Academic literature on the topic 'Research for Better Schools'
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Journal articles on the topic "Research for Better Schools"
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Betts, J. R., and R. C. Atkinson. "Better Research Needed on the Impact of Charter Schools." Science 335, no. 6065 (January 12, 2012): 171–72. http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1205418.
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Carpenter, Daniel, and Paul Munshower. "Broadening borders to build better schools." International Journal of Educational Management 34, no. 2 (August 15, 2019): 296–314. http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/ijem-09-2018-0296.
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Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore how rural teachers provided a PLC by leveraging virtual technologies to connect educators of like subject disciplines from several schools, foreign and domestic. Design/methodology/approach A phenomenological case study-based approach was leveraged to investigate established vPLCs at schools (Creswell, 2013; Stake, 2010). Qualitative data were collected from multiple sources to obtain rural teacher perceptions on the impact vPLCs had on their practice (Creswell, 2013). Findings Teacher collaborative teams build relationships comparable to teams that met face to face as part of a similar PLC and PD experience. Participant reflections in this investigation showed that rural educators favored face-to-face meetings; however, vPLCs provided similar teacher experiences to that of the face-to-face PBL model. Results indicated that educators recognized virtual collaboration just as valuable a tool for enabling PLCs than face-to-face collaborations while still offering similarities to improved teacher practice. Research limitations/implications The research was limited to teachers in rural settings in the USA (Texas) and in the Dominican Republic. The research was limited to teacher perceptions of change, and observed changes as part of their participation in a research-based virtual PLC model. The research was limited to the school setting over an academic year. Practical implications The findings from this study have practical implications for rural teachers and school implementation of a professional learning community model. Originality/value The promise provided by this study is that vPLCs may provide opportunity for rural schools to provide a job-embedded professional development model (Croft et al., 2010) for otherwise isolated teachers (Barrett et al., 2015).
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Fajar Shodiq, Sadam, Syamsudin ., Abd Madjid, and Naufal Ahmad RijalulAlam. "TOWARDS BETTER MANAGEMENT OF PRIVATE EDUCATION IN INDONESIA: LESSONS LEARNED FROM MUHAMMADIYAH SCHOOLS." Humanities & Social Sciences Reviews 7, no. 2 (March 19, 2019): 146–55. http://dx.doi.org/10.18510/hssr.2019.7215.
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Purpose: This study aims to examine problems related to the existing education management in Muhammadiyah schools in Indonesia.
Methodology: The present study is qualitative research, data obtained from observation, interview, and documentation. The results of the study show that Muhammadiyah, one of the private and independent institutions, has engaged in various fields, among which one of them is education. It has more than 4500 elementary, middle, and senior high schools spreading throughout Indonesia. In addition, the situations and conditions of education management at the Muhammadiyah School have different characteristics with public schools run by the government.
Results: The results of the study can be used to increase the quality of education, which directly affects other public schools.
Implications: The present research can help schools to provide the best educational services and produce competent and competitive graduates.
Novelty: This research has focused on the Muhammadiyah Schools, particularly its management and administration approach.
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Burušić, Josip. "The perceived school climate in Croatian elementary schools with poor, average and good school’s learning environment." Management 24 (May 29, 2019): 1–15. http://dx.doi.org/10.30924/mjcmi.24.si.1.
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The cross-sectional research design was used to investigate differences in teachers’ perception of school climate in schools with poor, average and good school’s learning environment, and to explore to what degree is possible to explain six school climate dimensions by school’s learning environment, some teacher’s characteristics and teaching practice experience. Participants in the study were 785 teachers from 44 primary schools in northern part of Croatia, 121 males and 579 females. Participants rated school climate in school where they teach and in addition provided information about various school’s learning environment. Schools which teachers perceived as having good school’s learning environment clearly differ in the level of school climate quality - school climate is significantly better in schools with better school’s learning environment. The performed hierarchical regression analyses, demonstrated in addition, how school’s learning environment and characteristics of teachers and teaching practice (e.g. gender, age, work experience and education level) are powerful predictors of (positive) school climate. In this paper, we provide possible explanation and stress importance on school climate as an essential concept in school effectiveness concerns and activities.
