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Purpose: This article examines the use of English medium instruction (EMI) for teaching Japanese as a foreign language (JFL) by non-native speakers with a focus on multilingual classrooms. It also explores teachers' positive and negative beliefs about using EMI in classroom settings for JFL instruction. Methods and procedure: 274 non-native Japanese language teachers from around the world (57 countries) voluntarily participated in a survey, answering a questionnaire on Google Forms and Jotform. Both qualitative and quantitative methods were employed. The research instrument was piloted before the main study and was found to be effective and adequate to elicit the desired data. The research questions aimed to identify whether there were any relationships between the use of EMI and the multilingual classroom. Findings: The results showed a clear correlation between the extensive use of EMI and the multilingual character of JFL classrooms. Translanguaging turned out to be a common practice adopted by non-native Japanese teachers regardless of the primary language of instruction. The article concludes that EMI can be a valuable tool for JFL instruction in multilingual classrooms. Based on the investigation of the teachers' beliefs, the results showed a changing positive attitude towards English employed in JFL classrooms. Implications for research and practice: The findings can be used to further investigate EMI in JFL instructional practices in multilingual classrooms, improve the quality of JFL instruction and facilitate the integration of multilingual education into foreign language teaching. Future research can explore the effectiveness of EMI in different JFL contexts and investigate the impact of EMI on students' language learning outcomes.

Previous research on gender differences in young people's digital development has shown that boys and girls differ in frequency and type of internet use, but vital gaps in the literature remain. In recent years, gender is increasingly considered to be a multidimensional concept with a growing number of young people identifying as non-binary (i.e. genderfluid, an umbrella term for gender identities that are not conforming to the male/female dichotomy). Non-binary youth more frequently engage with a variety of digital risks such as misinformation, cyberbullying, and co-rumination than binary youth. Despite this, no research so far has investigated how digital development differs between non-binary and binary youth. In this online survey study among adolescents in six European countries (N=6,221), we focus on differences in digital skills and digital activities. Non-binary youth tend to make greater use of the internet for content creation and mental and physical health information than boys and girls. They also report greater content creation skills than boys and girls. Disparities in terms of entertainment and social relationship use are also found. Furthermore, findings on digital skills indicate that non-binary youth closely mirror boys in this regard. We conclude with recommendations for future research that should help bolster our understanding of how digital contexts may predict the development and well-being of non-binary youth.

Goal: The problem of the authenticity of teacher questions has not received sufficient attention from educational researchers interested in the intersection between dialogue and argumentation. In this paper, we adopt a definition of authentic questions as dialogical units that prompt teacher-student interactions that are both productive (i.e., several students participating) and constructive (i.e., students produce arguments of high complexity). Our goal is to analyze whether and how specific types of dialogue prompts can encourage students' engagement in more sophisticated argumentative interactions, as manifested through the construction of high-complexity arguments. Method: We describe the implementation of our analytical approach to a large corpus of classroom interactions from five European countries. The corpus was segmented into dialogical sequences, which were then coded according to the argumentation dialogue goal expressed in the sequence. We also coded students' arguments according to Toulmin's elements and distinguished between low- and high-complexity arguments from a structural point of view. Findings: Our findings show the predominance of the so-called Discovery questions as prompts that are both productive and constructive and Inquiry questions as prompts of argumentative constructive interactions. We discuss the importance of these findings for teacher professional development purposes.

For over two decades now, the application of Citizen Science to Education has been evolving, and fundamental topics, such as the drivers of motivation to participate in Citizen Science projects, are still under discussion. Some recent developments, though, like the use of Artificial Intelligence to support data collection and validation, seem to point to a clear-cut divergence from the mainstream research path. The objective of this paper is to summarise the development trajectory of research on Citizen Science in Education so far, and then shed light on its future development, to help researchers direct their efforts towards the most promising open questions in this field. We achieved these objectives by using the lens of the Affordance-Actualisation theory and the Main Path Analysis method.

Immigrant minority (IM) languages have a significant presence in certain European regions. Nonetheless, these languages are not usually included in the school curriculum. This paper aims to analyse the studies published between 2010 and 2020 considering IM languages in multilingual European education contexts. The method included a search of academic papers published in the databases ERIC, Web of Science and Scopus, which yielded 42 studies. The studies were analysed by considering: (1) the demographic characteristics of the countries where the studies were conducted, (2) the sociolinguistic or psycholinguistic focus of the papers in relation to the European country, and (3) the characteristics of the bi-multilingual education programme including IM languages. The results indicate that: (1) the demographic characteristics of the country are not strictly related to the number of studies published, (2) most studies have a sociolinguistic approach even though many studies analyse both sociolinguistic and psycholinguistic factors, and (3) only seven multilingual education programmes including IM languages were described in these papers. We conclude that there is a lack of research focusing on IM languages in educational settings and discuss how addressing these gaps could create opportunities for building equitable multilingual communities in Europe.

