Catholic Education Globally: Challenges and Opportunities

This book offers a vision of an integrated Humanities curriculum, potentiated by the depth and diversity of perspectives that Catholic Studies contributes to both Catholic and secular universities. The result, inspired in various magisterial documents, is a more profound, relevant, and enduring college learning experience. It considers Catholic Studies as a response to the rich legacy of Vatican II, and its opening to contemporary culture, as it is expressed in Catholic education. It answers the dual call of the Declaration on Christian Education Gravissimum Educationis (GE) for cooperation and collaboration among Catholic institutions of higher learning, and among faculty of the different scholarly disciplines. This book displays the interdisciplinary breadth and disciplinary depth of Catholic Studies, while providing a window into the practical insights gained by experts in research, program design, and teaching in a flourishing Catholic Studies program that has inspired the founding of the Seton Hall University core curriculum. Complemented by the contributions of Catholic Studies experts from outside Seton Hall, this book serves as a pedagogical model for researchers and educators to consider and emulate, nationally and internationally, an interdisciplinary Catholic Studies model as a way to recuperate theology; stop the siege of the humanities; and teach humanities in contact and communication with other disciplines, including STEM and other vocation-oriented fields. In this overall context, this book serves as a guide and a reference for new and established programs of Catholic Studies, nationally and internationally. It seeks to extend a conversation, in the style of a symposium, to campuses and cultural contexts in the United States and internationally.

This edited collection is the first part of a two-volume set., which focuses on leadership in Catholic education settings in the United Kingdom. It includes an overview of the importance of different types of leadership, including ‘servant-leadership’, in understanding and framing Catholic school practice, a critical survey of why leadership matters to ensuring the success of Catholic education, and a discussion of what counts as the defining characteristics of leadership in Catholic education and how this relates to the aims or philosophy of Catholic education. The chapters in this book draw from the insights and experiences of serving Catholic school leaders as well as from academics and researchers in Catholic education studies. The final two chapters provide a comparative analysis for the United Kingdom in a global perspective using data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) . Together, the chapters argue that there is an urgent need to find, nurture, and sustain outstanding leaders for Catholic schools and colleges.