The benefits of a good education are numerous; it not only offers knowledge and power to individuals, but also enables them to lead the life they wish to; and to benefit both their own family and country. Education has a positive impact on the development of a country. An educated society can eradicate poverty, illiteracy and unemployment, and help in the improvement of the health care standards, the political structures, and the national productivity. The contribution of education in this development process is evident and easily recognized. Many studies show that investments in education generate benefits for people (private benefits) and society (social benefits), similar to those of the physical capital investments. Due to the important role that education plays in the development of human capital, in order to conduct the process of development in developing countries, to achieve their growth aims, significant attention should be placed on studying human capital investment accumulation through the means of the rate of return on education (RORE). So far, numerous economists and researchers have attempted to estimate the RORE for the purpose of observing the efficiency of educational spending and resource allocation (see Psacharopoulos, 1973, 1980, 1985, 1994, 2002, and 2004), in order to be able to analyse the output of the educational process on the economy. The estimation of the rate of return on education (RORE) can help in describing different phenomena, such as the following: employees of the public sector benefiting greatly from higher earnings as compared to the employees of the private sector working in the same capacity; the observed difference in the attendance between males and females to complete their education; the large demand for 'easy-discipline', 'aversion‘ (sub) specialties and the high rate of dropouts from school by males. The research problem of this thesis is that there has been a lack of information regarding estimating the RORE in high income petroleum-based developing countries, such as Kuwait, as most of the existing research has not accurately differentiated between low and high income developing nations. The aim of this research is to clarify the influencing variables and factors affecting the investment on education and their relationships by identifying these factors. This study endeavours to develop a framework based on the RORE model and to verify it by estimating the rate of return in high-income petroleum based economies in developing countries, and in this context, data is acquired from Kuwait to verify it, as a case study. The results of the employed regression model show positive and economically significant parameters for return on education and a negative return for extra years of experience. The estimated rate of return for females is relatively higher than males. The average estimated rate of return to education is 5.2%; with the estimated return for females being 6.7%; and for males 5.5%. On the other hand, by expanding the model to include the 'level of education‘ terms, the results show the highest return for primary education and lowest for intermediate and diploma education. Results indicate also that the highest rates of return on education for females occur in high school, whereas for males in bachelor-level higher education.

Voluntary aided schools exhibit a unique combination of characteristics including; responsibility for admissions, employment of staff (including the right to prioritise on the basis of faith), control of the RE curriculum, ownership of the premises, and funding from and being part of Local Authorities. This thesis investigates how headteachers of voluntary aided schools perceive their leadership role across the range of small/large, urban/rural and different faith schools of this type and whether they demonstrate similar leadership styles. The paradigmatic approach for this research is that of realism which acknowledges the benefit of both quantitative and qualitative data to generate a broad empirical picture of educational practices, patterns and institutional outcomes. This approach is particularly appropriate for this research as there is a real world of school regulations and requirements imposed externally by central and local government that affect how voluntary aided schools are organised. However, within schools it may be that individual perceptions and priorities distort the image of the external reality and affect how headteachers lead and manage their schools. Mixed methods were utilised comprising an on-line Likert-style questionnaire containing rating scales which provided the opportunity to determine quantitative frequencies and correlations. This was combined with open ended questions which provided the freedom to fuse measurement with opinions, quantity and quality. In addition, a purposive sample of 12 semi-structured interviews provided rich qualitative data conveying the views and perceptions of headteachers of voluntary aided schools in 12 different Local Authorities. This thesis has made a significant original contribution to the body of knowledge in this field by presenting an overview of the perceptions held by headteachers of 450 such schools throughout England (over 10% of the total number) from different phases of education, sizes of school, types of location and denominations. It has addressed the current gap in existing research, supported the findings of several previous smaller-scale studies, identified the distinctive ethos in voluntary aided schools, highlighted the pivotal role of personal faith for these headteachers, produced a new model of ‘ethotic leadership’ and presented suggestions for future research and training.