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Sahin, Alpaslan, Victor Willson, and Robert M. Capraro. "Charter School Achievements in Texas: Public versus Charter Schools." International Journal of Educational Reform 27, no. 1 (January 2018): 46–62. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/105678791802700103.
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This study aimed to investigate the performance of a charter school network, Harmony Public Schools (HPS), in a 3-year longitudinal student-level research study of high school mathematics, reading, and science performance using 2009–2011 Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skill student data. Propensity-score-matched public (N = 19) and Harmony (N = 11) schools' performances were compared. We conducted a two-level multivariate analysis of covariance on binary outcomes (pass–no pass) for grades 9–11. HPS performed significantly better at grade 9 and worse at grade 11, with no statistical differences at grade 10 in mathematics. Type of school was not significant at either grade 9 or 10 for reading. For science performances, Harmony charter schools performed better at 10th grade and significantly better at 11th grade. Implications of the findings were discussed as to whether charter schools keep their promises of providing quality education.
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Yaya, Rizal. "Twelve years of scottish school public private partnerships: Are they better value for money?" Journal of Public Procurement 17, no. 2 (March 1, 2017): 187–228. http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/jopp-17-02-2017-b002.
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This research evaluates the value-for-money (VFM) obtained from public-private partnership (PPP) schools in Scotland, based on headteachers questionnaires, local authority interviews and Scottish School Estate Statistics. The period covered is 2000-2012, when 395 new schools were commissioned. The PPPs were better in building condition and maintenance standards and conventionally-financed schools were better in terms of teacher access and improvement in staff morale. There was transfer of knowledge whereby the high standards of the PPPs then became the new standards for the conventionally-financed schools. Concerns about PPP VFM relates to the high cost of unitary charges and contract inflexibilities. A higher percentage of headteachers of conventionally-financed schools (63.64%) considered their new schools resulted in good VFM compared to PPP schools (42.86%).
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Deluca, Stefanie, and Peter Rosenblatt. "Does Moving to Better Neighborhoods Lead to Better Schooling Opportunities? Parental School Choice in an Experimental Housing Voucher Program." Teachers College Record: The Voice of Scholarship in Education 112, no. 5 (May 2010): 1443–91. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/016146811011200504.
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Background Previous research has demonstrated that children growing up in poor communities have limited access to high-performing schools, while more affluent neighborhoods tend to have higher-ranking schools and more opportunities for after-school programs and activities. Therefore, many researchers and policy makers expected not only that the families moving to low-poverty neighborhoods with the Moving to Opportunity (MTO) program would gain access to zone schools with more resources but also that mothers would be more likely to meet middle-class parents who could provide information about academic programs and teachers, leading them to choose some of these new higher-quality-zone schools. However, research evaluating the effects of the MTO program on child outcomes 4-7 years after program moves found that while the schools attended by the MTO children were less poor and had higher average test scores than their original neighborhood schools, the differences were small: Before moving with the program, MTO children attended schools ranked at the 15th percentile statewide on average; 4-7 years after the move, they were attending schools that ranked at the 24th percentile on average. Purpose The fact that the residential changes brought about by the MTO experiment did not translate into much larger gains in school academic quality provides the impetus for our study. In other words, we explore why the experiment did not lead to the school changes that researchers and policy makers expected. With survey, census, and school-level data, we examine where families moved with the MTO program and how these moves related to changes in school characteristics, and how parents considered schooling options. Setting Although the MTO experiment took place in five cities (New York, Boston, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Baltimore), we use data from the Baltimore site only. Population The sample in our study includes the low-income mothers and children who participated in the Baltimore site of the MTO housing voucher experiment. Ninety-seven percent of the families were headed by single black women. The median number of children was two, and average household income was extremely low, at $6,750. Over 60% received Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) as their primary source of income (at program entry in 1994), over 77% of household heads were unemployed, and 40% of the women had no high school degree or GED. Program The Moving to Opportunity program gave public housing residents in extremely poor neighborhoods in Baltimore, New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Boston a chance to apply for the program and move between 1994 and 1998. Families were randomly assigned into one of three groups: an experimental group that received housing counseling and a special voucher that could only be used in census tracts with 1990 poverty rates of less than 10%; a second treatment group, the Section 8 group, that received a regular voucher with no geographic restrictions on where they could move; and a control group that received no voucher through MTO, although they could continue to reside in their public housing units or apply for other housing subsidies (usually a regular Section 8 voucher). The program did not provide assistance with transportation costs, job searches, or local school information after the family relocated. Research Design We use survey data, census data, school-level data, and interviews from the Baltimore site of a randomized field trial of a housing voucher program. We present a mixed-methods case study of one site of the experiment to understand why the children of families who participated in the Baltimore MTO program did not experience larger gains in schooling opportunity. Conclusions Our article demonstrates that in order to discover whether social programs will be effective, we need to understand how the conditions of life for poor families facilitate or constrain their ability to engage new structural opportunities. The described case examples demonstrate why we need to integrate policies and interventions that target schooling in conjunction with housing, mental health services, and employment assistance. Future programs should train mobility counselors to inform parents about the new schooling choices in the area, help them weigh the pros and cons of changing their children's schools, and explain some of the important elements of academic programs and how they could help their children's educational achievement. Counselors could also assuage parents’ fears about transferring their children to new schools by making sure that receiving schools have information about the children and that little instruction time is lost in the transition between schools.
