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This research seeks to understand the current educational vision of the Marist Brothers' Teaching congregation, a Catholic religious order founded by Marcellin Chainpagnat in rural France in 1817 which currently has 5,000 Brothers educating young people in 76 countries. The Congregation is conceptualised as a charismatic social movement Using case study methodology, it is investigated as a single bounded system comprising many sub-systems, namely its individual school communities, which can be studied both as interesting in themselves and as leading to a significant measure of understanding of the overall system. The work of Marist Brothers in three schools in three continents is studied in detail. Marceilin College, Melbourne, St Mungo's Academy, Glasgow and Archbishop Molloy High School, New York. Interviews, document analyses and observations are carried out over a two year period, from 1990 to 1992. Theory contributes to the research, first, through an appropriation and adaptation of Max Weber's sociology of charismatic authority, second, through a study of the self understanding of religious congregations as reflected in and influenced by the current theology of religious life, and third, through brief analyses of some educational social movements with a claim to be charismatic, in particular the United World Colleges and the Society of Jesus. With the data from the three case study schools collected and analysed, initii1 research findings were sent to Marist educators in eight further schools in seven different countries. These educators affirmed those findings which coincided with their experience of Marist educational vision and added other findings based on their current work. Some theoretical conclusions are drawn about the fruitfulness of bringing the theological and sociological literatures on charisma into relationship with each other. A series of more practical conclusions relates to the nature of Marist educational vision, the possibility of pursuing this vision with different levels of contribution in terms of numbers and roles of Brothers in a school, of the relationship of Brothers to lay staff in Marist schools, and the process of school self-definition of educational vision.

This study investigates current teaching practice of the classroom religion program in two preschool settings in the Archdiocese of Brisbane. It also examines the approach to, and construction of, religious education in key Church and Brisbane Archdiocesan documents. Since the first Catholic school opened in Australia in 1820, research and scholarship have elucidated deeper understandings of the nature and purpose of religious education. Over time, a variety of approaches and curriculum models for the classroom religion program have been implemented in both primary and secondary schools. Broadly speaking there are two approaches to the Catholic primary school classroom religion program: educational and catechetical. The educational approach does not presume students' faith, and aims to develop students' religious literacy. The catechetical presumes student faith and aims to develop it. Currently, the Brisbane Catholic Education Religious Education Guidelines (Barry & Brennan, 1997a, 1997b; Barry et al., 2003) adopts an educational approach to the classroom religion program. However, while the approach to religious education in Catholic primary and secondary schools has received scholarly and professional attention over the years, the nature and purpose of religious education in early childhood education in the context of the Catholic preschool, have received minimal attention. Although the first preschools in Catholic schools in the Brisbane Archdiocese opened in 1988, there is no set curriculum for the classroom religion program for the preschool sector. However, Brisbane Catholic Education is presently preparing such a document in preparation for the introduction of the preparatory year of schooling into all Archdiocesan Catholic schools in 2007. The specific focus of the study is to use teachers' talk-in-interaction with their students during classroom religion lessons, as a means to exemplify their approaches to, and constructions of, their classroom religion programs. Underpinned by an Ethnomethodological methodology, the study gathered data in the form of lesson recordings from two preschool teachers. The lesson transcripts are analysed using the ethnomethodological analytic tools of Conversation Analysis and Membership Categorisation Analysis. These analyses reveal deep insights into teachers' practices: the nature of the content they present, their approaches to, and constructions of, their religion programs, as well as the ways in which they construct their students. In addition to classroom practice, this study also investigates relevant sections of the key Church documents The Religious Dimension of Education in a Catholic School (Congregation for Catholic Education, 1988) and the General Directory of Catechesis (Congregation for the Clergy, 1997), as well as the Archdiocese of Brisbane Catholic Education document, 'Religious Education in Preschools', which is part of the Preschool Handbook: Towards Continuity of Learning in the Early Years (Catholic Education Archdiocese of Brisbane, 2002b). Together with the Ethnomethodological methodology, this part of the investigation adopts a functional linguistic methodology using the analytic technique, Systemic Functional Linguistics. Both Systemic Functional Linguistics and Membership Categorisation Analysis are used to explicate these documents. The two Church documents are