American "International Education": History, Theory And Policy

The American international education (AIE) as part of national education development started after the Second World War and ever since has undergone a history of more than fifty years. Within such a long period of time, it has developed and formulated its own unique theories, policies and educational systems and exerted a certain degree of influence upon the American society and education in modern times.In 1990s, the AIE has shown its trend towards global education transformation. This dissertation discusses the historical development of the AIE and in so doing mainly investigates the AIE theories and policies with a view of exploring the nature and characteristics of the AIE; the relationship between international education and national education, and global education; the relationship between international education theories and policies and their practice. It will bring us the experience of the AIE as reference and enlightenments for the history of foreign education, the higher education reform, formulation of educational theories and national defense education reform in China.The dissertation has five parts: introduction, the history and status quo of the AIE, the theories and views of the AIE, the policies and laws of the AIE and conclusion.In the "Introduction", five problems are elaborated: the aim and use of this research; literature research findings; the scope and questions of the research; research thoughts and methods; research characteristics and its subsequent work.In Chapter one "the History and Status quo of the AIE", the historical development of the AIE is divided into five periods based on the dates when several international education acts were promulgated, i.e. "bourgeoning period (1936-1946) "; "rising period (1946-1966); "falling and resisting period (1966-1991); prospering period (1991-2002); and "transformation period (2002-)". Each period touches upon four aspects of the AIE, i.e. international education policies, international education management, international education practice and international education theories so that the historical development of the AIE will be reflected from them, the history research and problem research can be closely combined, and the four aspects will be compared historically after the narration of the history of the AIE. In the end, the views of the basic implications of international education by American scholars are summarized.In Chapter two "The theories and Views of the AIE", based the literatureresearch of education theories by various American international educators, the AIE theories are discussed and elaborated in terms of "problems" instead of "thinkers": international education and social development; international education and education change; international education and teacher training; international education and educational research. For example, "international education and social development" introduces three different views, i.e. international education is the nature of modern social education; international education is the guaranty of national social security; international education is the life need of global citizens. As a matter of fact, the three views represent three different thinkers. The purpose of doing so is to present each international education theory put forward by different perspectives of international educators so that a comprehensive understanding of each theory can be obtained. Along this line, the chapter attempts to help readers have an overall understanding and grasping of the AIE by elaborating and discussing the five aspects of the international education.In Chapter three "the Policies and Laws of the AIE", four AIE acts and reports are fully researched and based on the "problem" line, the policies and laws of the AIE are discussed and divided as follows: feature policy of international education; aim policy of international education; management policy of international education; aid policy of international education; implementation policy of international education. Each policy consists of detailed rules and req...