6 JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY EDUCATIONAL STUDIES 4/2013
Editorial
Dear readers, the last days of December have also brought the last issue of 
our journal for this year. Something we have not expressly mentioned before is that 
the journal celebrated its 130
th
 anniversary this year. When it was first established 
in 1880, the journal was named Popotnik (Traveler); in the last sixty-three years, 
it has been known by numerous generations of educators as Sodobna pedagogika 
(Journal of Contemporary Educational Studies). In Slovenia, there are few maga-
zines or journals – and even fewer scientific journals – that could pride themselves 
on a three-digit volume number. It is with pride that we report that the Journal of 
Contemporary Educational Studies is not only a preeminent Slovenian scientific 
journal, but also the journal with the longest and most distinguished tradition 
in the field of education. After more than a century of publication, its existence 
is taken for granted by every expert and educator working in education. We are 
proud of the fact that Slovenian pedagogy can hardly be imagined without the 
Journal of Contemporary Educational Studies. However, we should not be lulled 
into ignoring the fact that self-evidence is only an appearance; this is undoubtedly 
true in regards to publishing scientific periodicals in Slovenia.
The publishing of scientific periodicals has long been a profitable business 
globally. This is not limited to sales of journals or individual articles (often pre-
senting findings of publicly funded research), but also includes the increasingly 
thriving industry of bibliographic database indexes. On one hand, this certainly 
contributes to a higher international recognizability of individual journals, as 
the comprehensive Internet search engines allow readers from all over the world 
to access the articles published in our journal – something practically unimagi-
nable just fifteen years ago. Those of you who have been following the Journal of 
Contemporary Educational Studies carefully will have noticed some content and 
editorial changes introduced in the last few years. The journal has become part 
of two major bibliographic databases, ProQuest and EbscoHost, which relates to 
the fact that each issue is published (though not in its entirety) bilingually. We 
are still striving to include the journal in other bibliographic databases managed 
by multinational corporations such as Thomson Reuters and Elsevier, primarily 
because the inflow of high-quality scientific articles depends to a large degree on 
the journal’s inclusion in such databases. Current Slovenian policy is to measure 
researchers’ scientific work not by its quality or content, but predominantly by 
whether a scientific text is published in the right place (read: in a journal indexed 
by one of the above-mentioned multinational corporations). Such evaluation of sci-
entific achievements is one of the reasons we are attempting to include our journal 
in the bibliographic databases, which results in other positive impacts, as well: 
we have been including a wider range of contributors from a wider international 
area, we have enlarged the editorial board with distinguished foreign experts, 
we have given more attention to the exact methodology of scientific articles, etc. 
While becoming more international, we will always remain a leading Slovenian 
scientific journal, featuring highly relevant content. We have made important 

Editorial 7
contributions to the educational sciences in Slovenia, including the development 
of Slovenian scientific terminology and methodology, and although this is not 
always as interesting to our international readership, it is absolutely necessary 
for high-quality reflection within the local educational space.
As Tadej Vidmar, author of the introductory article The 130
th
 volume of 
the Journal of Contemporary Educational Studies (Popotnik and Sodobna peda-
gogika) – position and polemics writes, the journal (both when still called Popotnik 
and later as Sodobna pedagogika) has always been a place devoted to presenting 
and confronting different (critical) views, thinking, and suggestions in the field 
of education. As a rule, its editorial policies have allowed for – even encouraged – 
a pluralism of views and convictions and has attempted to introduce readers to 
the best information in the areas of pedagogic theory and practice. Vidmar ana-
lyzes three significant polemics in the journal, which serve as an illustration of 
its positions in the selected periods. Such polemics and scientific contributions 
enabled Popotnik to become the most eminent pedagogic journal in Slovenia, a 
reputation that Sodobna pedagogika has successfully retained and strengthened. 