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Evans, Moyra, Pam Lomax, and Helen Morgan. "Closing the Circle: Action research partnerships towards better learning and teaching in schools." Cambridge Journal of Education 30, no. 3 (November 2000): 405–19. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/713657160.
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Hoffman, Ellen S., and Joanne Caniglia. "Connecting Research to Teaching: In Their Own Words: Good Mathematics Teachers in the Era of NCLB." Mathematics Teacher 102, no. 6 (February 2009): 468–73. http://dx.doi.org/10.5951/mt.102.6.0468.
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In her award-winning book The Good High School: Portraits of Character and Culture (1983), Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot chronicles the life and complexities of six high schools across the United States. Through these narratives she tells stories designed to move and persuade. “I believed I could capture the attention of my listeners by conveying what was good about those schools,” she relates. “If we could hear the story better, we'd be in better shape” (cited in de Cuevas 1996).
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Hoffman, Ellen S., and Joanne Caniglia. "Connecting Research to Teaching: In Their Own Words: Good Mathematics Teachers in the Era of NCLB." Mathematics Teacher 102, no. 6 (February 2009): 468–73. http://dx.doi.org/10.5951/mt.102.6.0468.
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In her award-winning book The Good High School: Portraits of Character and Culture (1983), Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot chronicles the life and complexities of six high schools across the United States. Through these narratives she tells stories designed to move and persuade. “I believed I could capture the attention of my listeners by conveying what was good about those schools,” she relates. “If we could hear the story better, we'd be in better shape” (cited in de Cuevas 1996).
Dissertations / Theses on the topic "Research for Better Schools"
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McLeod, Jen. "Better relationships for better learning : schools addressing Maori achievement through partnership : research thesis submitted as partial fulfillment of a Masters degree in Education at Te Uru Maraurau, Massey University College of Education, Palmerston North." Massey University, 2002. http://hdl.handle.net/10179/991.
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This thesis examines the policy document Better Relationships for Better Learning: Guidelines for Boards of Trustees and Schools on Engaging with Mäori Parents, Whanau, and Communities (Ministry of Education, 2000a). The thesis is concerned with an examination and analysis of the Ministry of Education’s policy Better Relationships for Better Learning document and its implementation as evidenced by a case study school. The thesis demonstrates that while Government policy may intend to benefit Maori, the outcomes do not necessarily do so. It is argued that neither Government nor schools, as agents of the state, are neutral bodies but in large part reflect the influence of the majority over the provision of education for Maori. The claim for school/Maori partnerships made in the policy Better Relationships for Better Learning ignores the founding partnership envisaged through the Treaty of Waitangi. Maori participation as partners in negotiating the terms of the relationship with the school is ignored. This thesis examines the function of those relationships in terms of ‘Better Learning’, investigating the developments and practices in schools for Maori children’s learning.
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Björklund, Fanny, and Maria Bramfors. "An architectural perspective on schools in the Philippines : A research into the importance of a classroom’s physical environment and possible improvements for a better learning environment." Thesis, Linnéuniversitetet, Institutionen för byggteknik (BY), 2016. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:lnu:diva-53756.
