Rural education in Oman

Hello Cas , if you remember me I was doing some assignments with you and I want you to help me with my dissertation about the topic of “rural education in Oman” for the first part which is the literature review which is supposed to be 1500 words. Note that after you finish the review I will discuss with you if I will do the findings and discussion part with you.

Handbook of Asian Education Comprehensive and authoritative, this Handbook provides a nuanced description and analysis of educational systems, practices, and policies in Asian countries and explains and interprets these practices from cultural, social, historical, and economic perspectives. Using a culture-based framework, the volume is organized in five sections, each devoted to educational practices in one civilization in Asia: Sinic (the common culture of China, the Chinese communities in Southeast Asia, and related cultures of Korea and Vietnam), Japanese, Islamic, Buddhist, and Hindu. Culture and culture identities essentially are civilization identities; the major differences among civilizations are rooted in their different cultures. This framework better captures the essence of the diverse educational systems and practices of Asian countries than other possible approaches such as the forms of government or geographical locations. Each section opens with an overview of the civilization and its history, philosophy, and values that have had an impact on education, includes chapters on both the formal schooling system and out-of-school educational practices, and concludes with a chapter on how immigrants from the civilization have come to live in the West, how they are educated, and how they are adapting to their new homes. Uniquely combining description and interpretation of educational practices in Asia, this Handbook is a must-have resource for education researchers and graduate students in international and comparative education, globalization and education, multicultural education, sociocultural foundations of education, and Asian studies, and for educational administrators and education policy makers. Yong Zhao is University Distinguished Professor at the College of Education, Michigan State University, where he also serves as the founding director of the Center for Teaching and Technology, and executive director of the Confucius Institute and the US–China Center for Research on Educational Excellence. He is a fellow of the International Academy for Education. Handbook of Asian Education A Cultural Perspective Editor Yong Zhao, Michigan State University, USA Co-Editors Jing Lei, Syracuse University, USA Guofang Li, Michigan State University, USA Ming Fang He, Georgia Southern University, USA Kaori Okano, La Trobe University, Australia Nagwa Megahed, Ain Shams University, Egypt David Gamage, The University of Newcastle, Australia Hema Ramanathan, University of West Georgia First published 2011 by Routledge 270 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 Simultaneously published in the UK by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2011 Taylor & Francis The rights of the editors to be identified as the authors of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted by them in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. Typeset in Minion by Swales & Willis Ltd, Exeter, Devon Printed and bound in the United States of America on acid-free paper by Edwards Brothers, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark Notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Handbook of Asian education : a culture perspective / editors, Yong Zhao . . . [et al]. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Education—East Asia—Cross-cultural studies. 2. Education and state— East Asia—Cross-cultural studies. I. Zhao, Yong. LA1141.H38 2011 370.95—dc22 2010024116 ISBN13: 978–0–8058–6445–8 (hbk) ISBN13: 978–0–8058–6444–1 (pbk) ISBN13: 978–1–4106–1874–0 (ebk) Contents Preface Acknowledgments viii xxi PART I Sinic Education 1 1 A Cultural Overview of Education in Sinic Civilization 3 GUOFANG LI AND MING FANG HE 2 Educational Governance and Management in Sinic Societies 7 NICHOLAS SUN-KEUNG PANG 3 Curriculum and Assessment 29 JOHN CHI-KIN LEE, NGUYEN LOC, KYUNGHEE SO, RAMANATHAN SUBRAMANISM, PEYREU YEN, AND HONGBIAO YIN 4 Teachers and Teaching in Sinic Education 51 GUOFANG LI, MING FANG HE, WENLI TSOU, WONG PYO HONG, XIAOLAN CURDT-CHRISTIANSEN, AND PHAM LAN HUONG 5 Learners and Learning in Sinic Societies 78 MING FANG HE, JOHN CHI-KIN LEE, JIAYI WANG, LE VAN CANH, PHYLLIS CHEW, KYUNGHEE SO, BETTY CHRISTINE ENG, AND MIN-CHUAN SUNG 6 Home and Community in Sinic Education 105 GUOFANG LI, LIANG DU, I-WAH PANG, SHIH-PEI CHANG, HYUNHEE CHO, LE VAN CANH, AND LANA KHONG 7 Challenges and Future Directions in Sinic Education 134 JING LEI AND JIANWEI ZHANG 8 Education of Immigrants from Sinic Civilization DESIREE BAOLIAN QIN, GUOFANG LI, MEENAL RANA, AND EUN-JIN KIM HAN 157 vi Contents PART II Japanese Education 181 9 A Cultural Overview of Education in Japanese Civilization: Adaptive Learning at the Global Periphery 183 KAORI H. OKANO 10 Who Runs Japan’s Schools? Education Governance and Management 199 ROBERT ASPINALL 11 The Politics of School Curriculum and Assessment in Japan 214 RYUKO KUBOTA 12 Teachers and Teaching in Japan: Professional Mecca or Pressure Cooker? 231 CATHERINE LEWIS 13 Learners and Learning in Japan: Structures, Practices, and Purposes 247 PETER CAVE 14 The Changing Relationship Between the Home and School in Japan 265 RYOKO TSUNEYOSHI 15 A Nation’s School Unhinged? Challenges and Future Directions for Japanese Education 278 JUNE A. GORDON 16 Japanese Immigrant and Transient Students in the United States 295 YOSHIKO NOZAKI PART III Islamic Education 317 17 A Cultural Overview of Islam and Education 319 NAGWA M. MEGAHED 18 Education in the United Arab Emirates: A Socio-cultural Analysis 327 ALI S. IBRAHIM 19 Education in the Sultanate of Oman: The Conflict and the Harmony of Modernity and Traditions 345 HAMOOD AL-HARTHI 20 The Malaysian Education System: A Cultural Perspective 362 TAMBY SUBAHAN MOHD MEERAH, LILIA HALIM, AND NIK RAHIMI NIK YUSOF 21 Education of Immigrant Children from Islamic Cultures JING LEI 377 Contents vii PART IV Buddhist Education 387 22 A Cultural Overview of the Education Systems in Buddhist Countries 389 DAVID T. GAMAGE 23 Developments in the Sri Lankan System of Education: Third Century BC to the Twenty-First Century AD 403 DAVID T. GAMAGE AND PRASAD SETUNGA 24 Thailand: The Development of the Education System Since 1220 425 PACHRAPIMON SOOKSOMCHITRA FOX AND DAVID T. GAMAGE 25 The Education System in Bhutan from 747 AD to the First Decade of the Twenty-First Century 442 TANDIN WANGMO AND KINGA CHODEN 26 Immigrant Children from Asian Buddhist Countries: Issues in Education and Adjustment 452 WEI QIU, NAIYI XIE, AND YONG ZHAO PART V Hindu Education 461 27 A Cultural Overview of Education in Hindu Civilization 463 SHESHAGIRI K. M. 28 Colonialism, Modernism, and Neo-Liberalism: Problematizing Education in India 481 GAYSU R. ARVIND 29 Learners and Learning in India: History, Perspectives, and Contexts 503 DISHA NAWANI AND MANISH JAIN 30 Indian Americans and the Social-Cultural Context of Education 529 KHYATI Y. JOSHI Index 548 Preface There is little doubt that Asia has become the center of the world’s attention. Asian countries, especially East Asian countries, have rapidly grown into some of the world’s largest economies and there is no sign of slowing down or stopping. Many have predicted that the twenty-first century is the Asian Century. While a large part of the attention has been due to Asia’s amazing economic performance, Asia’s education has certainly also become a point of interest. Asian education has often been viewed as examples of excellence. Some Asian countries have consistently performed extremely well on international comparative studies such as the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) and the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). The extraordinary academic accomplishment in Asian countries has impressed many other nations, and in some cases, has led to reflections or criticisms in education in their own country. In the United States, for example, the achievement gap between Asian students and American students in international comparative studies has been widely cited in education policy documents at local, state and national levels, and education reforms are often called for to emulate Asian education and to narrow the achievement gap (Stigler and Hiebert 1999; Asia Society, Business Roundtable and Council of Chief State School Officers 2005; Stevenson and Stigler 2006). Asian education is also often viewed as a source of competitive workforce in the global economy (Friedman 2005a; 2005b). As globalization further deepens and broadens its impact and shrinks the world into a “global village” (Bernanke 2006; McLuhan 1964), businesses can fragment their production process and