This article offers a view on the emerging practice of managing external relations of the modern university, and the role of science communication in this. With a representative sample of research universities in four countries, we seek to broaden our understanding of the "science communication (SC) function" and its niche within the modern university. We distinguish science communication from corporate communication functions and examine how they distribute across organisational levels. We find that communication functions can be represented along a spectrum of (de)centralisation: public relations and marketing activities are more likely carried out at the central level (central offices), and public affairs and SC activities are more likely carried out at decentral levels (e.g. in specific offices and/or research institutes, departments). This study shows that little attention is paid to science communication at central structures, suggesting that it is not a practice that aligns easily with university corporate communication, yet SC might find its niche increasingly in decentral locations of activity.

The article addresses the issues surrounding the importance and impact of 'hinterlands' in the construction of European higher education systems and in the formation of sectoral policy. It draws on studies of Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Norway, Portugal and the United Kingdom to illustrate different policy approaches and shows how in some countries 'hinterland' issues have been the major factor in the reconstruction of national higher education systems. It draws a distinction between the past, where policies were essentially based on the growth of student numbers, and the present, where the drivers are much more related to regional social and economic factors and, in some countries, to public good policies on equalising opportunities between deprived and affluent areas. It suggests that 'hinterland' issues are now central to how higher education systems are constructed. As a result, systems will become more complex to manage but that regional and institutional 'bottom up' determination may offer better prospects for innovation and flexibility in the face of societal change.

This study investigates 14 digitally enhanced learning methods, shedding light on students with special educational needs (SEN) in inclusive digital learning environments. We seek to fill the gap in the literature by specifically investigating methods suitable for students with SEN. A survey among experts has been carried out to assess learning methods that are effectively applicable in inclusive digital learning environments. A mixed method: quantitative and qualitative data analysis with the use of a constant comparative method has been applied to synthesise and compare experts' answers. Quantitative data analysis showed that cooperative learning, digital problem/project-based learning, and virtual exchange are the most suitable methods for all students, whereas digital problem/project-based learning, cooperative learning, and service-learning were agreed upon as the most appropriate for students with SEN. Answers to open questions, evaluated using a qualitative approach, showed that the effectiveness of digital approaches is heavily reliant on the skills, experience, willingness, confidence, and knowledge of teachers implementing them. Employing cooperative learning and digital problem/project-based learning, particularly by experienced and highly skilled teachers, has the potential to effectively support all students, including those with SEN, in digital learning environments.

International student mobility has been rising as a global phenomenon in the last few decades, while its impact could be various in different contexts. For the European Union (EU), studying in another EU member country could be regarded as an important factor for the solidarity and integrity of the Union. The current study elaborates on the role of studying abroad regarding the attitudes of people toward immigration in the EU. It shows that people who are studying in an EU member country, belonging to higher social classes and from EU15 countries, are more likely to have positive attitudes toward immigration. But after controlling several socio-demographic variables studying abroad still contributes positively to the attitudes of EU citizens toward immigration. Accordingly, current study provides promising pieces of evidence on the social contribution of studying abroad for both future research and policymakers.

This research aims to conduct a bibliometric study to describe how game-based educational research is structured and how it has evolved over time. For this purpose, bibliometric analysis has been used to analyze 4980 publications indexed by the Elsevier SCOPUS database between 1967 and May 2021. The related publications were evaluated by analyzing co-authorship, co-occurrence, and citation by considering author, keyword, country, journal, university, and publication variables. As a result of the bibliometric analysis, it was concluded that the United States was leading the field and significantly publishing more studies. Top performing organizations were in Taiwan and the United States. According to the keyword co-occurrence analysis, "game-based learning" was the most used keyword followed by "serious games" and "gamification". Co-authorship status results show that collaboration between researchers in the field was not high and the number of researchers in co-author groups was small. It was found that the most influential research was related to literature review on games and the effectiveness of games on motivation or learning and Computers & Education was the most published and cited journal in game-based educational research.