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The physical environment in schools is an important factor that benefits the educational quality and has an essential role in the student's learning process. In the Philippines the physical environment is underdeveloped in the schools, since the main focus is on developing a basic foundation and on making sure that every child can go to school. This thesis studied the classrooms' physical environment in three selected schools in the Philippines. It presents improvements of the classroom’s physical environment. This study can be used as indicative guidelines when designing classrooms in the Philippines. This study is supported by the Minor Field Study scholarship, founded by SIDA.
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Adelakun, Sariat Ajibola. "An exploration and development of teaching resources to better include students with visual impairment in science and mathematics classes in South-Western Nigeria : an action research study." Thesis, University of Birmingham, 2017. http://etheses.bham.ac.uk//id/eprint/7544/.
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The study was concerned with access to science and mathematics curricula by students with visual impairment (SVI) in South-Western Nigeria. The main study adopted an action research approach. Six initial stakeholder ‘search conferences’ were organised to understand the nature and extent of the problem. They revealed evidence of inadequate accessibility to science and mathematics education by SVI due to unavailable resources and personnel. This led to the development of teaching resources and approaches (‘STEM Kit’ and the use of ‘Talking LabQuest’) and the trialling of these approaches in two selected study schools. Data were collected through classroom observation and teacher and student interviews. Findings show that the approaches enabled access of SVI to science and mathematics at a comparable level with their sighted peers, which brought about immersion in, and engagement with learning. With the multisensory teaching resources, SVI and classroom sighted teachers learn and teach with reduced specialist teacher involvement. The intervention positively challenged local views and practice regarding curriculum access and SVI and offers examples for improved provision of relevant resources and training for staff to better support SVI independence and inclusion. This study showcases the uniqueness of action research in empowering all participants to bring about change.
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Gill, W. Chris. "Public Schools and the Media: Recommendations for Building a Better Partnership." Youngstown State University / OhioLINK, 2015. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ysu1432894726.
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Timmers, Kendell M. (Kendell MacQueen) 1978. "Learning together better : the structured design of learning teams." Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2004. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/17729.
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Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, Operations Research Center, 2004.Includes bibliographical references (p. 105-110).
There is a great need among educators for a way to quickly assign teams in large or distance learning classrooms in a manner superior to random assignment or student self-selection. Forming teams based on knowledge of students' characteristics is too time-consuming for large classrooms, yet research has shown that the characteristics of individuals greatly affect the quality of the teamwork experience. This thesis provides an automated method to quickly assign students to teams based on individual characteristics. We begin with a thorough review of the literature on how individuals' characteristics affect team behavior, focusing on the level of diversity of four main classes of traits - knowledge/skills/abilities, demographics, personality, and motivation. By forming teams that have diversity on some of these traits and homogeneity on others, we will be able to improve performance over randomly assigned teams. We frame this problem from a group dynamics perspective, measuring the compatibility of every dyad of students within a team. We propose, for several group environments, which traits should be homogeneous and which heterogeneous, and how important each trait is, and use these values to create an equation for a student compatibility score, a number representing how well a pair of students will work together. We then simulate team assignment to determine which of several heuristics is most efficient. A combination of random generation and pairwise exchange is found to be the best, forming teams with average compatibilities 307% higher than the average randomly generated team. The code for this program is included in the appendices.
(cont.) Additionally, we perform a classroom experiment in which sections of a class are divided into teams by three different methods - random assignment, intuition, and the method devised above. Although the experimental design was flawed, the results were encouraging, demonstrating that average student compatibility on a team was significantly positively associated with both the resulting team grade and the students' perception of how much they learned about teamwork. For a more detailed executive summary of this work, please see the Structure of the Thesis section on page 16.
by Kendell M. Timmers.
S.M.
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Bounyasone, Keophouthong, and Ngouay Keosada. "Cultivating educational research in Lao PDR : For a better future?" Doctoral thesis, Umeå universitet, Pedagogiska institutionen, 2011. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:umu:diva-42905.
