Education! Education! Education!

The essays in this book criticise the new positivism in education policy, whereby education is systematically reduced to those things that can be measured by so-called 'objective' tests. School curricula have been narrowed with an emphasis on measurable results in the 3 R's and the 'quality' of university departments is now assessed by managerial exercises based on commercial audit practice. As a result, the traditional notion of liberal arts education has been replaced by utilitarian productivity indices.

Keywords: Education, positivism, education policy, tests, curricula, curriculum, 3 Rs, accountability, mismanagement of universities, Laura Spence affair, higher education, polyphony, social utility, neo-Luddism, primary schools, bureaucracy