This book seeks to offer the most up-to-date and relevant sample of contemporary research on Latin American education, by inviting the reader to understand the complexities, heterogenetics, nightmares, dreams, crisis and promises of education in the region.

Al-Bataineh and Nur-Awaleh's (both education, Illinois State U.,) text is designed for undergraduate and graduate students who want to improve their understanding of educational systems, formal school institutions, and educational reform worldwide. The text compares and analyzes systems and reforms in both developed and developing countries in several Islamic, Latin American, and African countries, and covers a number of themes, including the current systems, contemporary reforms, the historical development of educational policy and schooling, the role of national and international agencies in education, and post-public education in the developing world. Also suitable as a reference for researchers, educators, governmental and educational agencies, and university international studies programs. Annotation : 2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com).

This state-of-the-art, comprehensive Handbook fully explores the field of alternative education on an international scale. Alternatives to mainstream schooling and education are becoming increasingly recognised as pertinent and urgent for better understanding what really works in successfully educating children and adults today, especially in light of the increased performance driven and managerially organised economic modelling of education that dominates. For too long we have wondered what “exactly” education done otherwise might look like and here we meet individual examples as well as seeing what alternative education is when a collection becomes greater than the sum of parts. The Handbook profiles numerous empirical examples from around the world of education being done in innovative and excitingly democratic and autonomous ways from Forest Schools and Home Education through to new technologies, neuroscience and the importance of solitude. The book also sets out important theoretical perspectives to inform us why seeing education through an alternative lens is useful as well as urgently needed. Global in its perspective and definitive in content, this one-stop volume will be an indispensable reference resource for a wide range of academics, students and researchers in the fields of Education, Education Policy, Sociology and Philosophy as well as educational practitioners.

This invaluable Encyclopedia presents an interdisciplinary and comprehensive overview of the field of social innovation, providing an insightful view into potential future developments both practically and theoretically. This title contains one or more Open Access chapters.