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This thesis looks at the introduction of educational action research as part of the national education reforms in Lao PDR. National policies on education emphasise concepts such as ‘education for all’ and ‘student-centred education’ taken from the globalised education reform agenda. Action research became a tool to implement the new pedagogy of student-centred education that was labelled ‘the five-pointed star’. The thesis contributes to the field of global policy studies. It combines global and contextual aspects in order to analyse how action research travelled from policy to practice. This process was part of a Lao national education reform that developed after the introduction of the new economic mechanism, when the previous socialist planned-economy system was replaced by a globalised market-oriented system. Data were collected from national policy documents, international donor documents, instructional material, and interviews with Lao educators involved with action research in different ways. Furthermore, we carried out action research as part of our own teaching duties in Lao PDR, which were subsequently documented and analysed. In this study of educational reform in Lao PDR we have found that an educational approach like action research that is introduced as part of a taken-for-granted global agenda of change, is reduced to a technical rationality and practices that resemble previous experiences. Our findings are explained from the theoretical perspectives of hidden policy ensembles and policy backlashes. Hidden policy ensembles reduce action research to a technical rationality due to their alien cultural and social connections that are not brought into the open at the reform arena. Policy backlashes become a way for practitioners to create meaning based on previous contextual practices, conceptions, and discourses as a consequence of the technical rationality created by the hidden policy ensembles and the use of the cascade model. The thesis concludes with an outline of a possible future educational development in the form of a critical and educative action research network in Lao PDR that is inspired by cross-cultural dialogue, a critical pedagogy of place, and our own action research experiences.
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Murrell, Isa. "Developing a Human Cytomegalovirus strain for better in vitro research." Thesis, Cardiff University, 2014. http://orca.cf.ac.uk/70849/.
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Investigations into Human Cytomegalovirus (HCMV) pathogenesis should be based on strains that closely reflect the causative agent of disease, however HCMV invariably mutates in vitro, generating phenotypically distinct laboratory-adapted strains. In particular, mutations are selected in the HCMV genome UL128 locus (UL128L) that encodes sub-units of a virion envelope pentameric complex that impedes virus propagation in fibroblasts (the cell type most commonly used in vitro), but is required for infection of several naturally targeted cell-types (e.g. epithelial, endothelial, and myeloid cells). Addressing this issue, the genome of wildtype HCMV strain Merlin was cloned as a stable bacterial artificial chromosome (BAC), however similarly to clinical isolates, viruses reconstituted from the Merlin-BAC grow poorly and are prone to de novo mutation in cell culture. Direct comparison to viruses from the Merlin-BAC revealed that viruses from the BACcloned versions of strains TR (TR-BAC), TB40E (TB40-BAC4) and VR1814 (FIX-BAC) could be propagated more efficiently in fibroblasts, despite containing intact UL128L ORFs. Unique nucleotide variations identified in TB40-BAC4 and FIX-BAC UL128L ORFs were transferred into the Merlin-BAC, generating variants that produced greater titres of cell-free virus following reconstitution. Virions from these novel Merlin variants displayed reduced pentameric complex content, but remained able to infect epithelial cells, albeit with slightly compromised efficiency. The greater fitness of viruses from these novel Merlin-BAC variants alleviated the selective pressures for the selection of de novo UL128L mutations in fibroblasts. The Merlin virion proteome was determined, with up to 30 novel components identified to provide a more comprehensive picture of wildtype HCMV virion composition. Comparison of virions from several Merlin variants demonstrated that varying pentameric complex content impacted the incorporation of other components, however virions from the novel Merlin variants produced in this work closely matched those from the parental Merlin variant containing wildtype UL128L ORFs. Thus, the novel Merlin-BAC variants produced in this work represent valuable reagents for future HCMV research.
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Boyle, Jon. "Working "Faster, Better, Cheaper": A Federal Research Agency in Transition." Diss., Virginia Tech, 2002. http://hdl.handle.net/10919/28231.
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This research study explored the theoretical underpinnings of implementing government reform in the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), specifically focusing on a management philosophy called Faster, Better, Cheaper (FBC). It is situated within the broader context of Government reform efforts that attempt to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of government organizations in their delivery of products and services to the public.
This study employed the Grounded Theory qualitative research methodology that concentrates on a central phenomenon and generates a theory from a category or construct-oriented approach. The objective is to generate a substantive-level theory that describes the practice of FBC within NASA and is grounded in the data collected from the organization. The following research questions guided this study:
1.What is the meaning of Faster, Better, Cheaper for Public Professionals in the NASA organizational environment?