In the future – here we align with Vidmar’s wish – our readers and authors will 
make it possible for the Journal of Contemporary Educational Studies to continue 
improving upon its excellent tradition of the past 130 years in spite of the flood 
of “instant” pedagogic literature.
The second article, written by Taja Kramberger, approaches a topic that 
is historical, but no less relevant to our time. In German universities and their 
policy during the era of National Socialism: deliberative politicization of knowledge, 
anti-intellectualism, and abolishment of autonomy the author exposes the prin-
cipal National Socialist university modifications, which resulted in the creation 
of the new “political university” and the abolishment of university autonomy. She 
analyzes the processes of university reorganization, including the deregulation of 
academic freedom, the reorganization of university management, the reorganiza-
tion of the recruitment, promotion and habilitation of teachers, the prevention of 
international exchanges and the rejection of international scientific criteria, the 
disabling of assistantship, university collegiality and cooperation, the maintenance 
of the sense of employment insecurity, and the intimidation of outspoken profes-
sors. Kramberger critically presents the manner in which the National Socialist 
university reforms simplified the state control over universities by, for instance, 
abolishing the most autonomous and representative university bodies, while at 
the same time bringing in politically vetted designees. Thus, they displaced the 
center of university raison d’être and did away with university autonomy through 
a number of small administrative transformations and redefinitions carried out 
in the spirit of aggressive anti-intellectualism and pragmatic utilitarianism. This 
completely degraded the academic mission and ruined the old academic ethos. We 
should not overlook the author’s assertion that the rapidity of this transformation 
would not have been possible without the voluntary, spontaneous adaptation of 
the majority of the university personnel.
In the article Researching and directing the hidden curriculum, Anita Jug 
Došler presents the results of her case study. The author begins by emphasizing 

8 JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY EDUCATIONAL STUDIES 4/2013
that the hidden curriculum is importantly defined by the factors relating to 
preschoo l education quality indicators at all three quality levels: process, struc-
tural, and indirect levels. It can also be understood as the “battleground” of various 
competing influences and ideologies that appears in preschools and schools in a 
hidden manner. Since, according to Jug Došler, the Preschool Curriculum moves 
from strictly content towards process/developmental and goal-oriented planning – 
thereby becoming more open – educators are given more professional autonomy, 
which can also present additional danger in the factors of the hidden curriculum. 
On the basis of the Preschool Curriculum, the findings of relevant Slovenian and 
international research studies, the presented conceptual and methodological 
approache s to monitoring and assessing preschool education quality in relation 
to the hidden curriculum, as well as quality levels, areas, and indicators, the 
author developed an education and training model for researching and directing 
the factors of the hidden curriculum. The model, also practically tested by the 
author, turned out to be effective in supporting and improving the pedagogic 
work of preschool teachers, particularly at the process level of quality. Using the 
processes of action and evaluation research, and facing (raising awareness) the 
preschool teachers with their own concepts, the model enabled them to research 
and direct the factors of the hidden curriculum, consequently improving the quality 
of educational work in preschools.
Certain fundamental curricular issues, especially those relating to knowledge 
assessment and conducting the educational process, are the topic of Perceived 
traits as a factor of academic achievement in different groups of pupils by Mojca 
Peček, Ivan Čuk and Irena Lesar. Their research study, results of which are the 
partially presented here, examines academic achievement levels and considers the 
effect of the traits that teachers ascribe to different students (those they perceive 
as “regular”, students with special needs, Roma students, children of immigrants 
from former Yugoslavia, and children of poor parents). Their results show that 
children of wealthy parents are the highest academic achievers, followed by those 
that teachers recognize as “regular”. As far as children from marginalized groups 
are concerned, the academic results of poor children are somewhat lower – but 
not statistically significantly – than the results of children of immigrants from 
the former Yugoslavia; the results of children with special needs are statistically 
significantly lower, whereas the academic achievements of Roma children are the 
lowest. The authors interpret the results as showing that some traits that teachers 
perceive in students feature more prominently as indicators for determining 
students’ academic achievements. However, these traits are not the same in all 
the researched groups of students, although they tend to be primarily related to 
efficac y. Therefore, the authors conclude, the classroom is a space where surprising 
transactions between teachers and students take place and where teachers’ reac-
tions to students’ traits depend on teachers’ initial perceptions.
