This work sets out to answer questions such as, what have we learned after three decades of research into school effectiveness? What can we say with confidence about how schools improve? It reviews findings from seminal international work.

This volume presents an interdisciplinary framework to map out contemporary educational studies in India. Based on conceptual tools, quantitative methods and ethnographic accounts drawn from extensive fieldwork, it addresses emerging discourses on educational policies, their operation in the everyday functioning of institutions and actual practices in teaching and learning. Individual chapters discuss the intersectionality in the current educational system of region, gender, class, caste and minorities. With comparative perspectives and case studies from across states, including under-studied rural and urban regions of India, the book explores a wide range of issues affecting the educational system, including socioeconomic and gender inequalities; the educational status of tribal settlements in the hinterlands and their respective urban areas; the marginalisation of minorities; challenges in accessing educational avenues and choices; and the model for imparting vocational education and training. It navigates complex sites of discrimination and exclusion in the institutional spaces of the educational system and assesses the consequences of market dynamics and ideological undercurrents. Presenting first-hand information from the field, it evaluates educational policies, practices and research; investigates challenges and failures; provides suggestions and fosters critical thinking for a knowledge society. The findings in this book will be of interest to researchers, scholars and teachers of education, economics, sociology, urban education and the politics of education, as well as of public policy, governance and development studies. It will also be useful to research institutions, policymakers, educationists, social scientists, education professionals, and governmental and non-governmental bodies working on education.

The saga of the Indian National Movement; with its unique leadership and ideological foundation; continues to engage those interested in the history of India. Raj to Swaraj: A Textbook on Colonialism and Nationalism in India takes its readers through the panorama of modern Indian history; with all its trials and tribulations; and keeps it intellectually stimulating all through the narrative. This textbook for students attempts to present its case; free from ideological biases. The result of a lifelong engagement with teaching and research; this book incorporates the sharp classroom debates and analysis of bright and committed students; thus enriching its formulations and interpretations. It provides a fresh look at the national struggle for independence and attempts to provoke; promote and unleash; critical and creative thinking among the student community. In the process; it seeks to relieve them from the drudgery of working as intellectual foot soldiers to the authorities in our academia. This book marks a departure from the earlier studies in terms of its new and updated sources as well as in its freedom from the great ideological divides that continue to bedevil our academic life. As such; it avoids both the extremes of woolly sentimentalism and ideology-based debunking. Essentially eclectic and synthesising in its approach; and written in a lucid style; the book covers different phases and facets of our national struggle. To that end; it adopts a thematic; rather than a chronological narrative. The book will prove invaluable for students of political science and modern Indian history; as well as general readers.