2.What are the interrelationships between concepts of faster, better, and cheaper?
3.How does the technical and cultural structure of NASA influence the implementation of Faster, Better, Cheaper?
4.What are the required workforce capabilities to perform Faster, Better, Cheaper in NASA?
The theoretical sample for this study consisted of interviews scheduled with NASA personnel involved in Faster, Better, Cheaper projects. NASA documents and reports were analyzed to saturate the initial 29 provisional categories. A representation of the phenomenon of FBC was developed following the data analysis, including causal conditions, strategies, environmental conditions and context, and consequences. Several findings addressed the meaning of FBC, the interrelationships between the concepts, the impact of organizational infrastructure, and required workforce capabilities. Topics for future research are the nature of risk in public organizations, tools for aligning and measuring public policy alignment and implementation, leadership of public sector teams, and generalizing the findings to other organizations.Ph. D.
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Burnett, Jason K. "Building a Better Briton: Parliament's Push for State-Funded Secondary Schools, 1901-1903." ScholarWorks@UNO, 2000. http://scholarworks.uno.edu/td/2120.
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The first three years of the twentieth century were a crucial time in the development of state-funded education in England. The rising tide of Germanophobia in the wake of the South African War impressed Conservative politicians with the need to improve England's educational system in order that she remain competitive in the world. With the aid of a very few Liberal imperialists, the Conservatives were able to shepherd through a series of bills which established state funded secondary schools throughout all of England, an expansion on the system created by the Education Act of 1870 in terms of both curriculum and breadth of jurisdiction.
The Liberals opposed much of this legislation based on their allegiance to their nonconformist constituents, who viewed the expanse of state-funded schools as a threat to their voluntary schools and as an attempt to enforce Anglican uniformity. The fact that these MPs opposed these bills, and later modified them greatly when Liberal, and later Labour, governments came to power in the decade immediately preceding the first World War, should in no way diminish the importance of these pieces of Conservative legislation.
This essay fits into the historiography of its topic in that it provides a detailed examination of debates which have often been overlooked due to historians' emphasis on the later Liberal legislation.
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Bjarnason, Sigurjon. "Towards Better Schools in Iceland. A divice for Evaluating School Activity in Iceland." Thesis, Malmö högskola, Lärarutbildningen (LUT), 2006. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:mau:diva-27951.
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In this research project, that was carried out in Iceland, an attempt is made to construct and develop a questionnaire administrators can use as a “device” to shed light on and evaluate certain aspects of the administration in their school. The research is based upon a quantitative method that was chosen in order to secure a maximally objective approach of those who carry out the evaluation. The enactment of the Compulsory School Act from 1995 significantly increased the independence of principals. Likewise, the wage agreements 2001-2004 and 2004-2007 extended the scope of administration within the schools. The Act granted principals the warranty and opportunity to enhance the uptrend in school activity. This thesis is part of that uptrend. Theories and concepts put forth and developed by Bert Stålhammar and Tomas J. Sergiovanni concerning the role of the principal were a point of reference in the choice of questions in the questionnaire. Four schools were chosen to participate in the research. All the principals answered the questionnaire, one female and three males. The total number of respondents among the teachers of the four schools was 103. The methodology used to verify the reliability of the questionnaire is a statistically reliable measure and an effective instrument to gather extensive information and with the aid of statistics and a good software program it is easy to present it in an explicit manner. The information contained in this thesis may be used in various ways, e.g. the direct statistical findings of the questions and the comparison of the findings for teachers and the principal (frequency tables, cf. the report of the schools). But it may also be viewed as a manual for those who intend to pose this questionnaire in their school or another comparable one and how the findings of such a questionnaire should be read and interpreted. Principals of other schools do not need to carry out the factor analysis but can utilize the findings of this survey, i.e. the 25 questions that came under the five factors (F1-Interaction with the principal, F2-The policy regarding teaching and pedagogy, F3-Collaboration and flow of information, F4-Praise to teachers and pupils and F5-Teachers’ professionalism).
