Higher education and equality of opportunities: Cross-national perspectives
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Higher education and equality of opportunities: Cross-national perspectives By Fred Lazin, Matt Evan and Narayana Ayaram (eds). Lexington Books/ Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Lanham, MD, 2010, 355 pp. ISBN 978-0-7391-4669-9 (hbk), ISBN 978-0-7391-4671-2 (e-book) Joseph Zajda
Published online: 1 March 2013 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2013
In Higher Education and Equality of Opportunities, Fred Lazin, Matt Evan and Narayana Ayaram examine equity and access in higher education in a number of countries around the world. They discuss equality of opportunity with reference to race, ethnicity, gender and socioeconomic status (SES), the impact of reduced funding on higher education, privatisation of higher education, and the rising costs of higher education. The trend towards efficiency, marketisation and global academic achievement and performance, defined by the league tables and other international indicators, seems to reflect a neo-liberal policy in the higher education sector. The two introductory chapters and eighteen country-studies cover recent trends in higher education in the global culture. David Kirp’s chapter 2, ‘‘The earth is flattening: the globalization of higher education and its implications for equal opportunity’’, is an insightful critique of social stratification in higher education in the USA, as the preserve of the elite: ‘‘At the 150 most selective universities, 75 percent of students come from the top income quartile, while 10 percent of the students come from the bottom half of the socio-economic ladder – and only 3 percent come from the bottom quartile’’ (p. 14). Research indicates that global competition and a market-driven strategy have led to a remarkable convergence – a ‘‘flattening of higher education globally’’ (p. 3). In my book Globalisation, Ideology and Education Policy (Zajda 2010), I have argued that since the 1980s globalisation, marketisation and quality/efficiency-driven reforms around the world have resulted in structural and qualitative changes in higher education. In their quest for excellence, quality and accountability in education, governments increasingly turn to international and comparative education data analysis to rank their universities (ibid.). Part I, America, contains five chapters dealing with community colleges, minority access to higher education, social stratification and higher education etc. J. Zajda (&) Australian Catholic University, Melbourne Campus, Fitzroy, VIC, Australia e-mail: [email protected]
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Carol Schmid’s ‘‘Challenges and opportunities of community colleges’’ critically evaluates the role of community colleges, which enrol nearly half of African American and more than half of Hispanic and Native American undergraduate students. More than six million students are enrolled in two-year community colleges in the USA. Despite the access, Schmid observes that there remains a large opportunity gap in degree completion. Community college models, globalisation and higher education reforms were also explored rec
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