Alberta Political Economy in Crisis: Whither Education?
Keywords:
Alberta education, educational restructuring, education finance, educational policy, centralization, privatizationAbstract
Since the onset of recession in the late 1970s public education systems in the industrialized capitalist world have come under mounting criticism and pressure for change. “Reforms” of education have not been confined to fiscal measures but also include changes in management, curriculum, and evaluation practices. There have also been shifts in the balance between local and centralized authority, and between public and private control of education. The province of Alberta’s boom-bust oil economy interestingly illustrates educational restructuring now underway in Canada and elsewhere. The Alberta Government during the 1980s has sought not just to improve efficient delivery of public education, but systematically to redirect and to restructure education in line with changing capital accumulation requirements.
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