The Dialectics Of Globalization And Localization:The Research Of International Baccalaureate In The United States

Under the background of globalization,international education has attracted great attention all over the world,especially International Baccalaureate(IB),the top runner of international education,which has been expanding for the past decades.However,at the same time,it has also led to query and dispute among many nation-states,manifesting the enduring tension between globalization and localization.The United States is the country with the biggest number of IB programs in the world.How do the IB programs localise in the United States? What kind of policy support does IB get from the US federal government,state governments,and universities for localization? What effects has the localization of IB programs bring to American education?What kind of controversy is caused by the localization of IB programs,and how can we interpret the tension between globalization and localization demonstrated in the controversy? The discussion about these issues is divided into nine chapters in this research.The first chapter is the introduction,including the origin of research,research questions and significance,definition of core concepts,literature review,research framework and methods,innovations and deficiencies.The second chapter introduces the localization of IB in the United States,claiming that IB has experienced three stages in the United States: bringing-in,rising and boosting.While IB is rapidly expanding in the United States,it has also moved from the elite class to the common class,with the US government as the main driving force behind it.A typical phenomenon —— the International Baccalaureate Americas(IBA)voluntarily proposed that the IB curriculum should be matched and integrated with the Common Core Standards of the State of the United States——is also examined in this chapter.Chapters 3 and 4 focus on the three important actors in the localization of IB in the United States,including the federal government,states,and universities,who brought out policies that providing support for the development of IB.At the federal level,many educational policies regarded IB as a high academic standard and provided financial and other support for it.At the state level,the strength and forms of government support for IB varies greatly among states,which is also the reason for IB's imbalanced distribution among states in the United States.As for the American colleges and universities,IB is highly recognized,policies such as credit transfer and scholarship are provided to attract students to choose IB.Chapter 5 and 6 are about the influence and implementation of IB's localization in the United States.With the analysis of relevant statistical data and practice reports,it is pointed out from a macro perspective in Chapter 5 that IB has four positive impacts on American education,including improving academic achievement,promoting fairness,push public schools towards internationalize,and improving the quality of teachers.The next chapter backs the finding of chapter 5 with case study of three micro aspects:school districts,colleges and universities,elementary and secondary school.Chapters 7 and 8 focus on the controversy caused by IB in the United States,and interpret this controversy from the perspective of IB's own globalized development.Though IB has positive influence on American education,disputes arise with its rapid growth.It was mainly conservatives who criticize IB because they question the values and international vision advocated by IB and worry about IB affecting the sense of belonging of their citizens.So how does IB deal with this tension between globalization and localization? Chapter 8 analyzes this tension from the three dimensions: IBO's own overall ideal or mission,curriculum design and operational strategy,and points out that it is under such tension that IBO gradually realized its “global dream”,built a K-12 international curriculum with global influence and committed to achieving goodness and fairness on a bigger scale.Based on the analysis mentioned above,Chapter 9 concludes that IB has brought higher education quality,better education fairness,internationalization and global competency to the United States;on the other hand,the tension between globalization and localization caused by IB is universal around the world.Therefore,China should treat international education such as IB with both open-mind and cautiousness.Last but not least,some enlightenments for international education governance are proposed,regarding the development of IB curriculum in China.