Lawrence J. Saha

Gender, School Attainment and Occupational Plans: Determinants of Aspirations and Expectations among Australian Urban School Leavers.

This paper examines the factors related to the occupational plans of a sample of imminent Australian urban school leavers (N = 2135), with particular attention directed to differences by gender and level of school attainment (grade level). The conceptual distinction between preferred and expected occupational plans is discussed and empirically examined. Generally, males have higher career plans than females, as do students with higher levels of school attainment. Expected occupational destinations are more predictable, in terms of the variables in the model, than preferred occupations. Finally there appears to be no systematic variation in the disparities between preferred and expected occupation. The relevance of these findings for understanding career orientations and the need for further research into the formation and attainment of occupational goals is discussed.

Chapter 1 Attitudes towards education research knowledge and policymaking among American and Australian school principals

Abstract In-depth interviews and standardized questionnaires were administered to samples of school principals in Australia (ACT and South Australia, N = 39) and the United States (Missouri, N = 81) about their knowledge of, and use of, the results of educational research. This chapter examines respondents attitudes towards research knowledge. Among other results, we found that respondents in both countries held attitudes towards research knowledge that were quite positive. A number of factors were also found to predict these attitudes. To illustrate, respondents committed to innovation and disinterested in leaving their jobs were also likely to value research highly. We explain the implications of these and related findings.

Political Activism and Civic Education among Australian Secondary School Students

This paper investigates the impact of school variables on student political knowledge and political activity. The study is based on survey questionnaire data from 1311 secondary school students in South Australia and the Australian Capital Territory. The analysis focuses on the importance of civic knowledge, democratic values and dispositions towards normative and non-normative political activity. The findings show that many Australian students have had experience with normative forms of political activity, such as signing petitions or writing letters. Fewer indicate that they have engaged in forms of non-normative political behaviour, such as occupying buildings or participating in violent demonstrations. Students oriented to normative political activism tended to be female and more supportive of human rights and freedoms, whereas those oriented to non-normative political activism were generally male, alienated from school, and not supportive of rights and freedoms. Exposure to civics instruction was positively related to political knowledge and normative forms of political activity.

INTERNATIONAL NETWORKS AND FLOWS OF ACADEMIC TALENT: OVERSEAS RECRUITMENT IN AUSTRALIAN UNIVERSITIES*

Flows of academic talent among nations are an important factor in the transmission of values and knowledge throughout the world. As a point of entry for a study of international networks through which these flows occur, appointments to all universities in a single society, Australia, are examined for the years 1961–1974.During this period approximately 40 percent of appointees to academic positions in Australian universities came from overseas. Although there were fluctuations around this mean value, no major overall trends were discerned. The proportion of overseas appointments, however, was inversely related to university size, but unrelated to institutional age or total appointments.There has been a decrease in the proportion of appointees coming from British universities, and an increase from American universities. However over half of the appointees from the latter in 1970 were returning Australians.Some implications of these academic flow patterns are suggested, as are directions for future research.

Cultural and Social Capital in Global Perspective

The purpose of this chapter is to investigate the key concepts of cultural and social capital in a global perspective. This will be done by first examining the origins of the two concepts and their relevance for education. Second, the global implications of the concepts will be examined. Third, the relevance of cultural and social capital for understanding educational processes will be discussed. Finally, examples of cultural and social capital in educational contexts will be given to illustrate the global relevance of the concepts.

Insiders and Outsiders: Migrant Academics in an Australian University

aspects of this complex and important social phenomenon (Dedijer, 1964; Myers, 1967). For example, much attention has been directed to problems created by non-returning foreign students, that is, the much-discussed &dquo;brain drain&dquo; (Das, 1971), or to similar losses resulting from the migration of career scientists (Wilson, 1966). Yet other important implications of this particular kind of migration phenomenon have been virtually neglected. There have been, of course attempts to assess some of the motives and consequences of migration (Wilson and Gaston, 1974). Nevertheless little is currently known about the relative performance of migrant as compared with national scholars,

Cultural and Social Capital in Asian and Pacific Countries

This article investigates the relevance of cultural and social capital in school achievement and attainment in the Asian and Pacific countries. The Western concepts of ‘cultural and social capital’ are first defined in the Asian and Pacific context, and their relevance for understanding educational processes is developed in this article, together with a selection of the research that documents the extent to which cultural and social capital play a role in this region of the world. Where possible, comparisons are made with research evidence from Western societies. The article concludes with an evaluation of the importance of cultural and social capital in Asian and Pacific schooling.

The effects of socio-economic development on student academic performance and life plans: A cross-national analysis

Abstract This paper investigates the independent effects of country-level socio-economic variables, home background variables, and school variables on science knowledge and career plans. The data are taken from standardized questionnaires and tests in eighteen countries conducted by the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA) on national random samples of students. Country-level variables were added to the individual student files, all samples were reduced to approximately equal size for each country, and the data from the countries were pooled, giving a total sample size of 18,000 students. PLS path modelling procedures with latent variables were applied. The main findings show that the level of socioeconomic development exercises an independent positive effect on academic performance in science, but a negative effect on the career orientation of students. These findings are discussed in the context of variations in the relationship between education and employment choice across different development levels of countries. Possible social consequences and policy implications are suggested.

Educational expansion and equality of opportunity: Evidence from studies conducted by IEA in ten countries in 1970–71 and 1983–84

Abstract This chapter examines the relationship between the educational expansion that has occurred in ten countries, and whether there is evidence that expansion has resulted in greater equality of opportunity for students from different social backgrounds. The chapter draws on data collected in the First and Second IEA Science Studies, conducted by the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA) in 1970–1971 and 1983–1984 respectively. The ten countries involved are: Australia, England, Finland, Hungary, Italy, The Netherlands, Sweden, Thailand and the United States. Problems are encountered in the measurement of both social background and participation. The chapter examines the possibility of using several variables which assess home background and are shown to be related to the educational outcome of science achievement. A ratio involving membership of major occupational groups, is subsequently employed to provide an index of social selectivity or social bias. This index is used to show that educational expansion has, in general, resulted in the anticipated decrease in social bias and in the provision of greater equality of educational opportunity across different social class groups.

The Sociology of Comparative Education

The comparative study of educational systems has a long history. The field can be traced to the early 19th century when it became common for European governments to send emissaries abroad to find out how education was carried out in other countries. About the same time the practice became more structured and of interest to academics, as well as practitioners and policymakers, and the subject of comparative education came into being (Epstein, 1994; Holms, 1965).