124 CJHE / RCES Volume 38, No. 1, 2008 Fraser, Kym. (Ed.) (2005) Education Development and Leadership in Higher Education: Developing an effective institutional strategy. RoutledgeFalmer: New York. Pages: 240. Price: 49.95 USD (paper). Reviewed by Joy Mighty, Professor and Director, Centre for Teaching and Learning, Queen’s University. This book focuses on the central role that educational development can play in the effectiveness of higher education institutions. Edited by Kym Fraser, it describes the wide range of strategies, structures and processes in the practice of educational development in a variety of university settings in several countries, primarily in the United Kingdom and Australia, and suggests how decision-makers may use insights provided by research in educational development to develop institutional strategies to help address the increasingly complex issues in higher education. In the first chapter, Peter Ling provides an overview of the numerous challenges facing most institutions in the twenty-first century, including the massification and globalization of higher education, an increasing demand for the public accountability of universities that has led to a range of quality assurance systems, and the changing nature of institutions themselves with technological developments influencing their roles, structures, delivery modes and outcomes. Within this diversity of the context of higher education, the field of educational development focuses on creating environments that facilitate teaching and learning. Ling outlines three broad approaches to educational development. The oldest approach has a teaching orientation and focuses on providing teaching tips and strategies. By contrast, learning-oriented approaches to educational development focus on what the learner does rather than what the teacher does, and are based on research on how students learn. More recent approaches to educational development are strategic in orientation in that they are aligned with institutions’ mission statements and strategic plans, and are often driven by demands for public accountability for the quality of higher education. This chapter provides a unifying conceptual framework for the rest of the book and the remaining chapters further explore these issues, providing case studies and data from other research to illustrate the diverse approaches outlined by Ling. Chapters 2 and 3 describe different educational development contexts. Chapter 2 provides a historical overview of the context in the UK and the role of the government and other national organizations in enhancing the quality of teaching and learning in higher education. While acknowledging that the initiatives, and particularly the funding, provided by such agencies and organizations have raised the profile of teaching and learning in UK education, author Brenda Smith provides insufficient evaluation of these initiatives, reducing the chapter’s value for other contexts. By contrast, Chapter 3 is particularly useful for helping other educational developers address the challenges of getting faculty to take ownership for ensuring quality. Describing collaborative, team- Book Reviews / Comptes rendus 125 based approaches they have used in trying to transform teaching and learning through curriculum change at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT) University in Australia, Kate Patrick and Robyn Lines emphasize the need for committed leadership within departments and faculties. Chapters 4 and 5 respectively describe centralized and decentralized approaches to locating educational development within institutions. In Chapter 4, Denise Chalmers and Mia O’Brien describe the role of centralized units as collaborative engagement with multiple communities within the institution, with a focus on developing both teaching and the various environments in which it occurs. In Chapter 5, Alex Radloff uses a case study to explore the challenges of decentralized approaches to educational development. An important issue identified is building an individual academic unit’s capacity for program development and renewal within the context of an institution’s quality assurance framework. As with Chapter 2, there is no evaluation of the approaches described and Radloff acknowledges that, in the final analysis, some combination of centralized and decentralized approaches might be most effective. The remaining chapters (6 to 11) describe different strategies and processes used in educational development practice. Chapter 6, for example, explores issues of leadership in educational development. Drawing on several models of change management and grounding their ideas in a case study, authors Margot Pearson and Chris Trevitt discuss the importance of building capacity by sharing leadership and actively engaging faculty in the change process. In Chapter 7, Carmel McNaught uses two case studies to illustrate strategies and processes for integrating an institution’s information technology infrastructure and policies with teaching and learning principles. Kym Fraser and Ellen Sanders, in Chapter 8, demonstrate through a case study how educational development can help faculty facilitate the learning of students with disabilities. Chapter 9 identifies issues in providing programs for Graduate Certificates in Higher Education (GCHEs). The author, Kym Fraser, argues that in developing such programs educational developers should focus on the discipline of teaching and learning in higher education and consider participants’ disciplinary and local contexts, the stages of their teaching career, and their institutional structures. In Chapter 10, Bob Matthew and Ray Land draw on their own experiences to discuss educational development lessons learned through Scottish-, English-, and European-funded projects. They emphasize the importance of funding agencies and developers reaching consensus about the purpose and direction of the project at the beginning, and clarifying the theoretical perspectives and conceptual frameworks underlying the educational development approach taken in the project. In the concluding chapter, Yoni Ryan, Kym Fraser, and John Dearn suggest that, given the different contexts of higher education described by Ling in the first chapter, the professionalization of university teaching is urgently needed. However, after drawing on focus group data from a study that found mixed attitudes of Australian faculty towards such professionalization, the authors conclude that it is unlikely to occur unless an international body such as UNESCO acts as a “super-accreditation body for national schemes” (p.196). 126 CJHE / RCES Volume 38, No. 1, 2008 This book presents a very good overview of the multifaceted and complex nature of educational development work. One of its strengths is the structural coherence achieved by identifying in Chapter One the major themes that are more fully developed in subsequent chapters whose authors effectively crossreference each other’s chapters to support their own ideas. Despite such coherence, the quality of the writing is somewhat uneven, and a few chapters could have benefited from further development or editing. On the whole, however, the significance of the book’s content far outweighs the language limitations of a few individual chapters. The authors draw on their wide range of experiences as educational developers to discuss an equally wide range of issues which appear to be universal. In addition, the extensive use of case studies throughout the book adds authenticity to the complex issues discussed and allows readers to envisage how they might apply the lessons from the cases to their own contexts. The inclusion of numerous website addresses as additional resources for the reader further enhances the book’s usefulness and is consistent with the sharing, collaborative culture of the educational development community across the globe. In this regard, it is somewhat surprising that North American perspectives and experiences are largely missing from this book which emphasizes the globalization of higher education and its implications for educational development. Yet, both Canada and the USA are known to have a long, reputable history of distinguished leadership in the educational development field and the inclusion of experiences from their contexts might have further enhanced the book’s global appeal. In the final analysis, however, the key messages of this book will be appealing and useful to decision-makers at every level in institutions of higher education, wherever they may be located. Carroll, J., & Ryan, J. (Eds.) (2005) Teaching international students: Improving learning for all. Routledge: New York. Pages: 168. Price: 46.95 USD (paper). Reviewed by Carl E. James, York University Teaching international students: Improving learning for all is a collection of essays that draws on the experiences of scholars and teachers who have worked with international students in countries such as the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, the United States, Japan and Azerbaijan. Noting that “higher education (HE) institutions in English-speaking countries now contain a more socially and culturally diverse student population than ever before, including increasing numbers of international students” (p. 3), Janette Ryan and Jude Carroll attempt to address the problems, challenges, pressures and struggles faced by teachers (and students) and the changes that result. “The book,” Ryan and Carroll write, “explores these dilemmas and attempts to offer suggestions for new paradigms and new solutions” (p. 9). “International students” are understood to be “students who have chosen to travel to another country for tertiary study. . ., [and whose] previous experience will have been of