Assessment is critical in postsecondary education, as it is at all levels. Assessments are classified into four types: diagnostic, summative, evaluative, and formative. Recent trends in assessment have migrated away from summative to formative evaluations. Formative evaluations help students develop expertise and concentrate their schedules, ease student anxiety, instill a feeling of ownership in students as they go, and confirm the module's subject notion. Online formative assessment (OFA) emerged as a result of the convergence of formative and computer-assisted assessment research. Bibliometric analyses provide readers with a comprehensive understanding of a study topic across a particular time period. We used a PRISMA-compliant bibliometric method. The Scopus database was searched for BibTex-formatted publication data. In total, 898 studies were analyzed. According to the results, "Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education" and "Computers & Education" are the most influential sources. RWTH Aachen University and Universitat Oberta De Catalunya are the most effective institutions. The red cluster includes terms associated with higher education and evaluation. The word "e-assessment, e-learning, assessment, moodle" appears in the green cluster. This group is quite influential yet has a low centrality. The highest percentage is 79.2 for "online assessment". The subject is comprised of three components: "distance learning", "accessibility", and "assessment design". The most important topics were "e-assessment", "higher education", and "online learning". According to the country participation network, the USA and UK were the two main centers.

The study aims to understand the foremost challenges in the transition to online teaching and learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. The study adopts the PRISMA approach to screening the selection of journal articles and review papers according to the research aims and the inclusion criteria. The journal articles and review papers were extracted and stored in Microsoft Excel and Google Scholar, Academic. Microsoft, Semantic Scholar, Elsevier, and Emerald Insight databases searched relevant documents using formulated keywords. A statistical technique was applied using the M.S. Excel analysis tool (PivotTable and an independent t-Test) to analyze data and determine the differences between teachers and students. The review revealed the evidence that the majority of the studies were primarily focused on the individual developing countries and results from other developing countries were not considered. In addition, the foremost challenges in the transition to online teaching and learning during the COVID-19 pandemic were inadequate skills and training, inadequate Internet/Infrastructure, lack of supporting resources and lack of online student engagement and feedback. Finally, the independent t-test reveals there is no statistically significant difference in challenges in the transition to online teaching and learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. Both teachers and students encounter similar challenges. The systematic review raised concerns that higher learning needs to effectively implement long term strategies and support teachers and students in getting into online teaching and learning.

The current study aims to examine students' and teachers' voices and views on the outcomes of the implementation of a curriculum as relevant and appropriate to enhance students' citizenship skills by engaging them in dialogic and argumentative practices. To achieve the aim an innovative curriculum, consisting of 15 lessons per education level (pre-primary, primary and secondary) was developed. These lessons involved teachers and students in dialogue and argumentation around themes of citizenship education as cultural literacy using dialogue and argumentation as tools. The sample consisted of the responses of 134 teachers and 78 secondary school students. Overall, the curriculum was successful on supporting students on dialogue, argumentation and cultural literacy. A second finding has to do with teachers identifying changes in their practices related to dialogue and argumentation during the enactment of the curriculum. Furthermore, teachers underline the aspect of student enjoyment of the curriculum during the implementation. This finding supports the democratic and participatory aspect of the curriculum and adds a successful example of citizenship curriculum to the literature. Students emphasize as important aspects of the curriculum the fact that it makes the connection to everyday life, and is different from usual classroom related issues.

During voluntary work, volunteers acquire valuable new knowledge and skills, but they often do not recognize these newly developed competencies, cannot apply them in further education, and fail to make others, including potential employers, aware of them. The classification and validation of these competencies can help to facilitate the transfer of volunteers' competencies within the volunteer and labor markets; however, the required steps for validation of the acquired competencies are frequently complicated or unclear for volunteers. Additionally, accepted ways of validating are lacking in labor market. This paper starts by presenting the value and benefits of volunteering, especially in a business education context. Thereafter, the authors present a European partnership project--the Grundtvig Learning Partnership's Volunteering Validation Highway (VVH). The partnership aimed to facilitate the validation and transfer of volunteers' experience. The following paper discuss volunteering as important part of society and a business education approach integrating volunteering. To support the idea of integration, the authors present a study concerning volunteers' competencies, the benefits of volunteering, and the usefulness in business education of competencies gained through volunteering. The study used data from a questionnaire and group discussions. Regarding different countries, the partners expected different understandings of volunteering; therefore, the researchers conducted mixed-nationality group discussions to develop a mutual understanding of volunteering. The researchers also developed a questionnaire according to the group discussion categories (inductive) and included both open-ended and multiple-choice questions. The results support the idea of integrating volunteering experiences in business education. First, the results showed benefits for society and for the volunteers themselves. Second, the volunteers gain on the one hand professional competencies that were relevant to the labor market, like delegating tasks to other people. On the other hand, the volunteers mentioned social and process-oriented competencies, including communication and technical skills. Third, the researchers identified two major advantages of volunteering: volunteers learn networking and communicating, and volunteers experience opened new occupational fields. The authors presented in a fourth step opportunities to integrate volunteering into business education. Business education can therefore be a service learning or a social entrepreneurship education course.