critical documents, as they contribute to curriculum development and implementation of the classroom religion program in all Australian Catholic schools, whilst the Brisbane document outlines the current policy for religious education in Catholic preschools in the Archdiocese. These analyses elucidate key insights into how the classroom religion program is approached, and reveal that whilst the Church documents maintain an educational approach, aspects of the documents are ambiguous. Analysis of the Brisbane Archdiocesan preschool document reveal it to be at variance with the current educational approach taken by the Archdiocese in its classroom religion curriculum for primary and secondary schools. This study contributes significantly to the nature and purpose of religious education in the early years. It has implications for the theory and practice of the classroom religion program in early childhood, and for preservice and inservice teacher education programs. It also contributes to policy design that guides and shapes curriculum development and implementation. The use of analytic techniques drawn from two different methodologies, Ethnomethodology and functional linguistics, enables a detailed and in-depth analysis, showing them to be effective techniques to be used together in research. These methodologies complement each other to reveal critical insights into both the document studies and teacher classroom interaction. The nature and purpose of religious education in early childhood education is evolving. As Catholic dioceses continue to expand into early childhood education, the focus on religious education in this sector becomes more critical. This study provides a significant foundation for future research.

Catholic schools in Australia, which educate about twenty per cent of the Australian school-going population, are private-sector schools. As such, they are substantially funded by a combination of grants from State and Commonwealth sources but have chosen to compensate for shortfalls in their operational expenses by charging fees. Successive Australian governments have for the past quarter of a century provided largely bipartisan support for the public funding of Catholic schools in Australia, yet the policy contexts in which this support has been given vary markedly. Prior to that, Catholic and other denominational schools were largely unfunded by the state, resulting in the near collapse of most non- Catholic denominational schools, when the Australian state entered the schools provision sphere in the last quarter of the nineteenth century. Catholic schools survived and prospered during the ensuing century largely by importing many thousands of teaching religious, principally from Ireland, but the strain began to show after the Second World War, when Australia embarked on a major expansion of its immigration program, and religious vocations from Ireland and elsewhere began to decline. The Australian Labor Party, for all kinds of socio-cultural reasons the major representative at the time of Catholic political interests, but split on the issue of state-aid, was keen to rebuild party unity and saw the public funding of non-government schools as the key to creating a dual system of education to meet Australia's schooling needs. It succeeded in doing this and in transporting itself to government by the pragmatic overcoming of the split and through a commitment to funding all Australian schools on a needs basis. Since the mid-seventies non-government schools have been the beneficiaries of a general resolution to the state-aid debate that has seen relatively little difference between both sides of politics on schools-funding matters and which has kept state-aid off the agenda of hitherto intractable political problems. However, recent trends in funding policy, vigorously driven by the Commonwealth Coalition government after 1996, with its pursuit of market-oriented policies in key social and economic areas, have fuelled the rapid deregulation of the Australian educational environment, starting with the rationalising of funds for government and non-government schools. At the forefront of such change, Catholic schools were regarded by the former Commonwealth Education Minister, Dr Kemp, as models of the future provision of Australian schooling, and as an example of the mutual obligation of the public and private sectors in relation to the provision of essential social goods and services. Catholic Education in Australia must therefore serve two political masters for quite distinctive and different reasons, viz. the Common or Public Good on the one hand, and the notion of parental or private choice on the other. The notion of the Common Good is the most central and fundamental element in Catholic Social Teaching, adjuring Roman Catholics to move beyond a morality that is purely personal to include the social and structural dimensions of public life. Will it be possible for Catholic Education to reconcile these two evidently mutually exclusive principles, while striving to meet its own commitments to bridging the gap between funding and costs with fees in the additional context of maintaining its mission to make its schools accessible to all Catholics? Thus, Catholic schools in Australia find themselves a century or so after the cessation of state aid, and twenty-five years after its recommencement, at yet another crossroads, with a multiplicity of new factors to consider in terms of funding policy. This thesis researches one way in which this multiplicity of apparently contradictory and mutually exclusive imperatives may agreeably be met in order to ensure the long-term