A Tale of Two Curriculums: Putting the English and Norwegian curriculum models to the test of the 'high skills' vision

In the light of a shared discourse around the pursuit of a high-skill, knowledge-driven economy, this article compares the different policy approaches towards the curriculum (and more broadly education) across two national contexts, namely Norway and England and Wales. An attempt is then made to weigh the relative discrepancy between high-flown policy rhetoric and curriculum reality by asking which approach might be said to be more consistent with the professed 'high skills' policy vision. Three central areas of difference are highlighted: (1) the vision of education and its degree of subordination to economic priorities; (2) conceptions of what it means to create a skilled 'worker-citizen'; and (3) the level of trust vested in the teaching profession as genuine co-partners in a national project of curriculum reform and modernisation. The article concludes by asking what UK policy makers might conceivably 'learn' from the Norwegian example.