locate any part of their work anywhere on the globe. Thus the products of education systems in Asia, coupled with their relative lower costs, have become a major force of competition for jobs in Western countries. In addition, in many countries Asian immigrants are perceived as the “model minority.” They seem to be more successful than other groups professionally and their children seem to outperform native children academically in schools as well (Li and Wang 2008). Despite many research findings showing the contrary, this model minority myth persists (Zhao and Qiu 2008). But Asia is a vast continent that covers 43,820,000 square kilometers or 16,920,000 square miles with a population of over 3.8 billion living in nearly 50 nation states and special territories. These nation states and territories vary tremendously in terms of political systems, cultural beliefs, economic development, and of course educational practices and quality. Thus any attempt to treat Asia as a uniform entity of similar quality is erroneous. As illogical and irrational as it may sound, Asia has often been perceived as a single entity. The perception that Asia has excellent education and is producing some of the most competitive workforce is just one example of this misconception. The fact is that while it is true that some Asia countries have very good education, there are many that are struggling to develop their education systems. The purpose of this handbook is to present a more nuanced description and analysis of educational systems, practices, and policies in Asian countries than is typically described or perceived, and more importantly, explain and interpret these practices from cultural, social, historical, Preface ix and economical perspectives. However, this task is easier said than done. First, the vastness and diversity of Asian countries present an extremely difficult challenge. It is nearly impossible to provide a comprehensive description to each of the 50 nations. Moreover, there is tremendous variation in terms of educational practices and conditions within a nation, particularly some of the larger ones such as China and India. The second challenge has to do with the perspective one adopts to present the description and interpretation of Asian education. This handbook is primarily written for outsiders—those who are not familiar with education within a particular region or nation in Asia. Thus there are three possible perspectives: outsider, insider, and outsider–insider. The outsider-perspective is often taken by those who do not have extensive and sustained direct experiences with the education system in a certain region. As an outsider, the observer uses his or her own cultural framework to interpret educational practices in a culture or nation. The outsider can be an education expert and have some familiarity with education of the region under consideration, but due to the lack of extensive and sustained experiences, the outsider may miss the local meaning of certain policies and practices. However, the benefit is that the outsider knows the audience and can present the story using the audience’s frame of mind. Thus the outsider perspective is more likely to lead to more accessible writing for the readers. In contrast, an insider is someone who has intimate knowledge of the phenomenon but does not have much understanding of what an outside audience may need or what other systems may look like. As a result, an insider perspective may not result in presentations that can be easily understood by an outside audience. The ideal perspective is that of an insider–outsider, someone who has intimate knowledge of the context as well as the capacity to interpret an outside reader’s frame of mind. To address the first challenge, that is, to maximize the comprehensiveness of the representation of the diversity in Asian education systems without overburdening the reader or bankrupting the publisher and libraries, we adopted a civilization-based framework suggested by Samuel Huntington (1996) in his book The Clash of Civilizations. Huntington argues that culture is what is most meaningful to most people. Culture and culture identities essentially are civilization identities, and the major differences among civilizations are rooted in their different cultures. Huntington’s framework has been verified by others (Inglehart and Baker 2000; Georgas, Vijver and Berry 2004). Huntington divides the post-1990 world into nine major civilizations: Western, Latin American, African, Islamic, Sinic, Hindu, Orthodox, Buddhist, and Japanese; five of these are present in Asia (excluding the Russian Federation, which is considered Orthodox): Islamic, Sinic, Hindu, Buddhist, and Japanese. Despite the fact that most of these five civilizations encompass more than one country and the fact that education in different countries of a particular civilization can differ, it is reasonable to believe that the within-civilization differences are much smaller than those between civilizations. The civilization-based framework better captures the essence of the diverse educational systems and practices of Asian countries than other possible approaches such as the forms of government or the geographical locations for a number of reasons. First, education at large is driven by cultural values, and culture is more stable than political systems or political ideology. Culture defines social norms and sets priorities in a society. Although at times political government may want to impose certain practices and policies, it is the social norms and rules that define people’s interactions and behaviors in the long run. Civilizations as cultural entities thus have more enduring influence over educational practices than do political systems. For example, despite the different political systems in South Korea and China, the two countries have much more in common in their educational practices than South Korea and India, which are both democracies politically. Second, although certain geographical regions may share the same civilization, this is not always the case. For example, Singapore, while located in Southeast Asia, has more in common in education with China and Korea than with its immediate neighbors, Malaysia x Preface and Indonesia. China, Singapore, and South Korea, despite their differences in political systems and geographical locations, are similar educationally because they all belong to the same civilization. Following the civilization-based framework, the Handbook is divided into five sections, each devoted to educational practices in one civilization in Asia: Sinic, Japanese, Islamic, Buddhist, and Hindu. According to Huntington, the Sinic civilization refers to the common culture of China and the Chinese communities in Southeast Asia and the related cultures of Korea and Vietnam. Confucianism is a major component of Sinic civilization. The use of “Sinic” instead of “Chinese” separates the name of the civilization from the name of its core political entity. In the case of Japanese civilization, a civilization is a state, thus the Japanese civilization refers to the distinct culture in Japan only. The Islamic civilization refers to several Islamic cultures in central Asia and Southeast Asia such as the Gulf States and Malaysia. The Buddhist civilization exists in Southeast Asia countries and regions such as Sri Lanka, Burma, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Tibet, Mongolia, and Bhutan. One of the world’s most ancient civilizations, the Hindu civilization originated in the Indian subcontinent and now refers to a set of culture systems mostly located in India. Each section begins with an introductory chapter providing an overview of the civilization, its history, philosophy, values, and most importantly, the values and history that have had an impact on education. In this Handbook, we define education broadly to include not only educational practices conducted in schools, but also what happens outside schools. Hence each section contains chapters devoted both to the formal schooling system and to out-of-school educational practices including education governance and management; curriculum and assessment; teachers and teaching; learners and learning; and home and community. To address the new challenges brought by globalization and technology, some sections also include a chapter on the challenges faced by education in this civilization, and what efforts are underway or planned to meet them. In addition, Asia is now the largest source of immigrants for many countries in the world. Asian immigrants play an important role in many societies. An understanding of the education of Asian immigrants can help us understand effective educational practices in Asian families, and how they transition into the host society and interact with the host culture. Therefore, each section includes a chapter devoted to the education of Asian immigrants who have come to live in the West and to an understanding of how they are educated