viability of Catholic schools in Australia. It does so by investigating the proposal of the late Mr George Berkeley, a former Director- General of Education in Queensland, in his report on non-government schools in the Australian Capital Territory, which reads as follows: In the longer term consideration needs to be given to some breaking down of the current dual system of government and non-government schools, and to the possible integration of non-government schools (particularly those serving similar populations as government schools) with government schools while still allowing the non-government schools to retain the important aspects of their special character. (Report to the Minister for Education and Training on Needs Based Funding for ACT Non-Government Schools, 1992) The fact that virtually no consideration was given to this proposal, and that the Working Party set up to consider the Berkeley Report unreservedly agreed on all of Berkeley's other proposals, highlights two important anomalies that inhibit the development of state-aid policy in Australia, and which George Berkeley by his own admission was seeking to rectify once and for all. The first is to do with the enormously bifurcated (in terms of source) complexity of the schools-funding arrangement in Australia, in which the States provide most of the funding for government schools, and the Commonwealth most of the funding for non-government schools, thus making comparability of figures slippery and a cause for confusion and potential misinterpretation and division by government and non-government school lobbies alike. The second, connected with the first, derives from Berkeley's eagerness as a practising Catholic and a Director-General of Queensland Education to remove inter-sectoral disputes, and the potential for them especially before elections to become standard occurrences in the political and electioneering landscape of Australia. While it could be argued that Berkeley stepped outside his terms of reference in bringing down his Report, his recommendation, particularly in relation to such a senior and experienced educational administrator to consider the integration model of schools, now well-established in New Zealand, could not be dismissed as easily as it had been by the working party set up to receive his Report and comment on it. Accordingly, as part of the research reported here, I travelled to New Zealand to examine in detail the conditions under which non-government schools in general and Roman Catholic schools in particular had been brought into the public sector in 1975 under a special agreement covered by an Act of Integration, which, among other things, protected the special character of each school, and to assess how that arrangement had worked. From this core of information, I developed a series of categories of description, both positive as well as negative, in relation to responses to integrated schools that were put to a variety of persons critically influential in the schools-funding debate in Australia. Whereas initially there had been little or no interest, or otherwise hostility, engendered by the very idea of opening up discussion on a new mode of funding schools in Australia, this new approach, validated by the phenomenographic research method, was able to generate a considerable body of reason and opinion, initially in relation to why participants were so opposed to the idea of integration. Such a strategy enabled me to address through the subdiscipline of Policy Sociology some of the deepest and most heartfelt misgivings of participants in relation to the integration proposal and, in addressing each one of them, to arrive at a series of proposals which would satisfy and eliminate such misgivings, should the general consensus about current ways of funding school education in Australia collapse or in some other way be found to be deficient. The opportunity or danger of such a thing happening has emerged through dramatic recent changes to the mechanism of funding government and non-government schools by the Commonwealth government, called the Enrolment Benchmark Adjustment or EBA, and which in effect has introduced an opportunity-cost factor to rationalise and follow the steady stream of school students away from the government and into the private sector. Additionally, the Commonwealth Coalition government has changed the basis of Commonwealth needs-based funding of non-government schools to exclude private resources as a basis of funding, thus advantaging a category of elite schools hitherto ineligible to receive substantial public subsidies. Meanwhile Australian private schools, an increasing percentage of them new non-Catholic providers, now educate more than thirty percent of Australians as opposed to twenty percent a decade ago, fewer Catholics than ever before attend Catholic schools, and State governments, such as New South Wales, committed to preserving the quality of government schools, which are a ‘States’ right constitutionally, have cut their proportion of subsidies to the wealthier non-government schools in an act of evident retaliation. This development points to the reopening of the state-aid debate, the collapse of a bipartisan schools funding policy, and the need to review the assumptions on which state-aid to Catholic schools, at the very least, was commenced a quarter century ago. As a resolution to this problem, this thesis argues for the incorporation of Catholic systemic schools into an expanded and deregulated Australian educational public sector, as in New Zealand, and addresses in detail, some of the political and constitutional difficulties in doing so.

