Globalization affects nations, cultures, and education in multiple ways. Quality of education to a large extent depends on the teacher quality. To reform education and teacher preparation from within is ineffective – first of all, we have to consider effects of the national culture on education, educators, and learners. This chapter offers a comparative study of several nations' cultural characteristics and their impact on education. Many innovative ideas and practices can be learned from advanced international educational systems and adapted to the US schools. For that we should introduce comparative international education courses with a focus on practical applications into every teacher preparation program. The author presents an example of a specialization US Education in Global Context taught at National University.
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The increasing globalization of economy, business, science, and technology affects education both directly and indirectly in all countries and at every level. The U.S. educational system like others is facing numerous internal and external challenges caused by the global processes that call for innovative, transformative and proactive views of education aimed at the future. These challenges necessitate preparation of a new generation of globally minded, innovative and creative educators. The focus on globalization of education in teacher preparation programs might serve as a catalyst for improving our own educational system (Zhao 2009, Goodwin 2010, Stewart 2012, Hargreaves, Shirley 2012, Paine, Aydarova, & Syahril 2017). The importance of this task is underlined by national and state educational administration and accreditation agencies, such as the US Department of Education, National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education (Standards for Professional Development Schools, 2001) and State Offices of Education. There is much to do to reform our teacher preparation programs (Wagner 2008, Darling-Hammond 2010, Schleicher 2011, Prettyman 2012, Reforming teaching 2017), including introduction of international education studies. However, “despite significant attention to internationalization in higher education in recent years, teacher training programs are often among the least internationalized programs on American college and university campuses” (American Council on Education 2008, 7), and they remain so to this day. Moreover, there is an increasing marginalization of comparative international education in teacher education (Arnove 2015): many universities either do not want to open such programs or close the existing ones. Does it happen because they do not realize the importance of comparative study of global education, or because such studies are not required by the teacher preparation standards, or there is no initiative coming from teacher educators?