Emotional intelligence and educational reform Lefkios Neophytou* University of Nicosia, Nicosia, Cyprus This paper focuses on the notion of educational reform and discusses Emotional Intelligence (EI) in the context of the modernist-postmodernist debate. It is argued that through the application of EI into contemporary societies a new wave of reform emerges that provides science with normative power over the emotional world of individuals. This reform aims primarily on the maximization of performance and employs modes of judgment, selection and regulation of emotions. Thus teachers’ emotions can be accurately described, prescribed and synchronized with the paces of reform. Rewards, sanctions but also penalties can be applied based on the compliance of the individual teacher with the prede- fined indicators of appropriate or inappropriate emotional conduct. However, epistemological, ethical and moral questions should be raised and the side effects of the modernization movement should be considered before applying the new ethos that EI brings along. Keywords: emotional intelligence; educational reform; teachers; ethics/morals/ beliefs The assumptions and implications of reform and modernization Change appears to be the only thing that remains constant in the fluid context of contemporary education. Governments across the globe are re-examining and changing many aspects of education trying to find optimum ways to meet the pres- ent day challenges. The bargain is how to reform education, make it up-to-date and modern. Modernization of education (and in general) is commonly used as a synonym to improvement. Many notions are embedded into the discourse for educa- tional reform and modernization: benchmarks, standards, standardized tests, compar- ative studies, etc. National assessment strategies are combined with international assessments and the results are publicized and used for public comparisons (i.e., Department for Education UK; Cibulka 1990; Power and Frandji 2010). Com- parability comes hand in hand with certain terminologies that pinpoint where each student, teacher, school or educational system stands against its peers: above or below average, high or low performing, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, BA, MA, or PhD holder, etc. Like football, schools and educational systems are now described in terms of their rank in a league. As Levin (1998, 133) points out “countries now proudly hold up their rankings on the latest International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA) or International Assessment of Educational Progress (IAEP) study as a badge of honour.” *Email: neophytou.l@unic.ac.cy Educational Review, 2013 Vol. 65, No. 2, 140–154, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00131911.2011.648171 Ó 2013 Educational Review