Books on the topic "Research for Better Schools"
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M, Mohr Marian, ed. Teacher research for better schools. New York: Teachers College Press, 2004.
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1941-, Lomax Pamela, ed. Managing better schools and colleges: The action research way. Clevedon [England]: Multilingual Matters, 1991.
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McNaughton, S. Designing better schools for culturally and linguistically diverse children: A science of performance model for research. New York, NY: Routledge, 2011.
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Dvorak, Jack. Journalism kids do better: What research tells us about high school journalism. Bloomington, Ind: ERIC Clearinghouse on Reading, English, and Communication, 1994.
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Edward, Cumming Christopher, and Moray House College of Education., eds. Becoming a better teacher: Professional staff development in Scottish secondary schools : the report of an S.E.D. funded research project1985. Edinburgh: Moray House College of Education, 1985.
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F, Soltis Jonas, ed. Perspectives on learning. 5th ed. New York: Teachers College Press, 2009.
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F, Soltis Jonas, ed. Perspectives on learning. New York: Teachers College, Columbia University, 1985.
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F, Soltis Jonas, ed. Perspectives on learning. 4th ed. New York: Teachers College Press, 2004.
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F, Soltis Jonas, ed. Perspectives on learning. 3rd ed. New York: Teachers College Press, 1998.
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F, Soltis Jonas, ed. Perspectives on learning. 3rd ed. New York: Teachers College Press, 1998.
Find full textBook chapters on the topic "Research for Better Schools"
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Boys, Jos, and Anna Jeffery. "Valuing Urban Schools as Social Infrastructure." In Schools as Community Hubs, 113–30. Singapore: Springer Nature Singapore, 2023. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-9972-7_8.
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AbstractRe-thinking urban schools as part of an integral network of social infrastructure in cities presents new opportunities for mixed-use educational spaces at the heart of urban development. Yet these opportunities to leverage school assets to better integrate with, and enhance, their localities are often being missed. This chapter explores the value that schools can offer, not just for children, but for wider neighbourhood residents. While understanding that there is no one-size-fits-all approach, we report on a research project to produce a social infrastructure framework which can be included in schools’ policy, implementation and evaluation measures. Developed through an engagement process with key stakeholders, and focused on England, we propose principles for enabling schools to provide better local social infrastructure; based on broadening how we value schools; taking a long-term view; using joined-up thinking; enabling schools to deliver community support; and designing in community potential from the start. This chapter discusses the implications of each principle, supported by examples.
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Le Nepveu, Simon. "Progressive Pedagogies and Community Connections: Fifty Years of Urban Planning and Architectural Design." In Schools as Community Hubs, 175–89. Singapore: Springer Nature Singapore, 2023. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-9972-7_12.
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AbstractThis chapter reflects on fifty years of design industry experience working with schools to create better learning environments and community connections. It draws on the work of ClarkeHopkinsClarke Architects to explore changes over time with a focus on schools in Victoria, Australia. Starting with the work of co-founder, the late Les Clarke AM on Eltham College in the early 1970s, the chapter traces developments in school as community hub planning and design since that time and concludes with lessons learned about ‘Impacting Tomorrow’ through design that is sustainable socially, environmentally and financially. With a view towards scaling the concept, it is suggested that research-based evidence is needed to establish policies and practices that will enable schools to be developed as community hubs through joined-up approaches that involve enduring partnerships between educators, governments, and communities.
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Verhelst, Dries, Anna Mogren, Jelle Boeve-de Pauw, and Peter Van Petegem. "Getting to a Whole School Approach: Lessons From School Effectiveness and School Improvement in ESD Research." In Sustainable Development Goals Series, 71–86. Cham: Springer International Publishing, 2024. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-56172-6_5.
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AbstractThis chapter highlights the challenges faced by schools in implementing a whole school approach (WSA) for education for sustainable development (ESD) and suggests a potential reason for these challenges. While much of the current ESD research has focused on curricula and pedagogy, the chapter argues that an effective organizational context is crucial for implementing any school-wide approach. However, the factors that shape such an enabling context have largely remained unexplored in ESD research. The chapter suggests that SE and SI research can provide valuable insights into how the organizational characteristics of a school can facilitate the implementation and outcomes of ESD. By combining both perspectives, the chapter aims to foster a better understanding of how an effective WSA for ESD can be conceptualized and implemented.