and how they are adapting to their new homes. To address the second challenge—the perspective one adopts to describe and interpret Asian education—we made it a commitment to recruit authors who are both familiar with the education systems they write about and have extensive experience outside their system. But this proved to be quite a challenge. There do not seem to be many such scholars for some of the regions/civilizations covered by the Handbook. Thus in the end, not all sections have all the chapters we had planned. Despite the difficulties, we finally were able to find highly qualified authors. All section editors are scholars who have been working and publishing in Western countries such as the United States and Australia, but were all born and grew up in the civilizations they write about. Most authors of the chapters share a similar background. Overview of the Volume Part I: Sinic Education The Sinic civilization refers to the common culture of China and the Chinese communities in Southeast Asia and related cultures in Asia. It includes China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Korea, and Vietnam. Confucianism is a major component of Sinic civilization. This section includes eight chapters. Preface xi Guofang Li and Ming Fang He start this section with an introduction of the Sinic civilization, its influence on education in Sinic societies, and educational reforms in recent years. They point out that Sinic civilization permeates every aspect of educational practices in Sinic societies. Under this influence, the primary purpose of Sinic education is to cultivate humanity, integrity, beauty, justice, and equity through self-cultivation. In the last few decades education in Sinic civilization has experienced dramatic changes that are inextricably linked with the processes and impact of the diversification of the world landscape. The various educational reforms in Sinic societies demand paradigm shifts in their approaches to education systems and practices, to meet the challenges brought about by modernization and globalization in a highly competitive world. Sinic societies have begun to explore the possibilities of communication, negotiation, and accommodation in-between the fusion and clash of different cultural values, ethics, and civilizations. Sinic societies are becoming modernized and globalized without being Westernized. However, the reconfiguration of modernization and globalization in Sinic societies tends to intensify the inequalities in schools, which become one of the major barriers for maintaining the quality of education. They argue that in the midst of these obstacles and challenges, the key to maintaining the quality of education for all is to fuse Confucian civilization, other Eastern civilizations, and Western civilizations to develop an education of shared interests as one where all members of schools, communities, societies and policy making milieu have shared common interests. They believe that this environment is the ideal setting for developing an education of shared interests that commits to a high level of achievement and global awareness for all in an increasingly diversified world. Next, in Chapter 2, Nicholas Sun-Keung Pang examines the impact of globalization on traditional and Confucian values and ethics in educational governance and management in Sinic societies. By sharing research findings derived from a large-scale empirical comparative study in Shanghai and Hong Kong, Pang reveals that under the impact of globalization, people in the Sinic societies are constantly confronted with a choice in educational governance and management between traditional Confucian ethics and values, and the so-called new values of competitive relationship, market, choice, efficiency, flexibility, and accountability. This confrontation of the two ideologies has become more prominent and severe since Sinic countries gained access to the World Trade Organization (WTO). Pang found that under the impact of globalization, school administrators are now probing more into the instrumental values of markets, choice, competition, efficiency, flexibility and accountability rather than the traditional Confucian ethics and values in recent educational reforms. He points out that there are questions of whether Confucianism has a good or bad influence on educational governance and management and whether globalization will lead to development or division in education. Pang suggests that further empirical comparative research is necessary into the practice of Confucian values and ethics in Sinic societies if we want to understand more about the impact of globalization on educational governance and management in these societies. In the areas of curriculum and assessment, Sinic societies have also experienced significant reforms since the end of the 1990s or the beginning of the new century. In Chapter 3, John ChiKin Lee, Nguyen Loc, Kyunghee So, Ramanathan Subramanism, Peyreu Yen and Hongbiao Yin first examine the curriculum and instructional reform efforts in each of the six Sinic societies, and then summarize the trends and the underlying philosophy and objectives of curriculum reform in Sinic education. Their analysis reveals that the six Sinic societies exhibited varying degrees of local or school-based curriculum development. In some Sinic societies, such as Korea, Hong Kong and Singapore, there were signs of reducing curricular load and introducing integrated subjects or key learning areas, yet traditions and examination cultures maintained the allocation of curriculum time to school subjects. However, in Vietnam and China there was a trend of decentralization with flexibility for local or regional inputs and adaptation of national core curricula. Although Sinic societies displayed some broad similarities and differences in the xii Preface nature of curriculum and assessment reforms, each of them made great efforts in equipping their next generation to echo the impact of globalization and contribute to the economic development of the nation/region, and each of them has been striving to find their own way to “think globally and act locally” under the impact of Chinese Heritage Culture. Using information technology and new technologies in education is another common theme across all Sinic societies. The authors identify two key issues for curriculum reforms in the future: first, to rediscover and appreciate traditional values as well as to strengthen moral education and redefine national citizenship in the context of globalization and the knowledge economy; second, to keep a balance between top-down and bottom-up initiatives, teacher participation in, and development for, local or school-based curriculum. Chapter 4 focuses on teachers and teaching in Sinic education. Guofang Li, Ming Fang He, Wenli Tsou, Wong Pyo Hong, Xiaolan Curdt-Christiansen, and Pham Lan Huong review recent educational reforms in Sinic societies and discuss current issues and challenges surrounding teaching and teachers, including teachers’ social statuses, working conditions, professional development, teacher education, and instructional approaches. They find that all Sinic societies have made great efforts towards the development of a highly qualified and committed teaching force in order to improve student achievements and produce a new generation of manpower for the global economy. However, modernization and globalization have generated enormous demands on teachers, teaching, and teacher education and caused drastic changes in these areas. The current educational reforms also demand a paradigm shift in teaching and teacher education from the traditional teacher-centered format to a new paradigm of triplication that integrates globalization, localization and individualization. In light of these challenges, Li et al. suggest two methods for improving the conditions of teachers and teaching in Sinic societies: (1) to recruit the most capable and appropriate people into the teaching profession, provide them with high quality, pre-service programs of teacher education, and then ensure they have opportunities to upgrade their knowledge and skills over the full length of their professional careers; and (2) to find ways to increase the status of teachers and provide reward structures, and career and promotion pathways to meet the challenges teachers face in meeting the demands of globalization. In Chapter 5, Ming Fang He, John Chi-Kin Lee, Jiayi Wang, Le Van Canh, Phyllis Chew, Kyunghee So, Betty Christine Eng, and Min-Chuan Sung focus their discussion of learners and learning in Sinic civilizations on the impact of historical changes (e.g. feudalism, colonialism, capitalism, and globalization), convergence and divergence of philosophies (e.g. Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism, and Legalism), and educational policies on learners and learning. They first describe the historical and cultural contexts of learners and learning in Sinic societies, then explore the concepts of learners and learning by looking into the controversies, contradictions, and complexities that surround them within particular historical and cultural contexts. They conclude that learners and learning in Sinic civilization have been historically challenged by the dynamic, complex, and contested push-and-pull of indigenous traditions and globalizing forces, specifically Confucian civilization and the modern Western civilizations. These opposing forces engender chaotic and vigorous clashes of traditions and civilization, pose challenges to highly contested learning traditions, conceptions of learning, and purposes of learning, and revitalize an increasing recognition of critical issues about learners and learning such as inequalities and quality of learning. They suggest the creation of culturally responsive, humane, and inspiring learning environments to engage learners in active learning and cultivate world citizens in an increasingly diversified world. What happens out of schools is a critical component of education. In Chapter 6 Guofang Li, Liang Du, I-Wah Pang, Shih-Pei Chang, Hyunhee Cho, Le Van Canh, and Lana Khong discuss the development and dynamics of home, community, and school relations in Sinic societies in which Confucian tradition has credited a strong allegiance to the role of families and communities in maintaining the quality of education of children. They find that both cultural traditions Preface xiii and government policies in education are important in shaping how parents and communities play a part in education. The increasing demands of globalized economy and the need to maximize human and intellectual capital have intensified the governments’ attempts to institutionalize parental involvement in school contexts and community engagement in education; however, the increasingly institutionalized demands on parents to be involved in their children’s education have created tensions between teachers and parents, competition among schools, and widening socio-economic gaps. Teachers’ roles as the authorities and experts in the children’s education are being increasingly challenged. These emergent issues suggest that policy-making in Sinic societies must consider broader socio-cultural, economic and institutional constraints that might limit parental involvement in education. While Western notions of parental involvement can be used as points of references, localized frameworks must be developed to reflect the cultural and socioeconomic realities that shape the children’s education in the school, community, and home. Jing Lei and Jianwei Zhang then examine, in Chapter 7, the major challenges faced by Sinic education, analyze the social, cultural, political, and economical influence on these issues, and discuss the current reform trends and future directions. They point out five major challenges in Sinic education caused by the rapid globalization of the twenty-first century, including the knowledge-age creativity challenge, the inequality challenge, the quality challenge, the globalization challenge, and the challenge of localization and indigenous development of educational theories and models. They further identify six directions in relation to current education reform movements in countries with Sinic civilizations. First, diversifying education in an effort to cultivate creativity; creating learning conditions such that every student can have equal opportunities for access to education, giving priority to disadvantaged students and students with disabilities and special needs; building a lifelong learning society through promoting the development of continuing education, distance education, and vocational education; improving both the quantity and quality of higher education; continuing the investment in and promoting the use of information and communication technology in education to improve efficiency and effectiveness; and strengthening engagement in education globalization. Chapter 8 focuses on the education of immigrants from Sinic civilization in the United States. Desiree Baolian Qin, Guofang Li, Meenal Rana, and Eun-Jin Kimhan first review the histories and distributions of immigrants from Sinic civilization, followed by discussions on the inequity and diversity in educational achievement among these Asian immigrants. They thoroughly examine and analyze the diverse achievement patterns due to the culture, ethnicity, gender, generational status, socio-economic status, and linguistic backgrounds of the immigrants from the Sinic societies. They also examine the varied educational challenges still facing them in the host society, including under-achievement, psychosocial adjustment risks, and native language loss. They point out that the diversity within the Asian American group, even among the groups, is significant. In addition, despite the achievement gaps within the Asian immigrant groups, Sinic immigrant students continued to be stereotyped as high-achieving model minorities. They suggest that we must situate our understandings of Asian education within specific socio-cultural contexts and reexamine the conditions and statuses of Asian immigrant students’ education within the subgroups in America. Furthermore, a balanced view in research, in which both the struggles and successes of Sinic immigrant students are represented, is needed. Their findings have significant implications concerning the education of immigrants from Sinic societies in the United States and other Western countries. Part II: Japanese Education The Japanese civilization refers to the culture in Japan, Japan’s economic power, its distinct difference from China, and its unique position in Asia justify a separate section. Thus this section is devoted to education in Japan alone. This section contains eight chapters. xiv Preface This section starts with Chapter 9, and a cultural overview of education in Japanese civilization. In this chapter, Kaori H. Okano examines the place of education in Japanese civilization at both institutional and popular levels. By tracing the practice of education diachronically from pre-modern times to the present, Okano investigates several key questions on education in Japan: How has the Japanese civilization perceived education? What values have been attached to teaching and learning, why and by whom? How did institutionalized schooling emerge? How has popular education been maintained? What features of teaching and learning are unique to Japanese civilization? How have these features in turn influenced the society’s expectations of education? He concludes that Japanese civilization has maintained a wide range of learning and teaching forms, the practices and conceptions of education have developed as political regimes and social institutions have come and gone, and the ways in which Japanese society perceives education have evolved in response to prevailing circumstances and resources. Next, in Chapter 10 Robert Aspinall examines education governance and management in Japanese schools. He states that although Japan is often perceived as an orderly and conformist society, throughout its modern history there have been serious disputes concerning the correct organization and make-up of its educational system. He first gives an historical overview focusing on the two main formative periods of the modern education system—the Meiji period and the Occupation period—then discusses the main functions of the different parts of the system, starting with the Ministry of Education and working his way down to the teachers, parents and students; and finally examines three case studies covering the period from 1985 to 2008 that illustrate patterns of conflict and power relations within and between all three levels of the education system: the national, the prefectural (or municipal), and the individual school. Curriculum and assessment in Japanese education is examined by Ryuko Kubota in Chapter 11. Kubota finds that in Japanese schools, curriculum presents a highly politicized and ideological profile, and politics also underlies how to assess knowledge and skills that students have gained from the curricular content. Against this political backdrop, Kubota examines how the national curriculum in primary and secondary schools is designed and implemented, how schools assess students’ performance and the contentious issues surrounding curriculum and assessment, and how the political discourse in the last two decades has guided changes in curriculum and assessment, both prescribed and practiced. A case of foreign language education in Japan illustrates the process by which curriculum and assessment are designed and implemented, and demonstrates an interesting interplay between nationalist trends and an internationalist emphasis. Kubota concludes that Government-prescribed curriculum and assessment, and their practice at schools, have been guided by the political discourses of the last two decades. The dominant discourse affecting educational reforms in Japan in the last