Developing into Similarity: Global Teacher Education in the Twenty-First Century
Source: European Journal of Teacher Education, Volume 31, Issue 3, August 2008, p. 233 - 245
(Reviewed by the Portal Team)
This paper explains the process that is causing systems of teacher education in the EU, the USA and elsewhere to converge into a form of fewer qualitative distinctions. The authors argue that expansion brought about by processes familiar to globalization is creating wide differences in the cost of information that incentivizes use of standardized patterns for producing teachers.
The logic of institutional expansion, like the logic of globalization, operates as a uniting force across previously regarded nation-state boundaries and cultural distinctions.
This study identifies institutional scale and the division of information as key factors that link the interaction of institutions across markets. It also adds insight into the critically important issues surrounding the production of quality teachers, such as: recognize and protect the complexity of the education good; enshrine and protect academic freedom; scale down learning environments; increase teacher development costs by concentrating resources on excellence; develop a liberal disposition toward variation, creativity and innovation.