has become a central feature of modern international politics (Koremenos et al. 2001). Participation in international organizations, which is itself often used as an indicator of integration into the wider world system, may lead to the active incorporation of nation states with worldwide connotations. There are four principal international organizations, constituting nation state members, which have the capability to influence globalization and regionalism profoundly: the World Trade Organization (WTO), the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank, and the United Nations (UN). There are a few points to make about these organizations, which are closely identified with the international political economy and with both regionalism and globalization: (1) states themselves are still very much the dominant actors; (2) the impact of international organizations depends very much on how they work with other actors, especially the national governments (Drake 2001)—their effect is determined by how nation states manage their cooperation with international organizations (Stiglitz 2002); (3) the effect of an organization depends on its own management, leadership, and organizational culture; (4) international organizations are not a monolithic bloc-there are differences between governmental and nongovernmental organizations and between those within the UNO and the financial institutions (Stiglitz 2002; Wang an Xie 2004); (5) many international agencies are governed by and for special corporate financial interests-there is an absence of countervailing democratic checks to ensure that these informal and public institutions serve a general interest (Stiglitz 2002). With regard to higher education, nation-centric policies are no longer sufficient and cannot adequately engage with the new global realities of transnational economic, political, and cultural interconnectivities. Educational ideologies and experience now circulate around the world at a rapid rate, resulting in global educational policy networks that are often more influential than local political actors. Similar pressures, procedures, and organizational patterns increasingly govern educational systems, leading to “universalizing tendencies in educational reform” (Halpin 1994, 204). Consequently, there is a global convergence of educational policy being placed highly on the agendas of national governments and international organizations. While the actual dynamics and pace of change vary across national systems, the direction of change appears to be similar. They seem located within the same neo-liberal imagery (Schugurensky 1999). Why has today’s grand narrative of economic globalization acquired the status of a universalistic logic that supposedly propels and legitimizes such practices of managerialism as downsizing and state deregulations and privatization, as if they were a natural and inevitable response to the steering logic of globalization (Rizvi 2004)? International organizations are part of the answer. They play an increasingly important role in the processes of educational policy formation and evaluation at the national level, involving negotiating consensus and conventions, ensuring coordinated policy action across national systems, as well as supporting international cooperation in education through the development of global indicators and quality. The approaches driven by such organizations indicate a trend toward uniformity, demanding a convergence in thinking and accepting similar diagnoses of problems confronting educational systems with widely differing social, political, and economic traditions. They influence national systems through a number of normative and rule-creating activities (Jacobson 1984). The specific activities that show the relevance of international organizations for worldwide educational policy convergence include the exchange of information, charters and constitutions, standard-setting instruments, and technical and financial resources (McNealy and Cha 1994). With the help of the functioning of international organizations, the neoliberal imagery of globalization has acquired ascendancy in education thinking and become highly normative. It designates certain power relations, practices, and technologies, playing a hegemonic role in organizing and decoding the meaning of the world. Its dominance is secured through a range of political strategies, employed by international organizations and national governments alike. In the context of such multilateralism, developing countries are often coerced to take into account the alleged “imperatives of the global economy.” The restructuring of higher education worldwide informed by neo-liberal market ideologies has transformed the framework of the broader changes in policy and governance, and has had an impact on the manner in which universities are financed and managed (Rizvi 2004). International organizations developed fast in Asia after the Cold War. The Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN), for example, was founded in August 1967 with five members. It included Cambodia as its 10th member in 1999. Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) member states increased from 12 in 1989 to 21 in 1997. As Asian indigenous international organizations are growing rapidly, the presence of many international organizations that were established elsewhere are gaining increasing visibility in Asia as well. Due to the relative underdevelopment of representative politics and the social discourses, the effect of international organizations to promote neo-liberalism is particularly pervasive. Many international organizations have certain education components in their programs. Those without a mandate for education have also become vivid players in the education policy field. International organizations are active in Asia in similar ways, such as agenda setting, innovating, and disseminating fresh ideas through the coordination and distribution of statistics and policy papers developed by highly skilled professionals who are seen as capable to provide objective and effective solutions to national problems (Finnemore and Sikkink 1998; Haas 1992; March and Olsen 1998), and creating professional transnational networks in the field of education policy through the organization of conferences. With their growing activity, the way of policy making in most Asian countries has been altered (Leuze et al. 2007). As one of the oldest and most wide-ranging organizations, the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has been actively influencing education policy making in Asia. By developing and proposing conventions, resolutions, and recommendations in the field of education (McNeely and Cha 1994), by promoting lifelong learning, and by establishing worldwide applicable quality assurance systems, it shapes policy concepts in its Asian member states. It established the Asian Regional Office for Primary and Compulsory Education, which later became the Asia and Pacific Regional Bureau for Education, to interpret global priorities and goals in a regional context and adapt broad institutional strategies to achieve the regional goals. In a similar vein, the UNESCO Regional Bureau in Bangkok has now become a network of regional centers to promote training of specialists. It has organized a wide range of networking and capacity-building activities for higher and distance education, and made deliberate efforts to promote greater mobility and recognition of higher education qualifications by the universities in Asia and the Pacific region, often in tandem with the South-East Asian Ministers for Education Organization-Regional Institute for Higher Education. Another UNESCO regional inter-country cooperative program, the AsiaPacific Program of Educational Innovation (APEID), aims to strengthen its member states’ capabilities at national and local levels for creation and use of educational innovations in achieving national development goals, including stimulating and facilitating innovative activities for equity and quality in education, assisting member countries in enhancing capabilities of undertaking innovative actions in related program areas, and promoting inter-country technical cooperation and transfer of innovative experiences. Through the Regional Convention on the Recognition of Studies, Diplomas and Degrees in Higher Education in Asia and the Pacific, APEID provides financial and technical assistance, serves as a secretariat to implement programs, and assists in providing information on higher education and degrees in its member states for the mutual understanding and recognition of qualifications. As the largest financier of international educational development, and most powerful ideologue and regulator in the developing world (Jones 1992), the World Bank has been the most influential in Asia. Through its profile as a worldwide institution of knowledge-promoting projects in education (Robertson 2005), it propagates the specific neo-liberal view of how public education should be organized (Jakobi 2007), with its emphasis on systemwide reforms, quality, efficiency, decentralization, the restructuring of the public service, the introduction of standardized educational testing regimes, the introduction of private service providers, as well as cost recovery measures. Its projects cover a wide range of education issues in many Asian countries. Its activities in Asia also include providing guidelines for the development of cross-border higher education in the region, launching initiatives in quality, quality assurance, and mutual recognition of qualifications, promoting networking of higher education institutions within the region across the board, and establishing virtual universities to offer distance learning programs to students from the Greater Mekong subregion, namely, Cambodia, Lao PDR, Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam, and Yunnan province in China. There are a number of other international organizations that are influential in Asia. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), for example, publishes annually Education at a Glance, which covers Asian countries. The publication is often seen as one of the most important sources of educational indicators and is thus highly influential in Asia. The Program for International Student Assessment serves as another example, with more and more Asian countries joining the project. By placing greater emphasis on shared international standards rather than national peculiarities of education systems, the OECD has cleared the way for greater convergence and commitment amongst Asian states to uniform models of best practices. Its rating and ranking activities, which appear to be based on objective criteria, scientifically researched by experts, and presented in an easily accessible manner, puts many Asian states under pressure to import and apply models for education developed in other (usually developed) countries (Martens 2007). Increasing international activities in the arena of education raises the question as to what extent international organizations are complementing or even partly taking over the design and provision of education policies. Using examples from higher education practices from the People’s Republic of China, this chapter examines how international organizations “lend” their ideas for circulation, and how the local and the global play out. It analyzes what circulates internationally as “reforms” and its impact on the actors that move and translate such practices into local contexts, exploring the relation of the global in local situations and the complex impact of policy borrowing.