three decades has emphasized both neo-liberal and neo-conservative elements: competition and increased choice for parents and schools on the one hand, and the instilling of patriotic values in younger generations on the other. Turning to teachers and teaching in Japan, in Chapter 12 Catherine Lewis tackles the interesting yet puzzling image of Japanese teachers and their teaching: on the one hand, some accounts suggest that Japan epitomizes the professionalization of teaching, thus educators in diverse countries around the world are working to implement Japanese-style teaching methods for students and Japanese-style on-the-job learning approaches for teachers; on the other hand, other accounts of the teaching profession within Japan suggest unprecedented levels of stress and overwork for Japanese teachers, and pronounced concern in the media and policy circles about Japanese education. By focusing primarily on elementary and middle school teaching, and more heavily on the teaching of mathematics and science than of other disciplines, Lewis seeks to understand both why Japanese teaching and learning methods have attracted sustained attention outside Japan and what the stresses and challenges are that face Japan’s 1.3 million teachers. She concludes that the active, career-long on-the-job learning by Japanese teachers, who use Preface xv “lesson study” to build and share effective practices, gives them a central role in both research and policy development. In Chapter 13, Peter Cave analyzes the structures, practices, and purposes of Japanese learners and learning. This chapter takes a broad overview of learning in Japan, from the early years, through the different stages of the education system, and into the workplace. Cave suggests that the considerable research conducted since the 1970s on Japanese education has revealed a number of threads that run through attitudes to and practices of learning in Japan; however, they also show sharp discontinuities and variations. He states that Japan is a dynamic society in which educators and others are constantly exchanging ideas and debating practices with a view to improving learning. There are significant disagreements about what children should be learning, how, and to what purpose. Moreover, the education system is divided by institutional barriers which generally minimize interflow of personnel and practices between its different stages, resulting in discontinuities. Although Japanese education has often been lauded for its effectiveness in helping children to learn in areas such as mathematics and science, doubts exist about the quality of learning in other areas, such as humanities and social sciences. Beyond the development of intellectual capacities, there is great concern in Japan that not just the mind but the whole person learns and develops. Cave also points out that the greatest surprise overseas has been the refutation of the notion that learning in Japan is all about memorization and drilling from the early years upwards. The emphasis that Japanese preschools and primary schools place on human development and inquiry-style learning strongly supports those advocating such approaches elsewhere. At the same time, the attention given to the careful organization of learning in Japan is also worth noting. In terms of the role played by family in education, and the relationship between home and school, notable changes have been observed in Japan. In Chapter 14 Ryoko Tsuneyoshi analyzes these changes over the last few decades and discusses newly emerging themes in family–school relations in Japanese society. Tsuneyoshi notes that what used to be taken for granted—silent and respectful parents, uniformly committed students, everyone starting from more or less the same point—is changing. Under the market model, families no longer silently cooperate with teachers, but are also consumers, selecting their schools, and evaluators in external reviews. The relationship of parents to schools is diversifying. There is a new awareness that families differ in many ways, and that families’ socioeconomic standing are different enough to affect education outcomes substantially. At the same time, multiple changes are occurring at once, often in contradictory ways, thus the relationship of the Japanese family to the school is in transition. In addition, new actors are emerging on the scene, notably the NGOs, the public and private sectors, and civil society that come together in complicated ways through human networks. What emerges is a fluid, shifting, and diversifying image of the home and community in relation to the school in Japan, which challenges the rather monolithic image of the uniformly educationallyminded but submissive Japanese family (mother) that has long been portrayed in the Englishlanguage literature on Japanese education. Although Japanese schools have shown amazing success in preparing a competent workforce and have led to international recognition of its high quality, Japanese education also faces challenges from internal and external sources. In Chapter 15 June A. Gordon provides an interpretation of the challenges facing Japanese education by highlighting schooling issues within the increasing social stratification of Japanese society. Gordon first discusses economic factors in parental choice of schooling and parent–teacher relationships in middle class Japan, then analyzes the specific educational challenges facing immigrant families and the teachers who attempt to provide appropriate schooling for their newcomer students as well as the majority low-income students in the same schools, and then examines higher education for international and immigrant students. Gordon identifies several relevant national dilemmas in Japan and points out that some of the most serious challenges facing Japan focus on xvi Preface developing world citizens aware of their responsibilities as a leading industrialized nation and as a partner in responding to global concerns that affect us all. To this end Japan will have to begin to eradicate notions of essentialism and purity and to embrace diversity. It is essential that Japan—educationally, economically, politically and socially—move out of its island country mentality and acknowledge the various ways that it is, and has always been, a part of a larger world that shares resources, cultures, and people. In Chapter 16, Yoshiko Nozaki examines the educational trends and issues of Japanese “overseas children” in general, and in particular those residing in the United States. The Japanese children discussed here are temporary sojourners, or transients living abroad with their parents who intend to return to Japan in the future. Nozaki examines three important aspects of the Japanese overseas children’s educational experiences in the United States and across the globe to some extent. Nozaki first discusses the history of Japanese emigration to the United States, calling attention to the fact that although Japanese transients have outnumbered Japanese immigrants since the 1970s, the “model minority” image of Japanese (and Asian) Americans has remained intact. Nozaki then analyzes the available quantitative data to show the historical trends of Japanese overseas children living as transients around the world, and the Japanese government’s efforts to help build Japanese overseas schools to provide “Japanese education” for these children. Nozaki argues that these children’s experiences abroad are diverse, and that the state’s attempt to standardize their education overseas is difficult to achieve and its policy of providing special arrangements for them upon return is perhaps problematic. Finally, based on one ethnographic study of Japanese overseas children at a U.S. school, Nozaki examines the ways in which the model minority image—or the discourse of cultural difference—works to influence teachers’ views (and indeed actions) vis-à-vis the children who are having difficulties adjusting to new school environments. Part III: Islamic Education A distinct Islamic civilization, originated in the Arabian peninsula, exists in many parts of Asia in the form of sub-civilizations, including Arabic, Turkic, Persian, and Malay. Educational systems to be included in this section are those in Malaysia, Indonesia, Turkey, Pakistan, Central Asia, and the Middle East. The Islamic Education section is organized to illustrate how the educational and cultural challenges confronting Muslim-majority countries today vary by the historical, political, and socio-economic contexts of those societies. This section includes four chapters. Nagwa M. Megahed starts this section with Chapter 17, an introductory chapter on Islam and education. She first defines Islam and cautions that one must be careful not to use the term “Islamic” in a monolithic way in relation to societies, localities, cultures, movements, and activities, because cultural traditions and social norms in Muslim-majority societies combine the values and principles