Current research and anecdotal evidence has suggested that students enrolled in the QSA (Queensland Studies Authority) subject for Year 11 and Year 12, Study of Religion, as outlined in the Senior Syllabus for Study of Religion, are experiencing difficulties in meaning-making. This may be due to particular methodologies being employed to teach the subject to secondary students (Barnes, 2001; Flood, 1999; Kay, 1997). The purpose of this research was to explore the connection between student difficulty in meaning making in Study of Religion and the employment of phenomenological methodologies as a pedagogical tool for teaching Study of Religion. It was anticipated that this study would illuminate the nature of the relationship between these two variables and provide a framework for the consideration of possible changes to current methodologies being employed in the Study of Religion classroom. The researcher adopted a case-study approach and further utilized the research methods of a survey questionnaire and a focus group to collect data. A cross-sectional survey at a Catholic co-educational College was completed. Forty-five students from a Study of Religion cohort totalling ninety were surveyed at this College. This was followed up by a focus group discussion involving five of the original forty-five students surveyed. The participants furnished a range of valuable insights in regard to the connection between student difficulty in meaning-making and the employment of largely phenomenological methodologies in teaching Study of Religion. Data analysis revealed that students enrolled in Study of Religion in Year 12 are struggling to construct meaning when phenomenological methodologies are predominantly employed. This is arguably a result of phenomenological methodologies having their provenance within a modernist paradigm. Consequently, methodologies that once assisted students to make meaning effectively in a modern context are unable to continue to do so in a post-modern context. This may be due to paradigmatic shifts in Education, Philosophy and Religious Studies.

In light of the challenges faced by post-modern principals, and the changes in the Catholic Church and in Catholic education, this study aimed to analyse and identify the work of the principal in a Catholic school in the late 1990s. This meant examining the perceptions of the principal's work as identified by principals themselves, and those key players who work with them in Catholic schools. The study identified the key behaviours of principals in Catholic schools, and the factors that tend to enhance or inhibit their work. In the initial phase of the research, the instrument used in the study was a self administered questionnaire that consisted of 123 key behaviours which respondents were asked to rate according to degree of importance. The second instrument used was a semi-structured interview with a sample of principals. This methodology was designed as a further check on reliability and validity of the questionnaire. It was apparent from this research that in the late 1990s, it was essential that the principal in a Catholic school be committed to creating an authentic Catholic school where a climate of care prevailed, and where respect and privacy for families was upheld. The principal must be committed to whole school philosophy, orientated toward servant leadership, and able to articulate and bring into practice the ethos of a Catholic school. As well, the study showed that it was crucial for the Catholic school principal to ensure appropriate staffing, and that an atmosphere of co-operation and communication existed within the school community. In developing policies that incorporated the ideals of the Vision Statement, the study suggests that the Catholic school principal ensured that excellence in all areas of human growth is treasured. Bearing in mind that each participating group indicated different priorities, support for the principal and the development of skills, is essential for their work to be effective in Catholic schools of the new millennium.