Through qualitative research, which involved qualitative interviews and focus group meetings with members of four student teams, we identified a number of barriers to the development of cohesiveness in teams of local and international exchange (IE) students, who were undertaking service-learning (SL) together. Lack of cohesiveness in such teams resulted in the psychological withdrawal of some of the IE students and appeared to reduce opportunities to derive developmental benefits. Barriers to cohesiveness identified by the students included language, conflicting priorities, and East-West cultural differences. We also identified how students took action to remove the barriers to cohesiveness. These actions included conducting internal team meetings in English and arranging for local students to provide interpretation in meetings with community stakeholders. Students reported that the major developmental benefits associated specifically with working cohesively in a cross-cultural team were improved English language skills, greater interpersonal adaptability, and appreciation of diversity. We offer practical suggestions about how educators can prepare local and IE students to work together effectively on SL projects and about further research. Studies of projects undertaken by inter-cultural SL teams at host universities in other jurisdictions would facilitate the generalizability of the findings.

The aim of this study was to determine the examination of the researches about the use of technology by fine arts teachers. The study was conducted according to the content and citation analysis model. In this context, Web of Science (WOS) Core Collection indexes were included. In the document scanning in the WOS environment, the keywords 'Fine arts', 'Teachers' and 'Technology' were searched. In total, 169 documents were examined and analysed one by one. They were analysed according to year, document type, WOS content category, country, source title, organisation and citation, authors, publication language and categories. As a result of this research, the first study was conducted in 2004, while the most studies were conducted in 2016. It was concluded that the published studies had the most Proceedings papers as the document type. The area where the studies of fine arts teachers on the use of technology are mostly carried out is Education Educational Research, according to the Web of Science content category. The most researched title in the distribution according to the Source Title field is 'International Multidisciplinary Scientific Conferences on Social Sciences and Arts.' The university with the most studies is Kazan Federal University. The 19 authors who conducted the studies have a large number of studies in this field. It was concluded that other authors had only one study in the field. Again, when we look at the distribution of the countries and documents according to the language of writing, the country with the most studies is China and the language of the documents is English. The area continues to evolve.

Interest in higher education institutions (HEIs) as instruments for development has increased in recent years. The main objective of this paper is to address the contribution of HEIs to development through their missions, models, and challenges. With this purpose, we perform a historical analysis and characterise higher-education systems through the perspective of university models and missions, noticing relevant aspects regarding the evolution of this institution over time, as well as the transformations undergone. We also consider the main challenges that current higher education systems face in the 21st century. As methodological approaches, we carry out a literature review complemented by a comparative analysis based on data from the higher education systems of ten European countries. The findings show that HEIs can contribute to development through their missions, which are related to the models of higher education. Their first mission (teaching) contributes to improving human capital and attracting highly qualified people to their regions; the second mission (research) improves scientific knowledge which can foster innovative activities; and the third mission (community service) acts as a link between research and business, including patents, business incubators, and collaboration agreements. We also conclude that the challenges of higher education in the 21st century can be categorised essentially in three main areas: (1) globalisation and massification of higher education, as well as the internationalisation of HEIs' missions and diversification of the educational supply to attract new students; (2) new technologies related to the digitalisation of teaching and distance learning; and (3) higher education entrepreneurship, showing the importance of university-company relationships. This paper provides a global setting for a reflection on the role of HEIs in the 21st century, given their connection with society and the need for a more effective contribution to socio-economic development.

Purpose: Treating Active Citizenship as a sum of behavioral indicators requires certain prerequisites that can be difficult to meet in practice (e.g. structural validity and measurement invariance). We explore a different approach, in which we treat Active Citizenship as a categorical, rather than a linear, construct. Design: Based on longitudinal data from eight European countries, we discovered the patterns' structure based on the first-year data and then replicated the analysis on the second-year sample to confirm it. Next, we explored the change between the years and its' trajectories. We compared countries profiles and their change. Finally, we used multinomial logistic regression to explore the most common trajectories. Findings: We describe six patterns: fighter, activist, volunteer, backer, online and indifferent. The pattern structure is replicable and 41.8% of respondents preserve their pattern. For those respondents who changed their pattern, we identified political interest, religiosity, gender and age as the main factors behind this change. Research implications: The study contributes to the understanding of youth Active Citizenship and the factors that support and promote it.

