Hard Questions on Global Educational Change : Policies, Practices, and the Future of Education

This new book, from internationally renowned education scholar Pasi Sahlberg and his colleagues, focuses on some of the most controversial issues in contemporary education reform around the world. The authors devote a chapter to each of these “hard questions”:

• Does parental choice improve education systems?
• Is there a future for teacher unions?
• What is the right answer to the standardized testing question?
• Can schools prepare children for the 21st-century workplace?
• Will technology save schools?
• Can anyone be a teacher?
• Should higher education be for the public good?
• What knowledge and skills should an educator have?

Each educational change question sheds much-needed light on today’s large-scale education policies and related reforms around the world. The authors focus on what makes each question globally significant, what we know from international research, and what can be inferred from benchmark evidence. The final chapter offers a model for policymakers with implications for teaching, learning, and schooling overall.

Book Features:

• An in-depth look at the most contentious areas of contemporary education reform.
• Concrete examples from across the globe.
• Commentary from key experts, authorities, and organizations.
• A consistent, accessible organization that will appeal to faculty and students.
• Lessons learned that illuminate a good way forward to improve the educational experience of all students.

Pasi Sahlberg is a professor of practice at the University of Helsinki and Arizona State University and author of Grawemeyer Award–winning Finnish Lessons (now in its Second Edition). He received the 2021 Australian Council for Educational Leaders (ACEL) Hedley Beare Award for Educational Writing and the 2021 ACEL Dr. Paul Brock Memorial Medal. Visit his website at www.pasisahlberg.com. Jonathan Hasak is a manager of public policy and government affairs at Year Up. Vanessa Rodriguez is an assistant professor in the Center for Early Childhood Health and Development in the Department of Population Health at the NYU School of Medicine.