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento CientÃfico e TecnolÃgico / Esta dissertaÃÃo dialoga com os domÃnios epistemolÃgicos da EducaÃÃo Comparada e HistÃria da EducaÃÃo. Trata da TransiÃÃo para e ConsolidaÃÃo do ensino misto confessional no ColÃgio Salesiano de Juazeiro do Norte â CearÃ, destacando o perÃodo de 1970 a 1985. Parte da anÃlise dos fluxos discursivos entre Dom Bosco â fundador do Sistema Preventivo na ItÃlia â e Padre CÃcero â primeiro interessado pela implantaÃÃo da Pedagogia Salesiana em Juazeiro do Norte. Enfatiza a operacionalizaÃÃo das prÃticas pedagÃgicas dos Salesianos imigrantes, nos primeiros anos de atuaÃÃo no referido municÃpio. Em seguida, toma como foco a transiÃÃo do ensino confessional masculino para o ensino misto confessional. Para isso, destaca o processo de feminizaÃÃo do magistÃrio, a atuaÃÃo dos padres-professores e a ideia de uma âpedagogia da igualdadeâ direcionada e executada por distintos sexos/gÃneros. Ressalta os dilemas da educaÃÃo catÃlica, no contexto investigado e a aÃÃo pedagÃgica dos Salesianos, demonstrando a existÃncia de performatividades (des) generificadas no cotidiano escolar. A fim de entender como o Sistema Preventivo buscou reproduzir sujeitos para alÃm dos muros institucionais, discorre sobre o Regime Militar e a Pastoral da Juventude, vendo-os como pontos basilares para a consolidaÃÃo do ensino misto confessional na realidade do municÃpio. Antes de finalizar, dialoga com as noÃÃes de vigilÃncia preventiva e a urgÃncia da coeducaÃÃo salesiana, deixando questionamentos em aberto. Evidencia que, para a conduÃÃo desta investigaÃÃo, foi de suma importÃncia à abordagem interdisciplinar, a leitura da historiografia consultada, alÃm das crÃnicas da casa, regulamentos, relatÃrios anuais, circulares e subsÃdios preservados no arquivo escolar salesiano, bem como quatro entrevistas com ex-alunos e ex-alunas (atuais funcionÃrias) da referida instituiÃÃo. Como resultado, apresenta um conjunto de evidÃncias de que o projeto educacional do Padre CÃcero, isto Ã, a atuaÃÃo dos Salesianos em Juazeiro do Norte, foi aceito pela populaÃÃo local, a qual via na educaÃÃo escolar um caminho para o progresso e civilidade do municÃpio. Na transiÃÃo para o ensino misto confessional, o processo foi amistoso, embora tenha despertado uma sÃrie de ressignificaÃÃes de sentidos no cotidiano pedagÃgico. A condiÃÃo juvenil e as performatividades de gÃnero foram mantidas. O sexo visto como natural e ligado à anatomia fÃsica. A juventude, dependendo da situaÃÃo, discursada com enunciados positivos ou negativos. Em busca da desnaturalizaÃÃo da vida, dos sexos, gÃneros e idades, esta dissertaÃÃo encerra com alguns questionamentos sobre a coeducaÃÃo nas instituiÃÃes ligadas à Igreja CatÃlica, buscando despertar reflexÃes e futuros estudos.

AIMS:The project examines the perceptions of significant stakeholders in the Catholic Education system concerning the nature, outcomes and effectiveness of the implementation of the Quality Assurance Processes developed by the Catholic Education Office (CEO), in the Archdiocese of Sydney. The study identifies factors that were assisting or hindering the effective implementation of these processes as they existed in 1996. It offers suggestions and recommendations for a future and more effective implementation of these processes. SCOPE This research is qualitative in nature, and uses interview as the main source of data collection. The Catholic schools selected for this study are those that have been involved in the implementation of the first Cycle of the Quality Assurance Processes of the CEO, Sydney. Care was taken to select two schools from each of the three Regions under which the Catholic schools in the Archdiocese of Sydney are presently organised. CONCLUSIONS The achievement and maintenance of quality outcomes has always been an integral part of Catholic Education. Through the brief historical background, this study has revealed that leaders in Catholic Education in Sydney have always sought to achieve and maintain quality outcomes since the establishment of the first schools, up until the implementation of the current quality assurance processes. This study found that the current form of Quality Assurance Processes is a most effective means of achieving and maintaining quality outcomes in the present-day Catholic education system. The Processes are professionally articulated in context with current practices, and have the potential to enhance accountability, credibility and development of both the personnel and the schools system. The implementation of the Quality Assurance Processes, to a great degree, has been effective and successful, the present study has shown that, stakeholders are becoming more and more aware of the actual nature and outcomes of these processes. The study also found great optimism among in the key player about the future of the Processes and has concluded that they well received and appreciated across the system. There were a few concerns about the clarity of aims and objectivity, the link between the different processes, and the apparently high and technical terms involved in naming/describing these Processes. The study has, therefore, concluded further that the Processes need streamlining, regular reviews and training programs to strengthen the practice and consolidate the gains and achievement. The implementation of Cycle 2 with appropriate modification is desirable.