associated with Islam but also adapt and integrate the indigenous habits and customs of people (Muslims and non-Muslims) in a given society; she then reviews the history of education in Muslim-majority societies and points out that at different historical stages, different Muslim-majority countries have faced different challenges. These differences are demonstrated in the three chapters included in this section, each focusing on education in one particular Islamic country. In these three countries, Islam is the official religion, and education has been the key agent for constructing and reproducing or transforming cultural traditions. Yet, the interplay of modernity versus tradition has created different realities and challenges during the journey of nation building in each country. From a socio-cultural perspective, Ali S. Ibrahim discusses the education system past and present of the United Arab Emirates (U.A.E.) in Chapter 18, with a focus on female education and participation in the workforce. Ibrahim employs two sets of socio-cultural variables Preface xvii to illustrate the historical and current state of the U.A.E. society as well as its education system: (1) Islam and the indigenous tribal culture; and (2) the sudden oil wealth and the government focus on modernization and development. This chapter illustrates how these two sets of sociocultural variables have affected the culture of the United Arab Emirates educational system. Special attention is given to the effect on female education and participation in the workforce in order to highlight the dialectics between the traditional and modern streams that characterize the society. In Chapter 19, Hamood Al-Harthi discusses both conflict and harmony between traditions and modernization in formal educational systems in Muslim countries. By focusing on education in Oman, one of the Muslim Arab Gulf countries, Al-Harthi aims to develop a better understanding of the socioeconomic and cultural context in which conflict and/or harmony between traditions and modernization in educational systems was/were created. With four examples that demonstrate the relationship between traditions and modernization in the Omani educational system, Al-Harthi examines the conditions that have created conflict and/or harmony between traditions and modernization, predicts their consequences, and discusses the implications for Oman and other Muslim countries. He concludes that education has been used as a modernizing force in most Islamic countries, yet has also turned out to be an agent of resistance to modernization in the context of globalization. With a greater tendency to internationalize and standardize education curricula, which results in the reduction of social and religious studies (as seen in a previous discussion), families and students turn to informal education, in particular to the after-school Quranic schools, to fill the gap of religious and community socialization left by the formal school. This chapter has emphasized the importance of the educational system as an agent for harmony between modernization and tradition in Muslim countries. Chapter 20 focuses on education in Malaysia. Tamby Subahan Mohd Meerah, Lilia Halim, and Nik Rahimi Nik Yusof first examine the education system and policy past and present in Malaysia to provide an understanding of the composition of the ethnic groups and the educational structure, which was developed during the colonial period, and has since influenced Malaysian education, culture, and society. They then discuss the historical background of the Malaysian educational system, and analyze how it has moved from a segregated (separated) system towards a more centralized/unified system. This is followed by a discussion of the challenges confronting the unification through the current education policy. Special attention is given to educational initiatives aimed at overcoming those challenges while meeting the needs of diverse religious groups in a society of different cultures and beliefs and to an analysis of how Malaysian education and curriculum accommodate differingreligious beliefs and cultural elements in multiracial and multicultural settings. By revealing the process and efforts undertaken toward integration and reduction of socio-economic disparities developed during the colonial period, they state that during both the British occupation and at present, education has been an agent for change and the sole meaning of cultural unity and societal development. They also point out that the establishment of a multi-schooling system, although preserving the different ethnic groups’ cultural traditions, has widened the gap between these groups culturally, socially, and economically. Chapter 21, the last chapter in the Islamic education section, focuses on the education of immigrant children from Islamic civilization in the United States. In this chapter, Jing Lei first reviews the history of Muslim immigration into the United States, followed by a brief introduction of the Muslim American educational profile, and then discusses the different choices of schooling Muslim children in the U.S., including public schools, Islamic schools, and homeschooling, and analyzes the advantages and disadvantages of each option. Lei also includes some discussions on the education of Muslim girls. This chapter concludes with discussions of challenges and future directions for the education of immigrant children from Islamic cultures. xviii Preface Part IV: Buddhist Education The Buddhist civilization, although originating in India, exists in various countries and regions outside India including Nepal, Thailand, Laos, and Burma. This section includes five chapters. David T. Gamage starts this section with an overview of Buddhist philosophy and culture, which provides an over-arching analysis to guide the educational systems in Buddhist countries (Chapter 22). By introducing the life stories of Buddha and the development of Buddha’s teaching, as well as the preservation of Buddha doctrine, Gamage points out that the Buddhist culture was developed from the values and the belief systems arising from the teachings of Buddha. However, the historical development of Buddhism suggests that people in countries such as China, Bhutan, Japan, Tibet, and Taiwan practice Mahayana Buddhism whereas those in Sri Lanka, Thailand, Myanmar (Burma), Cambodia and Laos and since the early twentieth century, newly converted Indian Buddhists have practiced Theravada Buddhism. Gamage then reviews how Buddhism is practiced differently, and how it has different impacts in different Buddhist countries, and provides a cultural overview of the education systems in these countries. In Chapter 23, Gamage and Prasad Setunga discuss the development of the education system in Sri Lanka from the third century bc to the first decade of the twenty-first century. This chapter starts with the arrival of the Buddhist mission sent to Sri Lanka by the Indian emperor Ashoka and the beginning of education at Buddhist temples and monasteries. It also discusses the extensive contacts between the Buddhist scholars amongst the Buddhist countries, seeking help from each other whenever religion was in decline in one or the other country. Then, it presents the developments in the Sri Lankan system of education with the additional British influence after 1815. The authors discuss how the Portuguese, Dutch and British systems of education influenced the Sri Lankan system and analyze the adverse effects on Buddhism and Buddhist educational institutions. They also examine how the Buddhist educational system was revived with the establishment of the Buddhist Theosophical Society. Further, they examine the development of a system of free education from the kindergarten through to university within an Independent Sri Lanka, which has achieved one of the highest literacy rates within the developing world along with a fairly large higher education sector. Chapter 24 focuses on education in Thailand. Pachrapimon Sooksomchitra Fox and David T. Gamage review the history of the traditional education system in the Kingdom of Thailand and the influence of the Buddhist culture with the connections established with the other Buddhist countries such as Sri Lanka and Myanmar. Originally, education in Thailand centered in the Buddhist temples, monasteries and households as well as in royal palaces, more specifically for the daughters of nobility. However, from 1868, because of the high degree of tolerance practiced within the Buddhist doctrine, a number of missionaries were able to launch aggressive campaigns to convert the Thai people to Christianity. This prompted the Royal Thai Government to lay a foundation for formal education from 1884. In 1902, a Royal Proclamation had announced that the kingdom would provide formal education to all the citizens of the country. The newly established government education system was heavily influenced by Buddhist culture, as required by the Ministries of