Several studies have been published on disengaged test respondents, and others have analyzed disengaged survey respondents separately. For many large-scale assessments, students answer questionnaire and test items in succession. This study examines the percentage of students who continuously engage in disengaged responding behaviors across sections in a low-stakes assessment. The effects on calculated scores of filtering students, based on their responding behaviors, are also analyzed. Data of this study came from the 2015 administration of PISA. For data analysis, frequencies and percentages of engaged students in the sessions were initially calculated using students' response times. To investigate the impact of filtering disengaged respondents on parameter estimation, three groups were created, namely engaged in both measures, engaged only in the test, and engaged only in the questionnaire. Next, several validity checks were performed on each group to verify the accuracy of the classifications and the impact of filtering student groups based on their responding behavior. The results indicate that students who are disengaged in tests tend to continue this behavior when responding to the questionnaire items in PISA. Moreover, the rate of continuity of disengaged responding is non-negligible as can be seen from the effect sizes. On the other hand, removing disengaged students in both measures led to higher or nearly the same performance ratings compared to the other groups. Researchers analyzing the dataset including achievement tests and survey items are recommended to review disengaged responses and filter out students who are continuously showing disengaged responding before performing further statistical analysis.

This study uses PISA 2018 data to analyze, from a multinational perspective, whether interest in environmental issues is a determining factor of science literacy. A relational survey model is used as a quantitative research design to analyze secondary data obtained from the PISA 2018 evaluation data of 98,306 students at the age of 15 in 15 different countries and economies. Several statistical tests, including t-test, multiple regression analysis, and artificial neural network analysis are employed. According to the results of the analysis, significant differences are found between the science literacy scores of students who are 'very interested' in the environmental issues in their country and those who are not at all interested. Similarly, significant differences are found between the science literacy scores of students who are 'very interested' in environmental issues in other countries and those who are not at all interested. In addition, students' relevance to environmental problems are factors that statistically predict students' science literacy in a significant way.

Preschool education is an education process that prepares children for primary education, provides the training and upbringing conditions in the home and also aims to remove the inequalities in terms of language and society in the early period. The audit is to evaluate learning and all the factors that affect learning and also prepare the environment and conditions for effective learning. The purpose of this research was to develop a comprehensive point of view for preschool education audit in the world and our country. Document analysis that is one of the qualitative research methods were utilized in this paper as the method. The documents related to the systems in France, Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg, Denmark, Greece, Spain, Italy, Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Sweden, Sweden, Norway, Iceland, Switzerland, Russia, China, Israel, America, Saudi Arabia, Japan, India Jordan, Albania, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Romania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Poland, Kosovo and Turkey were researched out within the scope of this study.

Globalisation and policy transfer in education make it incumbent upon decision makers to prioritise among competing policy options, select policy initiatives that are appropriate for their national contexts, and understand how system-specific factors moderate the relationship between those policies and student outcomes. This study used qualitative comparative analysis and correlational analyses to explore these relationships with publicly available data on socio-economic, cultural, and education conditions, and their association with PISA 2015 results in 49 countries. Findings show that gender and income equality, human development, and individualism were outcome-enabling conditions for PISA 2015 results, and gender equality was the most consistent of these conditions. These factors significantly moderated the relationships between education policy and PISA results. Implications for the identification of meaningful peer countries for comparative educational research, policy transfer, and the future expansion of PISA are discussed.

The educational transition between early childhood education and primary education is a complex moment of change with repercussions throughout the academic life of the students. For this reason, it is important to seek continuity between both educational stages. A successful transition produces for the social, cognitive and emotional well-being of the student. The aim of this study is to find out how transition-related factors apply in ten European Union (EU) countries. The factors analyzed are the age of onset of transition, the teacher-student ratio, types of clustering, financing of the stage, responsibility, and both initial and in-service teacher training. The methodology followed in this study is documentary analysis and the main source of data search has been the European Commission's Eurydice portal. The results show differences in stage change within each country, especially in the explicit consideration of a transition period. The main conclusion is that there is a great difference between the northern and southern countries. The main differences between countries in the transitions from early childhood education to primary education in the EU are in the years of compulsory education, the teacher/student/unit ratio, the initial teacher training, and the decentralization of education.

Seamless learning has a significance that has been increasing in recent years, and an increasing number of studies on the subject in the literature draws attention. This study aimed to examine the research on seamless learning between 1996 and 2020 with the bibliometric analysis method. The Scopus database was used in the collection of the data. After various screening processes, a total of 389 publications were included in the analysis. Descriptive analysis and bibliometric analysis were used in the analysis of the data. The distribution of publications by years, types of publications, sources, and languages were analyzed in the research. Additionally, visual maps were created with analyses of co-author, cocitation, and co-word. At the end of the study, it was seen that there has been an increase in the number of publications from the past to the present, articles and papers were predominant, and that most of the studies were carried out in English. As a result of bibliometric analysis, it was concluded that the most efficient countries in seamless learning were the United Kingdom, the United States, and Singapore. Also, it has been determined that the National Institute of Education, Center for International Education and Exchange, and Kyushu University institutions are dominant. The most frequently mentioned authors cited in studies in many different fields are M. Sharples, L.-H. Wong, and H. Ogata. According to the co-word analysis, the keywords seamless learning, mobile learning, ubiquitous learning, and mobile-assisted language learning stand out in the field of seamless learning.

