Lessons from other countries

Many argue we can learn a lot from education in other nations, benefitting by borrowing education policies. There are others who argue we can learn nothing from other systems. For them, other systems are like a voyeuristic focus of academic curiosity, not a source of insight into potential domestic action. There is a third group, who use data from international surveys to frighten their home audience into compliance with their own policy recommendations – a new version of the hysterical cold war cry ‘the Russians are coming!’

Fortunately, there are international comparativists who are cutting through this conflict. Jeremy Hodgen, now at the University of Nottingham, conducted a study that highlighted the need for forms of maths qualifications other than A-level, to better meet the needs of higher education and the economy. Hilary Steedman at the London School of Economics has for many years dug deeply into vocational systems around the world, and outlined key mechanisms in initial industrial training that are not exploited in England and could be, to good effect. Paul Morris, UCL Institute of Education, continues as editor of Compare, the journal of comparative studies, and is pushing methodology in comparative education.

My view is that we can learn from others’ systems, but we must not naively cherrypick or borrow policies. To avoid these errors, and create ‘policy learning, not policy borrowing’, sophisticated and sensitive analytic approaches have been developed at Cambridge Assessment, drawing on the work of Bill Schmidt in particular.