The universities of Britain, France, Germany, and the United States stem from a common European academic tradition and are today among the most influential and powerful in the world. Each has cultivated a high degree of scientific and intellectual autonomy and has served as a model for world higher education. Yet, those four systems are structurally distinct and show considerably different patterns of development. In Centers of Learning Joseph Ben-David sxplores these differences and provides insight into the role and scope of contemporary higher education.

The Bologna Declaration started the development of the European Higher Education Area. The ensuing Bologna Process has run for already 20 years now. In the meantime many higher education systems in Europe have been reformed – some more drastically than others; some quicker than others; some with more resistance than others. In the process of reform the initial (six) goals have sometimes been forgotten or sometimes been taken a step further. The context too has shifted: while the European Union in itself has expanded, the voice for exit has also been heard more frequently. Higher Education System Reform: An international comparison after Twenty Years of Bologna critically describes and analyses 12 Higher Education Systems from the perspective of four major questions: What is currently the situation with regard to the six original goals of Bologna? What was the adopted path of reform? Which were the triggering (economic, social, political) factors for the reform in each specific country? What was the rationale/discourse used during the reform? The book comparatively analyses the different systems, their paths of reforms and trajectories, and the similarities and the differences between them. At the same time it critically assesses the current situation on higher education in Europe, and hints towards a future policy agenda. Contributors are: Tommaso Agasisti, Bruno Broucker, Martina Dal Molin, Kurt De Wit, Andrew Gibson, Ellen Hazelkorn, Gergely Kovats, Liudvika Leišytė, Lisa Lucas, António Magalhães, Sude Peksen, Rosalind Pritchard, Palle Rasmussen, Anna-Lena Rose, Christine Teelken, Eva M. de la Torre, Carmen Perez-Esparrells, Jani Ursin, Amélia Veiga, Jef C. Verhoeven, Nadine Zeeman, and Rimantas Želvys.

The universities of Britain, France, Germany, and the United States stem from a common European academic tradition and are today among the most influential and powerful in the world. Each has cultivated a high degree of scientific excellence and intellectual autonomy and has served as a model for world higher education. Yet these four systems are structurally distinct and show considerably different patterns of development. In Centers of Learning Joseph Ben-David explores these differences and provides insight into the role and scope of contemporary higher education. Although the movement toward modem systems grew out of shared convictions and practical needs, Ben-David's comparative analysis shows that educational reform had surprisingly different consequences in America, England, Germany, and France. In France, higher education became identified with the purposes and authority of the state through specialized training for various professionals. In contrast, the German reforms consolidated the scholarly disciplines under a highly centralized university system with no special status accorded to the professional faculties. In England, Oxford and Cambridge adopted the German model, but smaller specialized institutions established a tradition of academic diversity and community 'service. The modernization of the American system followed the European reforms in updating the scientific curriculum and following the university model, but with a special emphasis on extending higher educational status to a broad strata of the population. In assessing the development of these systems, Ben-David finds their greatest success in extending the prestige and benefits of higher learning to the professions. General education, while strong in America, has suffered in the European systems, especially through its slackening ties to research. Centers of Learning contains a forceful critique of the politicization of the academy. Ben-David sees the furthering of social justice and equality as a necessary, though controlled part of the university's mission. Uncontrolled, political criticism will have the potential for disrupting educational functions and undermining the relationship between the university and society. In undertaking a historical survey of national education endeavors, this volume clarifies the contexts of current problems and inadequacies. Its broad-ranging analyses and proposed solutions make it essential reading for educators, social historians, political scientists, and sociologists.

Foreign students have travelled to Britain for centuries and, from the beginning, attracted controversy. This book explores changing British policy and practice, and changing student experience, set within the context of British social and political history.

PISA 2006: Science Competencies for Tomorrow’s World presents the results from the most recent PISA survey, which focused on science and also assessed mathematics and reading. It is divided into two volumes: the first offers an analysis of the results, the second contains the underlying data.

Verslag van een onderzoek naar cultuurverschillen in 7 westerse landen.

This volume provides a focused account of English Medium Instruction (EMI) in European higher education, considering issues of ideologies, policies, and practices. This is an essential book for academics, students, policy makers, and educators directly or indirectly implicated in the internationalization of European higher education.

At once a book about Oxford and Heidelberg University and about the character of European society on the eve of the World War I, Our Friend "The Enemy" challenges the idea that pre-1914 Europe was bound to collapse.