For teaching practice to be useful, educational materials must be thoroughly evaluated prior to use. In this study, teachers evaluated open educational resources (OER) created for a European Commission Horizon 2020 project called DIALLS ('DIalogue and Argumentation for cultural Literacy Learning in Schools'). Considering research on how OER are evaluated, we were interested in learning (1) how teachers perceive their "application," "content," "design," "value" and "sustainability" and (2) what other aspects teachers find important when evaluating OER. After analysing quantitative and qualitative data, we found that aspects facilitating self-regulated use were rated most highly and mentioned most often. Teachers additionally valued "adaptable" materials offering "opportunities to reflect" their teaching practices. Future research may benefit from evaluating OER based on 'affordance' aspects -- aspects that allow teachers to adapt the materials in a self-regulated way and reflect on their teaching.

Due to globalisation and migration, multilingualism has become both a reality and an aim of education systems across Europe, affecting how language education is shaped. To improve the ways in which schools cater for language education in diverse settings, research is required on the potentials of multilingualism in order to design curricula that foster skills in different languages. This paper aims at identifying and explaining research priorities in the field of multilingualism and language education in a cross-national perspective. It draws on data from a survey with 298 expert participants in five European countries (Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain) who ranked pre-identified research topics in relation to their perceived urgency. Results show that experts identified 'effectiveness of multilingual support in regular lessons', 'features of multilingual didactics' and 'effectiveness of literacy support in home languages on the development of academic language skills in the majority language' as having the highest research priority overall. However, these results vary across national settings investigated. While the German, Dutch and Portuguese respondents attributed urgency to research on academic language skills, other issues were rated higher in the Spanish and Italian research contexts. The advantages and limitations of conducting cross-national research are also addressed.

The Programme of International Student Assessment (PISA) has instigated domestic policy debate aimed at improving education systems' quality and efficiency. Its high performers are often described as knowledge-based legitimation tools that have become reference societies. This article analyses if and the extent to which PISA affects the choice of reference societies used in education policy. We conducted a systematic literature review of scholarly peer-reviewed journal articles. We identify two ways in which PISA affects the reference societies chosen: it builds but also triggers the collapse of the reference societies used in domestic education policy. However, there are also cases in which PISA has little influence on which countries or regions are used as references. The domestic processes of choosing the reference societies used in education policy emerge as more nuanced than first expected. This article provides a firm basis for a much-needed understanding of the topic.

The doctoral defence is the oral examination of the doctoral thesis. While it is a major milestone for doctoral candidates, this event is often shrouded in mystery. In this article, I explore the doctoral defence from an international perspective. I have studied the format of the defence based on written testimonies as well as the literature on this topic. From this analysis, I distinguish four main elements of the defence format: (1) timing of the defence with respect to thesis publication, (2) number of steps in the defence, (3) public or private defence, and (4) the timeline of the defence itself. I then use these building blocks of the doctoral defence format to discuss differences and similarities between the formats, and finally to categorize defence formats used internationally by analysing the format of 26 countries, 24 of which use an oral defence format. The result is a deeper understanding of the defence format, which is valuable for candidates, committee members, supervisors, and administrators, and which can also serve the current discussions within the European Union on a standard format for the doctoral defence. Ultimately, understanding the defence format removes the mystery surrounding the defence.

The present study sought to examine the psychometric properties of new German, Portuguese, and Spanish versions of the Revised Short Form of the Physical Self-Inventory (PSI-S-"R"), and to contrast these properties against those from the original French version of this instrument. Participants (n = 1802) were 288 French youth, 177 German youth, 848 Portuguese youths and 489 Spanish youth. Results from exploratory structural equation modeling (ESEM) analyses supported the factor validity and reliability of PSI-S-"R" across the overall sample and each linguistic sample. Subsequent analyses supported the weak, partial strong, and strict invariance of this measure, and revealed a lack of differential item functioning (i.e., measurement bias) as a function of age, body mass index, sex and sport involvement across all linguistic versions. However, latent mean differences were observed as a function of these predictors and countries.