This issue also publishes two high-quality professional papers. In the first, 
Alenka Jurič Rajh presents the Common tasks shared by the pedagogue and 
headteacher, written in the program guidelines for the primary school counseling 
service. The author starts by emphasizing that in the Slovenian school system, 

Editorial 9
the counseling service has a special role and responsibility to work together with 
students, teachers, head teachers, parents, and other participants in the educa-
tional process. In her paper, however, the author is primarily interested in the 
cooperation between the counseling service and the head teacher. She writes that 
the cooperation of the counseling service with the school management is highly 
varied and is conducted at different levels. The findings of her research study 
demonstrate that – in spite of a number of positive conclusions – new program 
guidelines for primary school counseling should be prepared, taking into account 
all the fields that the counselor has to work in nowadays. In regards to coopera-
tion with the head teacher, Jurič Rajh states that the following areas should be 
included: enrollment in school, participation of students with special needs, learning 
problems, foreigners and immigrants, and the implementation and evaluation of 
the school educational plan. The author stresses the need for consideration of the 
degree to which specific tasks should be defined and how broadly or narrowly this 
should be done. It is of the utmost importance that the school counselor and the 
head teacher have an open communication and a free exchange of information. 
According to the author, at the system level, in-service training should be con-
sidered to complement the counselor’s knowledge, particularly in the areas that 
she/he had the least opportunity to study during her/his studies. Such in-service 
training would be particularly useful in schools which employ only one counselor 
and are therefore unable to complement different school-counseling profiles in 
an interdisciplinary manner.
This issue is concluded by Diagnostic assessment of prereading competence, 
in which Ivanka Bider Petelin discusses the issue of assessing children’s pre-
reading competence at the time of their entrance to primary school. In the intro-
ductory section of the article, the author defines the “diagnostic assessment” of 
prereading competence as a flexible and dynamic process of collecting data about 
children. The data served as the basis for the development of expert opinions and 
the adoption of adequate measures for each individual child in regard to teaching 
and reading instruction. In other words, the aim of the diagnostic assessment of 
prereading competence is to support pupils and help to diagnose any problems they 
may have during the learning process. The author presents a detailed evaluation 
of two instruments used to test prereading competence: the test of early reading 
competences developed by B. Jurišić and the English test Cognitive Profiling 
System (COPS). The test of early reading competences is intended for children 
between five and six years of age and is suitable for establishing early reading 
competence in children prior to entering school, as well as for evaluating pupils 
during the first primary school educational period. It enables the distribution of 
children into two groups – a group with a risk of future problems with learning to 
read and a group without this risk. The English COPS test is a computer-based 
psychometric instrument, standardized for children between the ages of four 
years and eight years and eleven months. It has been designed in the form of a 
computer game, which is supposed to be more motivating for children. The results 
provide an insight into a child’s cognitive skills and weaknesses. For instance, this 
test can help us to identify dyslexia or specific learning difficulties, individual 

10 JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY EDUCATIONAL STUDIES 4/2013
educationa l needs, developmental problems, and the dominant learning style. This 
contribution is certainly relevant and very informative, especially for the teachers 
who are faced with early literacy development in their practice. Nevertheless, 
certain terminological (and, at least indirectly, conceptual) issues, particularly 
those concerning the translation of the English term assessment into Slovenian, 
require further attention. 
Dear readers, let me wish you, at the end of this calendar year, a lot of pleasant 
moments, exciting ideas, and critical thoughts – stimulated not only, but also by, 
the company of the Journal of Educational Studies!
Jasna Mažgon, Ph.D.,
Editor-in-chief