The article addresses the funding of higher education in a period when there is increased pressure on governments to reduce their funding support to higher education, and on universities to become more creative in expanding their own sources of funding. The article demonstrates that universities have and will continue to benefit from the combined private and public approaches to the funding of higher education, with cost sharing being the philosophical base of this model.

Science syllabuses, standardized examinations, and teacher content knowledge are critical to the development of scientific literacy. In this study, we quantify the presence of biological evolution in the Caribbean Secondary Examinations Certificate (CSEC) biology syllabus and examinations as well as evaluate the level of evolutionary knowledge held by teachers in the country of Belize. Analyses of the biology syllabus (2002) and the 2005–2012 examinations suggest that biological evolution plays a minimal role at the secondary level in the Caribbean.

Previous studies have identified sociocultural factors as one set of classroom variables impacting students’ performance in science. In this study, Jamaican grade 12 students’ perceptions of the sociocultural environment of their chemistry classes were measured, using a modified version of the Sociocultural Environment Scale (SCES) developed by Jegede and Okebukola (1988). The six sociocultural factors explored in this study are: authoritarianism, goal structure, traditional cosmology, societal expectations, sacredness of science and language.

This paper examines the philosophical underpinnings of the call for reforming the financing of higher education from the perspective of higher education administrators, politicians, and students. It argues that there are three underpinnings associated with the call: the entrepreneurial thrust, as well as the financing, and the resource allocation underpinnings. It then uses the experiences of some universities to point out challenges faced by Caribbean higher education institutions in their quest to reform. It also suggests actions that may be taken to combat the challenges.

This paper presents an overview of the model of quality assurance at The University of the West Indies (UWI) as developed by the Office of the Board for Undergraduate Studies (OBUS). “Fitness for purpose” is the definition of quality that informs the articulation and operationalization of the UWI model, and the authors engage in a critical examination of the processes involved. These processes include self-assessment, peer review, and site visits, and the follow-up of the recommendations of review reports.

Higher education has been positioned as an important contributor to development in low-income countries in the context of the knowledge economy. This paper assesses the potential for building sustainable higher education systems that can contribute to development in low-income countries. The premise of this paper is that developing countries cannot be researched in isolation. The intensification of higher education relationships across national borders means that developments

This article examines the role of facilities management in ensuring the sustainability of higher education institutions, with particular reference to ecological sustainable development (ESD). It describes an ESD model, developed by the Tertiary Education Facilities Management Association, for incorporating sustainability into facilities management, and recommends the adoption of such a model by Caribbean higher education institutions.

The industrial world has moved away from its exclusive emphasis on the manufacture of goods and services to an era of knowledge creation and application of information. This paper therefore posits that if the objective of higher education is to effectively and efficiently transfer the competencies, atitudes, and behaviour required for citizens to secure employment and satisfy the needs or demands of industry, then higher education has a role in the fostering of innovation.

The rapid dissemination of digital technology has fundamentally changed our students in the Caribbean. Some of these students have spent their lives surrounded by computers, video games, digital cameras, text messaging, and cell phones. In contrast, these students are enrolled in programmes offered by universities in the Caribbean which are taught and managed by individuals who did not experience the pervasive digital technology culture when they were growing up, as is the norm for these students.

According to the Global Education Digest 2009 (UNESCO Institute for Statistics [UIS], 2009), the number of students pursuing tertiary education globally has skyrocketed over the past 37 years, from 28.6 million in 1970 to 159.5 million in 2008. Today, there is widespread concern in the Caribbean region about the issue of gender and achievement in education in general, and higher education in particular. This paper explores this phenomenon regionally and globally, providing a critical analysis of explanations and theorizing that have emerged to understand this situation in both contexts.