In an academic semester, living in social isolation and under restrictions of the pandemic, we organized weekly multidisciplinary seminars from a postgraduate course program in Curitiba, Southern Brazil, integrating students from different regions of Brazil and South America. Outstanding researchers from Brazil, Germany, France, Argentina, Mexico, Portugal, England, and United States' institutions gave seminars on chronic and infectious diseases with immunological, pharmacological, biochemical, cellular, and molecular biology point of views. The meetings were longer than traditional seminars, containing a part with scientific debate and other with a humanization or deconstruction of the researcher including trajectory, hobbies, scientific, and social thoughts. To facilitate learning and conceptualization, the seminars were available through YouTube and we applied weekly questionnaires to be answered rescuing scientific and motivational topics to give companionship and support to the students in pandemic times. Here, we are defending the creation of permanent platforms for scientific diffusion, with higher accessibility, connecting centers of different levels and giving academic excellence and opportunities for young researchers. Feedback received from participants indicates that this seminar structure can increase confidence and improve their perception of scientific processes and inspire researchers with development trajectories. We have discussed multidisciplinarity, scientific excellence, regional isolation and economic inequality, integration, humanization, and the value of science in society.

Parents play a vital role in identifying children's needs for support and Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) features that support children's well-being. This study examined parental perspectives on features of ECEC that foster young children's well-being under and above the age of 3 years by interviewing 359 parents across nine European countries (England, Finland, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, and Portugal). Results revealed that parental perspectives largely converged with quality features discussed in ECEC research. Process quality features were mentioned more frequently than structural features for all children 0- to 6-years-old in almost all countries. However, care-oriented features were mentioned more frequently for under 3 years, and educational-oriented features were mentioned more frequently for the older group. Regarding structural features, patterns of responses across the two age groups were similar in most countries. Age differences were not more pronounced in countries with a split governance system. [This article was written with the CARE research team.]

As the ecosystem of actors communicating science has become more complex, there is a need to understand the motivations and deterrents of those involved in the communication of science, technology and health topics. This article reports on a survey of 465 communication actors based in seven European countries. The findings suggest strong commonalities between role and country, with personal enthusiasm a key motivator, and from a theoretical perspective, these motivations can be viewed as relatively pragmatic. More variation was found between countries and roles in barriers to communication, though these suggest a perception that institutions do not value this work.

Purpose: To improve school organisational performance and innovativeness, and meet diverse student needs, school leaders should be innovative, risk-takers and proactive, thus applying entrepreneurial practices/strategies and market mechanisms. This study aims to investigate, from a schoolteacher's perspective, the degree of entrepreneurial leadership behaviour (ELB) applied by school principals in European primary schools. Given that school autonomy is perceived as an important predictor of leaders' entrepreneurship, this study investigates the impact of educational macro (autonomy and accountability) and micro (demographics) contexts on ELB by comparing centralised and decentralised European school systems with the highly centralised Greek school system. Design/methodology/approach: This comparative study was conducted in Greece (630 participants) and in 14 European countries (972 participants). Thornberry's Entrepreneurial Leadership Questionnaire was used, comprising general entrepreneurial leader (GEL), miner (MIN), accelerator (ACC), explorer (EXP) and integrator (INT) behaviours. Findings: The results revealed that ELB is a multi-dimensional concept, and that all participating teachers perceived ELB application moderately, with more focus on the internal (than external) school environment. Furthermore, the dual-directional macro-contextual influence found in applying ELB indicates that high school autonomy and accountability activate ELB owing to the school's freedom to engage in entrepreneurial ventures, while low autonomy/accountability still activates ELB, but only for organisational survival within hierarchical-bureaucratic school environments. This feature differentiates "intrapreneur/intrepreneur" from "entrepreneur" school principals. Originality/value: The theoretical basis of entrepreneurial leadership (EL) in education should include entrepreneurial multi-dimensional leadership aspects (competencies, behaviours, skills) and educational context (macro and micro). Implications for school leadership research and practice are also discussed.

As higher education quality assurance in many countries in Europe has become a mature activity, some agencies carrying out external quality assurance are developing beyond their core tasks and missions. The current study identifies new tasks taken up within quality assurance agencies and analyses the drivers behind such development. Based on an empirical investigation into six quality assurance agencies in Europe, the study finds that these agencies are still under substantial control of and influenced by national authorities--often resulting in new tasks and responsibilities that are added to older tasks and established responsibilities. The ongoing innovations can be characterized by two dynamics: 'bounded innovation' where new tasks and activities are induced by public authorities, and agency drift where agencies themselves redefine and expand existing tasks and activities. The developments also show a high degree of diversity, suggesting that mature quality assurance agencies do not develop on a convergent path.

