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Worlds of Education

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Education transforms the world. Education is our world, as rich and diverse as the voices speaking out on the pages of Worlds of Education.

Worlds of Education is a platform for teachers, unionists, activists, and academics to share their insights into the issues affecting the education workforce and community around the world. The aim is to encourage a global conversation, to reflect, mobilise, and take action for education everywhere.

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Thematic Series

Recent Posts

  1. Equity and inclusion 7 March 2018

    #8March: UK Union UCU addresses gender inequity head on

    Joanna de Groot

    Reducing gender disparity in pay and campaigning around issues of sexual harassment and violence against women in the workplace are two key areas focused on by the UK’s University and College Union (UCU).

    #8March: UK Union UCU addresses gender inequity head on
  2. Leading the profession 6 March 2018

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #17: The World Bank’s Reports and its Practices – Organised Hypocrisy? By Salim Vally

    Salim Vally

    This blog argues that the inconsistencies of the World Bank seen as instances of ‘organised hypocrisy’ and ‘duplicity’ are not new nor are they limited to the area of education. On the heels of the WDR, another significant World Bank report, The Changing Wealth of Nations 2018: Building a Sustainable...

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #17: The World Bank’s Reports and its Practices – Organised Hypocrisy? By Salim Vally
  3. Leading the profession 27 February 2018

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #16: Early Childhood Education, Poverty and Privatization: Why is ECE so important and underfunded in World Bank policy? By Carol Anne Spreen

    Carol Anne Spreen

    Learning does not begin when a child enters school. It is widely known that from birth to age five the brain develops more rapidly than at any other stage of life, and it is also most sensitive to influences from the external environment (such as cognitive stimulation, language development, care,...

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #16: Early Childhood Education, Poverty and Privatization: Why is ECE so important and underfunded in World Bank policy? By Carol Anne Spreen
  4. Achieving Sustainable Development Goal 4 22 February 2018

    Reflections on GPE replenishment: rhetoric, facts, questions and the way forward.

    Jefferson Pessi

    The city of Dakar, the fascinating and lively capital of Senegal, was the stage of two key moments in the history of global governance of education. First, in the year 2000, it hosted the World Education Forum that adopted the Education for All Goals. Second, eighteen years later, on February...

    Reflections on GPE replenishment: rhetoric, facts, questions and the way forward.
  5. Leading the profession 20 February 2018

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #15: Technical and vocational education and training – realising the potential to transform the lives of millions, by Pat Forward

    Pat Forward

    The most striking features of the World Development Report 2018’s chapter on technical and vocational training (TVET) are that it is a superficial examination of the role and impact of TVET around the world, and that it persists in perpetuating a very narrow framing of the role that the sector...

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #15: Technical and vocational education and training – realising the potential to transform the lives of millions, by Pat Forward
  6. Fighting the commercialisation of education 18 February 2018

    Low-cost private schools in Peru: The high cost of low quality?

    By Clara Fontdevila, Universitat Autonoma Barcelona. During the last two decades, there has been a significant rise in the relative numbers of non-state education providers as well as the share of private education enrolment in Peru. This change has been particularly striking in urban areas – in the case of...

    Low-cost private schools in Peru: The high cost of low quality?
  7. Leading the profession 13 February 2018

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #14: Where is the World in the WDR 2018? An Appeal to Rename it the ‘American Development Report’ by Jeremy Rappleye & Hikaru Komatsu

    Jeremy Rappleye, Hikaru Komatsu

    The 2018 World Development Report “Learning to Realize Education’s Promise” provides deep insights into the worldview of the World Bank, the world’s most powerful development institution. Instead of critically questioning the Bank’s explicit claims – as most of the blogs thus far have done – it is also worth pausing...

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #14: Where is the World in the WDR 2018? An Appeal to Rename it the ‘American Development Report’ by Jeremy Rappleye & Hikaru Komatsu
  8. Leading the profession 6 February 2018

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #13: “It’s not a learning crisis, it’s an international development crisis! A decolonial critique” by Iveta Silova

    Iveta Silova

    The 2018 World Development Report (WDR) “Learning to Realize Education’s Promise” has been widely praised for placing education at the forefront of the international development agenda. But while signaling a global commitment to increasing education access and quality in the context of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the 2018 WDR...

