This unique handbook offers an analytical review of the education systems of all European countries, following common analytical guidelines, and highlighting the paradox that education simultaneously pursues a universal value as well as a national character. Coverage includes international student performance studies, and a comparison of education dynamics in Eastern "new Europe" with "older" western EU members. The book provides a differentiated analytical data base, and offers suggestions for further research.

This book fleshes out activities and initiatives in the field of education from across areas of European Union competence in order to highlight the extent to which education and training have penetrated the European Community’s policymaking since its creation. Policies are all too often placed in their individual silos, which can sometimes work against deeper understanding of policymaking and its reach across policy domains. This project avoids such compartmentalisation and instead crosses boundaries to explore education’s relationship with other policy areas, as well as its far-reaching role in the construction of a united Europe. It demonstrates education’s significance across the broad landscape of European integration by presenting a collection of case studies, which represent policy areas that have experienced the infiltration of education. These include: Migration, Health, Agriculture, Multilingualism, Media and Communications, and the environment.

Today, a substantial portion of higher education is provided outside of the traditional universities in non-university institutions with a multitude of varied characteristics. In recent decades, higher education systems have been subjected to many changes and reforms throughout the world. One of the most important was undoubtedly the expansion of higher education in the second half of the last century from an elite system to one for the masses. While institutions of higher learning have been in existence for approximately 1,000 years, this exponential growth has been much more recent. This movement toward mass higher education has created substantial national impacts on the development of the systems of higher education. While common denominators of change and adaptation can be identified globally, there remain important differences from country to country. There are many factors challenging higher education today and in the foreseeable future. In one form or another, these issues and trends can be seen in higher education systems throughout the world. They include chronic underfunding, marketisation and competition, alternative providers, massification, internationalisation, governance, leadership, strategic management, accountability, accreditation, and social relevance. Another key factor for many countries, especially in Europe, and the focus of this book, is the current and future status of the higher education systems that differentiate the university and non-university sectors.

This book is open access under a CC BY 4.0 license. This open access book examines the modern role of the European School system within the European Union, at a time when the global economy demands a new vision for contemporary education. The European schools are currently in a state of crisis: their 60-year-old tradition of bilingual and multilingual education is being strained by rapid EU expansion and the removal of English speaking teachers as a result of Brexit. Their tried and tested model of mathematics and science education has rapidly been overtaken by new developments in pedagogy and assessment research, while recruitment and retention of students and teachers has become increasingly fraught as European member states review what they are, and what they are not, prepared to fund. The authors draw on original and empirical research to assess the European Schools’ place in a new Europe where the entire post-war European Project is potentially at risk. This well-researched volume will be of interest to practitioners working in European schools as well as students and scholars of EU politics and international education.

New Public Management and the Reform of Education addresses complex and dynamic changes to public services by focusing on new public management as a major shaper and influencer of educational reforms within, between and across European nation states and policy actors. The contributions to the book are diverse and illustrate the impact of NPM locally but also the interplay between local and European policy spheres. The book offers: A critical overview of NPM through an analysis of debates, projects and policy actors A detailed examination of NPM within 10 nation states in Europe A robust engagement with the national and European features of NPM as a policy strategy The book actively contributes to debates and analysis within critical policy studies about the impact and resilience of NPM, and how through a study of educational reforms in a range of political systems with different traditions and purposes a more nuanced and complex picture of NPM can be built. As such the book not only speaks to educational researchers and professionals within Europe but also to policymakers, and can inform wider education and policy communities internationally.

The public provision of early childhood education has developed at different rates across individual countries over the past two centuries. This book provides the historical background to explain how these national differences occurred, with particular reference to welfare and educational systems, to highlight how particular influences grew.