first glance at almost any policy document generated by a bilateral or multilateral donor agency reveals a familiar rhetoric of participation, partnership, community, good governance, growth and strong democracy as key ingredients for a successful development program. While some critics of this rhetoric argue that this is merely a recasting of old aid agendas, others confirm that recent rethinking of aid policies and agendas are sincere efforts to address poverty reduction and ensure aid effectiveness. Education has been proposed as an indispensable element to achieving the aforementioned goals of development policy rhetoric, not least in the Eight UN Millennium Development Goals. This article provides a literature review of global donor trends and the development agenda, and examines the role of the Australian Agency for International Development (AusAID) in the current global development environment, with particular focus on education policy in the Asia Pacific region. The article provides a comparative analysis of AusAID's approach to its educational development programs in Papua New Guinea and Cambodia in order to evaluate how AusAID's education policy aligns with international goals for poverty reduction and sustainable development, and how AusAID coordinates its education policy priorities with other development agencies and recipient governments. [Author abstract, ed]