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #13: “It’s not a learning crisis, it’s an international development crisis! A decolonial critique” by Iveta Silova
  9. Standards and working conditions 30 January 2018

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #12:The World Bank and the chalkface: a teacher’s perspective by Jelmer Evers

    Jelmer Evers

    My colleagues in my school probably know the World Bank quite superficially, at least if they teach economics history, geography or social sciences. For the rest of them I would say there is name recognition, but not much more than that. However, they would recognize its policy, the tone and...

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #12:The World Bank and the chalkface: a teacher’s perspective by Jelmer Evers
  10. Union renewal and development 25 January 2018

    #EI25: reflections by Fernando M. Reimers, Harvard University

    Fernando M. Reimers

    I first heard about Education International in 1996. I had recently joined the staff at the World Bank, on a leave from Harvard University, to lead their education projects in Mexico, and I was invited by Maris O’Rourke, then director of the education group at the Bank, to meet a...

    #EI25: reflections by Fernando M. Reimers, Harvard University
  11. Union renewal and development 25 January 2018

    #EI25: Reflections by David Archer, ActionAid

    David Archer

    My first memory of meeting with Education International was in October 1999 – when ActionAid, Oxfam and the Global March for Child Labour met in Brussels to set up the Global Campaign for Education. That was a landmark moment – forging links between EI’s campaign on quality public education, Oxfam’s...

    #EI25: Reflections by David Archer, ActionAid
  12. Leading the profession 23 January 2018

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #11: School-Based Management: Questions and Concerns by D. Brent Edwards Jr.

    D. Brent Edwards Jr.

    One of the primary avenues highlighted for educational improvement in the World Bank’s World Development Report (WDR) 2018 is school-based management (SBM). This is not surprising, as SBM has been one of the World Bank’s preferred education governance reforms since the 1990s. Indeed, as Dean Nielsen, former Senior Evaluation Officer...

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #11: School-Based Management: Questions and Concerns by D. Brent Edwards Jr.
  13. Achieving Sustainable Development Goal 4 16 January 2018

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #10: “We Need More than Just Better Teachers?” by Pasi Sahlberg

    Pasi Sahlberg

    The World Development report 2018 (WDR2018) is right about the global learning crisis: many children not in school, educational inequity, and low quality of learning outcomes. But it often misses the point when trying to use available evidence to realize education’s promise. The problem is that there are so many...

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #10: “We Need More than Just Better Teachers?” by Pasi Sahlberg
  14. Achieving Sustainable Development Goal 4 9 January 2018

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #9: A Critical Analysis of the World Bank’s World Development Report on Education by Steven J. Klees

    Steve Klees

    The annual World Development Report (WDR) is the World Bank’s flagship publication. The 2018 report is entitled Learning to Realize Education’s Promise. In the 40 year history of the WDR, this is the first time its focus has been on education. Many commentators have welcomed this as needed in this...

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #9: A Critical Analysis of the World Bank’s World Development Report on Education by Steven J. Klees
  15. Leading the profession 19 December 2017

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #8: "Unions do contribute to quality education. An example from the Gambia", by Marie Antoinette Corr

    Marie Antoinette Corr

    The World Development Report 2018 recognises, although briefly, that poor working conditions for teachers can undermine learning (p.138). It argues that the status of the teaching profession has declined over the last few decades, and that as a result, “teachers deserve more from the systems that employ them” (p.138).

    #WDR2018 Reality Check #8: "Unions do contribute to quality education. An example from the Gambia", by Marie Antoinette Corr
  16. Fighting the commercialisation of education 15 December 2017

    Hidden privatization

    By Sylvain Marois Vice-president, University Sector, Fédération nationale des enseignantes et enseignants du Québec   This blog was originally published in French

    Hidden privatization
  17. Leading the profession 15 December 2017

    The new compact on domestic financing for education

    David Archer

    The replenishment events of major global funds tend to be donor-dominated affairs, but on 2nd February 2018 the replenishment of the Global Partnership for Education (GPE) promises to be different. For the first time ever a replenishment conference will take place in Africa – hosted by Senegal – and on...

    The new compact on domestic financing for education
  18. Fighting the commercialisation of education 12 December 2017

    English school students face the future in ‘Zombie Schools’

    By Howard Stevenson, University of Nottingham School students in England currently find themselves at the centre of a giant experiment in the marketisation of education, with the real possibility that they will pay for this ideological gamble with their futures.  Those least able to bear the cost of policy incompetence...

    English school students face the future in ‘Zombie Schools’