Thesis advisor: Dennis Shirley / This dissertation is a conceptual study of Catholic education as a distinctive approach for learning in elementary and secondary Catholic schools. It draws upon the academic disciplines of philosophy, theology, and education to construct a theory of pedagogy that attends to and faithfully reflects the particular beliefs and aspirations of Catholic education. The opening historical analysis describes significant changes to the US Catholic school landscape, including the ways in which Catholic education is defined and accounted for in the life of the school. This analysis is widened to explore the claim that there is no adequate definition of Catholic education today. Together, these observations reveal an urgent need for new theories to realize the core mission of Catholic education. Toward this end, I develop a conceptual framework for Catholic education interbraiding Christian anthropology—emphasizing the themes of imago Dei, relationship, and grace—relevant Church documents authored by the Congregation of Catholic Education, and the pedagogical theory of Bernstein (1990, 2000). I employ this framework to construct a new pedagogical theory for Catholic education. The theory explores the identity of the person as both a knower and a learner. Bernstein’s (2000) concepts of classification and framing are used to articulate the distinctively Catholic qualities of the pedagogy. The pedagogical discourse features three dynamic movements: composition, juxtaposition, and transposition. Each movement consists of practical and spiritual considerations that, over time, foster learning and strengthen relationships. These outcomes, or text (Bernstein, 2000), create the conditions for deepening the dispositions of discipleship while allowing persons an essential way to participate in the flourishing and fullness of each other’s lives in the realm of God’s grace. The final segment of the dissertation explores the ways in which the instructional model, tutoría, appropriates the new pedagogical theory for Catholic education. I trace the evolution of tutoría and highlight the experiences of students and educators who are implementing the model in four schools in Chile. The dissertation concludes with a discussion on the value of the new pedagogical theory for Catholic schools globally. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2021. / Submitted to: Boston College. Lynch School of Education. / Discipline: Teacher Education, Special Education, Curriculum and Instruction.

Although Catholic schools are the largest sector of the national private and faith-based educational market, the overall student enrollment in Catholic K-12 schools has steadily declined. In order for Catholic schools to remain sustainable and competitive among the many different educational options in the twenty-first century, they must set themselves apart from other schools by offering unique learning opportunities that support twenty-first century education while promoting Catholic educational values. Recognizing the need for updated teaching practices, balanced pedagogy with Catholic educational values, and focused research on Catholic education, this two-year multiple-case study explored the instructional practices of eight middle level Catholic teachers during an initiative focused on shifting instructional strategies to support twenty-first century education supported by educational technology integration. Teaching practices were documented through participant observations, interviews, survey, and historical and field evidence. Data illuminated much variability in teachers' interpretations of twenty-first century education, classroom practice, and levels of technology integration. All teachers encouraged creativity, critical thinking, communication and collaboration in their instruction, however these specific domains of learning were primarily supported through an emphasis on lower order cognitive skills and processes. Although evidence suggested consistent technology integration in classrooms, technology was primarily used to substitute or augment instruction as opposed to the transformation of teaching and learning to support twenty-first century education. Data also revealed a balance between Catholic educational values and new teaching pedagogies except in Religion classes or instruction. This finding suggested content subject culture was a confounding aspect to instructional practices. This study highlights suggestions for teacher practice that include rethinking the purpose and structure of assessment, balancing personal opinions of technology with twenty-first century instruction, and shifting teacher-student classroom roles to foster teaching and learning environments that support creativity. Furthermore, additional implications for teachers and policy makers center on collaboration as a model for student learning, and to promote a shared vision for Catholic education in the twenty-first century. The implications for future research focus on expanding the study to include school level influencing factors and participants, centering on Religion class as the context, and the inclusion of students' perspectives.