Religious Affairs and Culture. The major reforms towards modernization occurred as a result of a high-powered commission report in 1997 appointed after the Asian Financial Crisis of the 1990s. Based on its recommendations, coordination and unification of the Thai education system including decentralization and devolution of school management were embodied in the National Education Act of 1999. The SBM model that is being implemented in Thailand is significantly influenced by the Victorian public education system in Australia. However, community participation in management is also a principle embodied in the Buddhist principle of the Middle Path. In Chapter 25, Tandin Wangmo and Kinga Choden point out that Bonism was the Preface xix traditional religion whereas Buddhism reached Bhutan during 273–232 bc. Yet, until 747 ad when Mahayana Buddhism was introduced with a monastic system of education, Buddhism was not influential. Modern education started in 1914 following a Western model to meet the basic education needs of the country. However, Buddhism, along with Bhutanese culture and values together with the concept of Gross National Happiness form the bedrock of the Bhutanese people’s unique and independent national identity. The current Bhutanese education system comprises general education, monastic education, and non-formal and continuing education; general education is the dominant structure. In Chapter 26, Wei Qiu, Naiyi Xie and Yong Zhao review the educational issues facing immigrant children in the Western world coming from Mahayana Buddhist and Theravada Buddhist countries, such as Vietnam, Bhutan, Burma, Cambodia, Laos, Sri Lanka (see also Chapter 23). They point out that research on this group of immigrant children is relatively sparse. On top of this, their educational challenges are often invisible or ignored by the general public. This chapter summarizes a growing body of research on their adjustment issues in religion, culture, language, schooling and family relationship. Following this review, implications for policy-makers and researchers are discussed to inspire more research to broaden our understanding of these students, as well as more policy interventions that will improve the quality of their life in the new country. Part V: Hindu Education One of the world’s most ancient civilizations, the Hindu civilization originated in the India subcontinent and now refers to a set of culture systems found mostly in India. The Hindu Education section comprises four chapters. Chapter 27 provides a cultural overview of education in Hindu civilization. Sheshagiri K. M. points out that a cultural overview of education in the Indian context which spans three millennia in the vast and complex sub-continental tradition demands a layered and hybrid interpretation of the various religious and cultural traditions that have emerged at different points in time. The influences of Hinduism, Buddhism and Islam are apparent in teaching practices and the image of the teacher. However, the purposes of education, systems of delivery and assessment are still governed by a Western model that became institutionalized through colonial influence. The twentieth century has progressively shown the impact of psychology, sociology, and manufacturing and economics. Next, Gaysu R. Arvind discusses the various ideologies of colonialism, modernism and neoliberalism, and their impact on India education. This ideological baggage has shaped educational policies, provisions and practices in varying ways in India. An empirical analysis of the policy discourse of socio-historical narratives and learning ecologies of marginalized learners illuminates their positioning in relation to teachers, peers and curricular practices; how meanings are produced and negotiated within and through a nested system of structures and processes of formal education; and how these in turn frame learners’ experiences and self-definition. An informed perspective on traditionally subordinated identities can restructure political, social and educational practices for social transformation, critical consciousness and social justice. In Chapter 29, Disha Nawani and Manish Jain examine the history, perspectives and contexts of learners and learning in India. This chapter uses an interdisciplinary approach to understand how categories of learner and learning acquire and denote specific meanings in specific sociohistorical contexts. Besides giving a historical overview of learner and learning from pre-colonial to independent India, the authors discuss the various perspectives that inform the debates on learners and learning, draws out the relationship between multiple learning sites and the socioeconomic locations of different learners and explains how these sites and locations shape learners’ identities and their learning. xx Preface Chapter 30 focuses on the education of Indian immigrants and their social-cultural context of education in the United States. Khyati Y. Joshi points out that the third largest group among Asian Americans, Indian Americans, who trace their lineage to the territory now within the borders of the Republic of India, are not a monolithic population but can be identified as Generation 1, 1.5, 2A, and 2B. Though tagged with the model minority myth, each generation’s social and educational experiences are significantly different, with a profound impact on their responses to schooling, teachers and peers. Teachers, principals and other educational personnel need to understand the varying academic and social-emotional needs of Indian American students if they are to serve them effectively. Acknowledgments The editors of this Handbook would like to thank our colleagues, families, friends, students and research collaborators around the world. In particular, we want to thank the many educational policy-makers, school leaders, teachers, and K–12 students in the United States and in Asia with whom we have worked in various settings. Their insights have helped us understand the profound influence of culture on different education systems. We also thank our colleagues at our respective universities who provided support for this cross-national collaboration. We are especially grateful to Naomi Silverman of Routledge for her invaluable support during the preparation of this Handbook. Yong Zhao US–China Center for Research on Educational Excellence Michigan State University Part I Sinic Education 1 A Cultural Overview of Education in Sinic Civilization Guofang Li and Ming Fang He Introduction The Sinic civilization, or Confucian civilization, refers to the shared and related cultures of China and the Chinese communities in Southeast Asia, which includes China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, Korea, and Vietnam. It also includes the Chinese diaspora, especially in relation to Southeast Asia. In the last few decades, education within Sinic civilization has experienced rapid changes. These changes have engendered some of the most vital, exciting, and revitalizing developments in education in these countries, in the midst of modernization, diversification, and globalization. This development is characterized by a dramatic resurgence of educational reforms, heated debates over educational practices, and ongoing struggles over highly contested educational policies in Sinic societies. This educational development in Sinic civilization is inextricably linked with the processes and impact of diversification of the world landscape which, in turn, further complicates the diversification of cultures, languages, communications, economies, ecological systems, and ways of lives in the East, in the West, and in-between. This diversity and complexity, though creating vitality, excitement, revitalization, and renewal in the field of education, has emerged as one of the most urgent challenges facing twenty-first century educational workers—learners, teachers, educators, parents, community workers, administrators, and policy-makers. Influenced by Confucian ethics, educational workers in Sinic societies have attempted to address diversity and complexity in their educational landscapes by searching for more holistic and eclectic approaches to educational reforms and practices. These efforts are of great significance to our understanding of the educational development in these societies and beyond in the era of diversification and globalization. In “Part I: Sinic Education,” we discuss current educational reforms and practices in governance and management, curriculum and assessment, teachers and teaching, learners and learning, and home and community in countries and regions with Sinic civilization. We also explore the challenges and future directions for educational reforms as well as the dynamic, fluid, and contested convergence of educational practices within the social, political, economic, and cultural contexts of these Sinic societies. We end this Part by investigating the education of Asian immigrants in the West. Since many emigrants from Sinic civilization have come to live in the West, how they are educated and adapting to their new cultures, language, and places will shed light on the increasing diversity and complexity in the educational landscape across the globe. This Part consists of eight chapters. Our aim in this introductory chapter is to stimulate the reader’s imagination. We urge readers to compare ideas and discussions presented in chapters in Part I with those in other Parts. These chapters stimulate reflections on the predicaments of Sinic civilization advanced above, and authors push our thinking, individually and collectively, to re-imagine Sinic education in the twenty-first century. 