Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book shows how higher education expansion has been taking place especially in the exponential growth of the private sector and how this affects the teacher education programs there. It provides a close analysis of developments in Australian teacher education policy. The book examines teacher education regulations in Chile, and Andrea Lira and M. Beatriz Fernandez analyzes how these effectively reduce teachers to technicians by using student achievement on standardized tests as the measure of concern. It explores how teachers in Japan employ their identities as "learning professionals" to modify and resist neoliberal and neoconservative policies in teacher training reforms. The book outlines both the great diversity and great chasms of educational equity faced by educators in India. It also outlines the selective nature of the concept of the "common good".