Faculty of Education - Theses
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ItemA philosophical analysis of the concept of education( 1989)The thesis critically examines some of the concepts involved In the elucidation of the concept of education developed by R.S. Peters who says that education Is a family of processes whose purposes are the development of desirable states of mind. In particular, it critically examines the concept of mind built into Peters' conception of education and argues that Peters is correct to imply that the mind cannot be reduced to brain states. Education, I .claim is a telological concept primarily concerned with the transmission of cultural values. The thesis begins by briefly looking at behaviourist views of mind, and introduces the Identity Theory as an attempt to provide a better explication of the nature of mind. Feigl's views on the nature of mind are examined, in particular, his attempted reduction of the mental to the physical. His rejection of the concept of emergence is challenged and what is meant by the reduction of one theory to another is elucidated. It is concluded that the mental cannot be reduced to the physical. The features of scientific explanation in general are explored. It Is found that scientific explanation is applicable largely in physical science contexts, and so is of limited use in explaining the concept of mind, and so the concept of education. Teleological explanations are examined, since it is apparent that education is a teleological explanation. The question of whether teleological explanations can be reduced to non-teleological explanations is considered. It is found that there are at least three forms of teleological explanation, (i) functional explanation, (ii) goal-directed explanation and (iii) purposive explanation. It is clear from an examination of these that education is explained in terms of purpose. An examination of the concept of intention and its relationship to action forms a major portion of the thesis. The problem of whether there can be several descriptions of one action is considered, as well as whether Intentions are entailed by desires. The relationship between actions and events is considered, discussing in particular the concept of cause. Five uses of the term "cause" are outlined. It is postulated that the causal power In agent causation is the "act of will", which forms part of the intention to act. The concept of a process, and some of the ways in which it may be defined, is examined. The concept of development is briefly considered in the light of the analysis of the concept of a process. It is concluded that education may be termed a super-process. As a process, education can never be completed, but continues throughout an Individual's life. The purposes of education and what might be meant by desirable states of mind are discussed. The primary purpose of education, it is asserted, is the imparting of values. The question of who decides what states of mind might be termed desirable is considered and it is concluded that it is society, or the community who decide what values are to be imparted.
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ItemSkilling the Australian community: futures for public education: a public sector perspective( 1989)On November 4th, 1987 a group of public sector representatives met at the University of Melbourne to consider the skills that those entering the public sector required from the public education system. However, the initial debate centred on what was perceived as a fundamental difference between private sector and public sector purposes. After an introductory chapter and the study methodology chapter, the essence of this initial debate is outlined in Chapter Three. This is followed in Chapter Four by the representative group's list of skills and requirements for those entering the public sector. The curriculum and contextual implications associated with this list are then discussed in Chapter Five. Chapter Six is a scenario about the impact on the public education system and youth policy that any resulting changes may have had by the year 1998. Chapter Seven concludes this study with some comments about the possible future problems facing education as the twenty-first century approaches.
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ItemPrivate schools, impact assessment and the regulatory regime of federal state aid( 1989)This work addresses a particular aspect of Commonwealth Government education funding policy emergent in the post-Kamel era -- the attitude of successive governments in the .1970s and 1980s to the funding of new non-government schools and to the expansion of the non-government schools sector. It traces in particular the emergence of the notion of "impact", which entailed a concession that the establishment of a new non-government school could adversely affect education services offered by neighbouring schools. Incorporation of impact provisions into formal government guidelines for funding of new non-government schools after 1983 represented one of the more important differences between Hawke Government education policies and those of the former Coalition Government. It is my contention that a focus on this relatively limited policy area maps out a site of intersection of government and non-government school sectors that is comparatively rare in recent documentation of education policy development. The impact policy serves to illustrate the potential friction and abrasiveness involved in the relations between the two sectors; at the same time it can be shown to have contributed itself to the construction of a relationship between the sectors which has gone largely under-scrutinised in past studies of dual sector education provision in Australia.(From Introduction)