This paper presents an explanatory model of undergraduate non-completion based, primarily, on the findings of a qualitative case study. Previous research in the field of non-completion is briefly reviewed. Such work is somewhat limited in its explanatory usefulness because it tends to focus on the student as the problem. The causes of non-completion can only be fully understood as the culmination of a complex social process of student-institution interaction which operates within the context of change in higher education. From this sociologically-informed theoretical framework an explanatory model has been devised that shows how the process of withdrawal for conventional students (i.e. students who enter HE through the traditional academic route) is markedly different from that for mature students. For conventional students the factors which appear to be of central importance are student preparedness, compatibility of choice, and time of exit. In contrast, mature students are often forced into non-completion because of external circumstances. Following a detailed description of our explanatory model of undergraduate non-completion, we present a number of strategies for intervention at both national and institutional levels and outline the implications for higher education policy.
This paper draws on a comparative study of the growth of data and the changing governance of education in Europe. It looks at data and the 'making' of a European Education Policy Space, with a focus on 'policy brokers' in translating and mediating demands for data from the European Commission. It considers the ways in which such brokers use data production pressures from the Commission to justify policy directions in their national systems. The systems under consideration are Finland, Sweden, and England and Scotland. The paper focuses on the rise of Quality Assurance and Evaluation mechanisms and processes as providing the overarching rationale for data demands, both for accountability and performance improvement purposes. The theoretical resources that are drawn on to enable interpretation of the data are those that suggest a move from governing to governance and the use of comparison as a form of governance.
This article argues that the 'quality' debate in education research is not so much about quality as about creating the conditions in which research and knowledge production in the field of education can be managed and steered. The criticisms of research in education have destabilised the field and promoted its closer dependence on and alignment with policy. The paper connects changes in the nature of knowledge to developments in the governance of education, suggesting that experts and techno-scientific research are increasingly necessary not only as sources of information but as ways of 'doing' governing, especially through quantification and comparison.
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