Mental health literacy (MHL) encompasses understanding mental health and learning how to obtain and maintain good mental health. Increasing MHL may increase help-seeking behaviors and positive mental health. This study aimed to identify school-based MHL interventions for children/youth using a scoping review methodology following the Johanna Briggs Model. The interventions were assessed for quality of evidence using the National Institutes of Health Study Quality Assessment Tools. Six databases were searched: Scopus, APA PsycInfo, Cochrane Library, ERIC, PubMed, and ProQuest Psychology. Search terms included "mental health literacy," "intervention," and "children." The search yielded 27 studies after applying inclusion criteria. Eight of these studies were assessed as "poor" quality, twelve as "fair" quality, and seven as "good" quality. The results highlight the need for more research to implement and evaluate interventions to sustainably and feasibly incorporate school-based MHL interventions for children and youth into practice.

School-home communication is a growing research field in social sciences, particularly in education sciences and communication studies. While previous studies have paid much attention to the importance of school-home interaction in supporting primary academic socialisation and progress of elementary school pupils, the role of teacher-parent communication and collaboration in influencing the development of children's and adolescents' digital skills remains an under-researched area. This paper employed thematic analysis of in-depth interviews with education experts in six European countries, providing an insight into their opinions and views on the problems in communication between homes and schools. The analysis identified main problems in and obstacles to school-home collaboration on children's digital skills development, and the changes the COVID-19 pandemic brought along in this field of education. The paper provides five policy recommendations for enhancing school-home collaboration on digital skills development.

There is much anecdotal evidence of the benefits of fieldwork, but a small amount of research has been carried out on the value of fieldwork for student learning. Existing studies have focused on analysing fieldwork in mostly disciplinary and national contexts and the effects of interdisciplinary fieldwork on student learning have not been fully analysed. This paper aims to fill this gap by providing empirical evidence of the impact interdisciplinarity and internationality have on student learning while carrying out fieldwork. The case study consists of three field courses in Portugal in which biology, geography and geology students from Germany and Portugal took part. Based on a group interview with twelve students, their experiences, perceived learning outcomes and overall success of the fieldwork are evaluated. The results support the initial assumptions that interdisciplinary and international fieldwork adds value above and beyond the traditional field experience, and has a positive effect on the learning experience of the students. The students agree they have learned to better define their own study field and the interconnections with other disciplines. They also reported improved communication skills and methodological abilities and now feel better prepared to meet academic challenges and careers beyond campus.

In the long history of the Catholic school in Europe, it has taken various forms, linked to local cultures and to the history, particularly religious but also political, of each state. While it is possible to account for this diversity, it is also important to highlight common features and challenges, such as secularisation and globalisation, which question the identity of Catholic schools. It is by addressing these challenges that Catholic schools will maintain an original school model that inspires the public schools of the different educational systems present in Europe.

Purpose: Adapting the Health Promotion School (HPS) approach to context specifics is acknowledged as being essential for implementation and achieving optimal effectiveness. This study aims to explore implementation variations on seven HPS spectra (such as top-down to bottom-up involvement of stakeholders) on which implementation of the HPS approach can vary, and the factors that relate to navigation on these spectra. Design/methodology/approach: In 2020, fourteen HPS researchers and professionals from ten European countries participated in semi-structured interviews. Findings: Navigation variations on the HPS spectra occurred throughout most spectra. Further, a tendency was found towards spectrum extremes of addressing multiple core-components, implementing non-disruptive Health Promotion (HP) programmes, and evaluating the HPS approach through an action-oriented research approach. Important general factors were resources, staff capacity and time available to staff members for implementing the HPS approach. Some spectra required more specific factors like organisational skills, leadership or a certain level of democracy. Practical implications: The implementation of the HPS approach should be supported by implementation strategies addressing the spectrum-specific factors, but more generic factors such as staff capacity, resources and the level of democracy should also be considered. Originality/value: This study explores navigation variations throughout HPS spectra rather than the HPS approach in general. It also nuances implementation diversity across and within different European contexts.

Delivering a project has several challenges to be addressed, and to mitigate them, multiple approaches have arisen and suggested as best practices to stakeholders' satisfaction. This research presents a proposal to manage communication inside a virtual project team, adapting concepts from traditional and agile approaches into a hybrid framework, created using the action research spiral approach to evaluate the performance. It was possible to implement three action-research cycles, considering the spiral approach, starting will a diagnosis of the team, followed by action planning and implementation in a two month cycle, finishing with evaluation of the results and collection of feedbacks and potentials improvements. This paper describes all the process, tools and communication structure implemented in a product development project team of an industrial company for a period of six months. The results show that the team became project oriented, increasing trust among members and the alignment of dependencies between areas.