This thesis examines England’s academy schools policy by integrating interpretive policy analysis (IPA) with a critical approach to scale. The thesis begins with the observation that studies of policy have an underdeveloped conceptualisation of scale. The concept of scale used here refers to how the social world is perceived to be vertically ordered and is given labels such as the ‘local’, ‘national’ and ‘global’. Categories of scale have typically been used by policy actors and social scientists alike to describe, understand and analyse policy. Policy and scale are thus inextricably linked and this thesis seeks to study policy by critically engaging with scale and in this way develops a research focus that has been largely unexplored. The implementation studies literature is identified as being a particularly striking example of policy analysis which has tended to use categories of scale in an unquestioned manner. Implementation studies have a tradition of discussing ‘bottom-up’ or ‘top-down’ processes which reveal an analytical framework that assumes the existence of a scalar hierarchy. While the thesis supports the critiques of implementation studies made by scholars associated with IPA, it is argued that the interpretive critique has not been extended to the concept of scale. In order to address the problematic approach to scale in interpretive studies of policy this thesis examines how actors adopt ‘scalar practices’ in their policy work, which is consistent with the critical approach to scale that has been developed by post-structuralist human geographers. The latter group of scholars describe scalar practices as the way actors use categories of scale to interpret and strategically construct their social worlds. A focus on scalar practices allows for scale to be understood as an epistemological concept; this marks a departure from how social scientists have tended to use scalar categories to explain things with which has, in turn, problematically suggested that scale has an ontological existence. Education has been identified as an arena where representative struggles over scale come sharply into focus. The way in which education has been mobilised in relation to a wide range of scalar constructs such as the state, local authorities and a school’s catchment area, demonstrates how education is understood to be part of a political world which is ordered according to a vertical hierarchy of scales. This is particularly striking in the case of England’s academies policy. The official policy narrative of academies describes how a school converting to academy status becomes free from local authority control, becomes directly accountable to the state and gains greater levels of individual autonomy. It is thus a policy that is underpinned by distinctly scalar claims, making it a highly appropriate case study through which to explore the scalar practices of policy actors. The case study design of the research project focused on two local authorities and four academies within each of these. Interviews were carried out with local authority officers, academy sponsors, principals and chairs of governors. The study identifies how actors deploy four key scalar practices: constructing scalar boundaries, dissolving scalar boundaries, shifting between scales and emphasising the interconnectedness of scales. A theoretical approach called the practice of scalecraft is subsequently developed which not only focuses on the nature of scalar practices but also on what kinds of political concepts underpin these practices. The thesis concludes by suggesting that scalecraft can be used as a framework through which to incorporate a critical approach to scale in future interpretive studies of policy.

Since the implementation of the 2012 fee and funding regime in England, that notably increased the maximum undergraduate tuition fees to £9000, the focus of policymakers and those in the higher education sector has been on student participation rates. Thus, to date little is known about the extent to which the 2012 fee and funding changes have affected students’ higher education decision-making. The purpose of this research was to explore students’ study mode, subject and institution choices under the 2012 fee regime, with the aim of contributing new knowledge in this area. To this end, a comprehensive approach to mixed methods was used to generate quantitative and qualitative data on students’ decision-making (Hesse-Biber, 2010a). Two methods were used to generate the data, which were questionnaires completed by 550 students and follow-up interviews with a sub-sample of 30 students. The students, aged 17 to 21, were from six schools and colleges across Greater London and in the final year of their level 3 qualifications (NQF/QCF). The timing of the fieldwork was pivotal to the research and generated data at a specific moment in students’ decisionmaking, after they had submitted a UCAS application (January 2013) and prior to the publication of their level three qualifications (August 2013), which has provided new knowledge of students’ responses to the increased costs of higher education. Informed by Hodkinson and colleagues’ theory of pragmatically rational decision-making (Hodkinson, Sparkes and Hodkinson, 1996), this research provides evidence that the 2012 fee and funding regime has altered and constrained students’ higher education choices. In terms of students’ study mode choices, despite policymakers expectations of increased diversification, the traditional mode of three years of full-time study towards a bachelor degree qualification in a face-to-face teaching and learning environment remains as highly, if not more highly, favoured, with some students avoiding four year courses (typically sandwich courses) to minimise costs. Over half of the students in this research reconsidered and altered their subject choices to those they perceived as improving their graduate employability. This decision was taken by students to ensure that the costs of participating in higher education were beneficial to their future career. The increased costs of higher education has also caused students to live at home whilst studying to reduce their debt and expenses, which was a decision disproportionately made by black and minority ethnic students from all social classes. The findings from this research provide new insights into students’ decision-making that contrast with prior literature, particularly in relation to trends by social class (Bates, Pollard, Usher and Oakley, 2009; Callender and Jackson, 2008; Reay, David and Ball, 2005; Usher, Baldwin, Munro, Pollard and Sumption, 2010). The research argues that the 2012 fee and funding ‘reforms’ have been counterproductive; as opposed to putting financial power into the hands of learners” (BIS, 2010, p.5), the ‘reforms’ have disempowered students by limiting their choices to those that are perceived as affordable.