4 Guofang Li and Ming Fang He Cultural Overview of Education Confucian civilization, Sinic civilization, though with different stages of development (Tu 2000), permeates educational practices such as education governance and management, curriculum and assessment, teachers and teaching, learners and learning, home and community through constant changing process of stability, chaos, changes, revivals, and flourishes of cultures, languages, communications, economics, ecological systems, and ways of life in countries and regions with Sinic civilizations, other civilizations around the world, and in-between. The countries featured in Part I, to various degrees, share similar but slightly different traits of Confucian civilization, such as hierarchical relationship, collectivism, humanism, self-cultivation, trust, empathy, compassion, grace, and honesty (see Pang in Chapter 2 for more details). These variations of Confucian civilization are affected by and influence the resurgence of intellectual movements, the fluctuation of economic development, different stages of social and cultural growth and upheavals, and varied forms of political governance. These shared Confucian ethics of “equality over freedom, sympathy over rationality, civility over law, duty over rights, and human-relatedness over individualism” (Tu 2000, 215) seem to oppose the modern Western values of “contract, market, choice, competition, efficiency, flexibility, productivity and accountability” (Pang in Chapter 3; see also Tu 2000) translated in education by modernization and globalization. In the midst of these clashes of civilizations (Huntington 1996; Zhao, Lei, and Conway 2006; Zhao, Zhang, Yang, Kirkland, Han, and Zhang 2008), values, beliefs, and ethics, Sinic societies have been experiencing various educational reforms which demand paradigm shifts in approaches to education systems and practices to meet the challenges brought about by modernization and globalization in the highly competitive world. While the chapters in Part I cover several areas of educational practices for readers to ponder and wonder over, cultural epistemological curiosities about education in Sinic societies emerge: What implications can modernization and globalization engender for the promises and perils of education in Sinic societies? What can educational workers do to adequately meet the challenges of modernization, diversification, and globalization? Sharing Civilization, Overcoming Inequality, Maintaining Quality, and Cultivating Humanity In Sinic societies, the primary purpose of education under the influence of Confucian civilization is to “cultivate humanity, integrity, beauty, justice, and equity” (Schubert, 2009) through self-cultivation, which is “the common root of regulation of the family, the governance of state and peace under heaven, the quality of life of a particular society depends on the level of self-cultivation of its members” (Tu 2000, 215). A Confucian society which encourages self-cultivation as a prelude for human flourishing is a society that cherishes virtue-based governance and regulation, communal ways of self-cultivation, families as gathering places for learning to be human, communities as places to invigorate human interaction and sharing, and education as a place to cultivate full human potential. The process of modernization and globalization in Sinic societies is shaped by these common cultural values and ethics, deeply rooted in Confucian civilization. As modernization and globalization pervade the globe, Sinic societies begin to explore possibilities of communication, negotiation, and accommodation between the fusion and clash of different cultural values, ethics, and civilizations. Traditions continue in modernity and globalization. Sinic societies are becoming modernized and globalized without being Westernized. However, the reconfiguration of modernization and globalization in Sinic societies tends to intensify “inequalities in wealth, power, and accessibility to goods, ideas, and information” (Tu 2000, 200). These inequalities are further intensified in schools, and become one of the major barriers to maintaining the quality of education. There are drastic disparities in Cultural Overview of Sinic Education 5 facilities, equipment, and resources between city schools and rural schools and between developed regions and underdeveloped regions (particularly in China and Vietnam; see Chapters 5, 6, and 8 for details); disparities in sharing governance in school management and curriculum opportunities (see Chapters 3 and 4 for details); disparities in faculty benefits, salary, and social welfare (see Chapters 5 and 8 for details); and disparities in access, resources, and power for disenfranchised individuals and groups including those with disabilities, and minority groups (see other chapters in Part I for details). Overcoming inequality has become one of the most important goals of education in the twenty-first century (UNESCO 2009). Education in Sinic societies is infused with Eastern and Western cultures, traditions, and civilizations while absorbing the most advanced concepts, theories, and experiences from modern Western education. Nevertheless, the inequalities and inadequacies within the existing education systems and practices in Sinic societies must be overcome in order to achieve Education for All (UNESCO 2009). There have been a wide range of reform initiatives in Sinic societies, building upon both Confucian civilization and modern Western civilizations. We hope the chapters in this Part can revitalize ongoing, heated, debate in educational practices, and increasing recognition of the chaos and vigor of clashes of civilizations and challenges over uncertain, confusing, and highly contested educational issues such as inequalities (urban–rural, gender, digital divide, educational provision for disenfranchised ethnic minorities, immigrants, or learners with special needs) and quality of education (visions of education, quality of teachers, active learners, engaging content curriculum, culturally inspiring learning environment, parental and community involvement, culturally responsive policy-making, creative learning assessment and evaluation, teacher training and development, etc.) in countries with Sinic civilizations and other civilizations around the world. In the midst of these obstacles and challenges, we believe that the key to maintaining the quality of education for all is to fuse Confucian civilization, other Eastern civilizations, and Western civilizations to develop an education of shared interests (He, Phillion, Chan, and Xu 2008; Li 2005). We envision this education of shared interests as one where all members of schools, communities, societies and the policy-making milieu have shared common interests. Families and communities connect their concerns about the education of their children with those of larger societies. Schools share their interest in educating creative and lifelong learners with families, communities, and societies. Individuals have equal opportunities to “take and receive from others” and to have “free interchange of varying modes of life experience” (Dewey 1916, 84) from various civilizations, and are willing to adjust their interests to the interests of others in larger societies. In such an education of shared interests, teachers cultivate cultural competence, full human potential, and world citizenship in learners to recognize themselves not only as members of local communities but also as members of global societies. They develop pedagogical and cultural competence based upon the fusion of Eastern and Western civilizations to enrich the curriculum for all learners. Learners are encouraged to value their cultural and linguistic heritage rooted in their cultural norms and civilizations, to respect and accept differences, to critically examine their positions in societies, and to perceive themselves as agents of positive social and educational change. Policy-makers and administrators learn the nuances of learners’ experience at home, in the community, and at school. They value the knowledge held by teachers, students, parents and other curriculum stakeholders, and incorporate this knowledge into culturally relevant policy-making. 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