Rong Wang

This paper does an empirical study on the impact of decentralized school finance and personnel management system on the rural compulsory education quality with the method of hierarchical linear model and the data of Rural Compulsory Education Survey launched by China's Education Finance Research Institute in 2007.Results show that the decentralized personnel management system has a statistically significant positive effect on the education quality,but the decentralized school finance system has a statistically mixed effect on the education quality.In order to improve the quality of rural compulsory education and advance the reform of the new guarantee mechanism of education funds in the middle and east regions,rural primary and secondary schools should be given certain autonomy to use funds and meanwhile,the monitoring mechanisms for the process of the use of public funds in schools should be improved and strengthened.And the decentralized system of personnel management of teachers should be implemented and certain degree of autonomy of personnel management of teachers should be given to principals in rural schools.

Yasushi Hirosato, Yuto Kitamura

No abstract is available for this record.

Bao Jinling

During the decentralization of recent years,Japan has begun to reform the national treasury support system for the compulsory education finance.Through the financial system centralization and financial adjustment,Japan's financial guarantee system of compulsory education is adjusted with transferring the treasury full support to reducing the support proportion,and with the compulsory education quota,payment delivery and the general financial resources.Japan began to rebuild the educational finance relations of the central and the local governments.

Joanne Xiaolei Qian, Russell Smyth

Reforms to China's education sector over the last two decades have sought to diversify the sources of funding education. This paper examines the consequences of these reforms for Chinese families and regional disparities in access to education. To illustrate the implications of education reforms for Chinese families, we draw on a large survey of urban residents across 32 Chinese cities as well as a case study of fees charged by a single secondary school in Chengdu. We argue that while China has made progress in moving towards the United Nations objective of ‘Education for All’, decentralization of China's education funding has impeded access to schooling for many, particularly those living in financially disadvantaged locales, and placed an undue financial burden on many ordinary Chinese households.

Litao Zhao

No abstract is available for this record.

Kaori Suetomi

No abstract is available for this record.

AN Xuehu

Based on a random survey for 50 school districts in 20 counties of western China,this pa- per empirically measures and discusses the allocation of personnel power in rural education system. By examining the characteristics of personnel administration system,we discover that the impacts of education finance reform on the reallocation of personnel power.The personnel power in the educa- tion system has been centralized to county education bureau and party organization bureau in most of sample school districts,while the township government gradually loses the control during the educa- tion finance reform.Only in a small number of districts,the decentralized system for personnel ad- ministration can be established.

Innocent Buberwa Rugambuka

ABSTRACT\nA students’ Loan scheme is one among many alternatives for financing higher education in various countries around the world. Tanzania is one of the countries that have been practicing loan scheme system for financing higher education sub-sector. The purpose of this study is to examine the performance of the students’ loan scheme in Tanzania basing on the views of the stakeholders, mostly higher education students who are the main beneficiaries of the scheme.\n\nSome university students at the University of Dar es Salaam, the policy makers and policy implementers in the Ministry of Higher Education, Science and Technology and the Higher Education Student Loan Board respectively, were identified for the study. The study was guided by two research questions. These are: what is the performance of higher education student loan scheme in terms of the procedures for loan application and money disbursement; and does the student loan scheme contain the structures for loan recovery to the extent of being able to recover the loan?\n\nA qualitative strategy has been used in this study. Multiple methods were used for data collection, namely semi-structured interview, group discussion and documentary analysis. Twelve students of different academic years of study and student leaders at the student organization level, two policy makers and two policy implementers were interviewed. Twenty students were involved in a focused group discussion. And various documents including policy documents, guidelines and website documents were analyzed. Data collected was analyzed by induction process.\n\nThe findings show that the loan scheme in Tanzania is partly not performing well in terms of application procedures, disbursement of funds to students and loan recovery. Therefore to make the loan scheme perform at the convenience of the stakeholders, it is recommended that the government should decentralize the HESLB to district level (establish the district offices). By doing so some services such as distribution and collection of loan application forms and means-testing can be done at the district offices. In addition, it is recommended that the loan application forms can also be stationed at Advanced Secondary Schools to make it easy for the applicants to access them as most of the applicants are students from these schools.

Ka Ho Mok, King Lun Ngok

The economic transition in China since the late 1970s has led not only to drastic social transformations but also rapid advancements in science and technology, as well as a revolution in information and communications technology. In order to enhance the global competence of the Chinese population in coping with the challenges of the knowledge-based economy, the higher education sector has been going through restructuring along the lines of marketization, privatization and decentralization. Responding to the challenges of globalization, the Chinese government has opened up the education market by allowing private/minban higher education institutions and even overseas universities to offer academic programmes in the mainland. Hence, we have witnessed a proliferation of education providers, a diversification of education financing, and an increase in private-public partnerships in education provision since the policy of educational decentralization was introduced in the mid-1980s. This article sets out to examine the politics of educational decentralization in this wider policy context by critically analysing the tensions between the central education ministry, conventional minban higher education institutions and the newly emerging state-endorsed independent minban colleges (second-tier colleges or independent colleges). It also reflects critically upon the policy implications for the evolving "governed market" in education, and analyses the challenges for the new regulatory regime now that the higher education sector has become highly diversified in post-Mao China.