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Kvalsund, Rune. "Bigger or Better? Research-Based Reflections on the Cultural Deconstruction of Rural Schools in Norway: Metaperspectives." In Knowledge and Space, 179–217. Cham: Springer International Publishing, 2019. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-18799-6_10.
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Feldhoff, Tobias, Katharina Maag Merki, Arnoud Oude Groote Beverborg, and Falk Radisch. "Concept and Design Developments in School Improvement Research: General Discussion and Outlook for Further Research." In Accountability and Educational Improvement, 303–12. Cham: Springer International Publishing, 2021. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-69345-9_13.
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AbstractThis book aimed to present innovative designs, measurement instruments, and analysis methods by way of illustrative studies. Through these methodology and design developments, the complexity of school improvement in the context of new governance and accountability measures can be better depicted in future research projects. In this concluding chapter, we discuss what strengths the presented methodologies and designs have and to what extent they do better justice to the multilevel, complex, and dynamic nature of school improvement than previous approaches. In addition, we outline some needs for future research in order to gain new perspectives for future studies.
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Schweitzer, Reinhard. "Introduction." In IMISCOE Research Series, 1–7. Cham: Springer International Publishing, 2022. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-91731-9_1.
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AbstractWhat happens in institutions like schools or hospitals when local service provision overlaps with the control of national borders? Such overlap is unavoidable if unlawful residents are to be excluded from mainstream public services. With this explicit aim, governments not only modify the rules and established practices of welfare provision, but also encourage the people who administer and deliver these services to incorporate the logic of immigration control into their everyday work. To identify and better understand the concrete mechanisms that either help or hinder such internalisation of immigration control, this study systematically compares three spheres of service provision – healthcare, education and social assistance – across two distinctive legal-political environments: Barcelona/Spain and London/UK. Looking at official policies as well as their implementation, it primarily draws on a total of almost 90 semi-structured interviews with irregular residents, providers and administrators of local services, and representatives of NGOs and local government. Its innovative analytical framework helps to map and explain the significant variation in how immigration control works within different institutions and how individual actors occupying key positions in these can reproduce, contest, or readjust formal structures of inclusion and exclusion.
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Kvan, Thomas. "Space Are Places in Which We Learn." In Teacher Transition into Innovative Learning Environments, 1–8. Singapore: Springer Singapore, 2020. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-7497-9_1.
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AbstractWe make and occupy spaces for purposeful activities. Significant investments are made in learning spaces in schools without adequate consideration of pedagogical and architectural issues. This chapter notes that it is a broad and multifaceted challenge to guide capital investments that deliver better learning outcomes in schools. It introduces the research presented in this volume and some of the underlying concepts and considerations embedded in the work of LEaRN and the projects described in following chapters.
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Bozdağ, Çiğdem. "Digital Inclusion Through Distribution of iPads During the Covid19 Pandemic? A Participatory Action Research in a German Secondary School." In Palgrave Studies in Digital Inequalities, 129–46. Cham: Springer International Publishing, 2024. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-28930-9_7.
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AbstractThe research on digital inequalities today not only focuses on inequalities related to access, but also on digital skills and outcomes of digital media use (van Deursen AJ, Helsper EJ, The third-level digital divide: Who benefits most from being online? In: Communication and information technologies annual, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, 2015; Ragnedda M, The third digital divide: A Weberian approach to digital inequalities. Routledge, 2016). However, the access inequalities are still an issue that needs to be scrutinized even in the context of the developed countries especially in relation to quality and quantity of technology access and maintenance issues (Gonzales A, Inf Commun Soc 19:234–248, 2016; van Deursen AJ, Van Dijk JA, New Media & Society 21:354–375, 2019). Focusing on the case of the distribution of iPads for all students in primary and secondary schools in the state of Bremen during the Covid19 pandemic, this chapter discusses if and how hardware distribution projects can be successful for mitigating the digital inequalities among the young people. The presented analysis is based on a participatory action research project that was conducted in a secondary school that is based in a socioeconomically disadvantaged and culturally diverse school in Bremen. The empirical data that will be discussed here consists of participatory observations from January 2020 to April 2021 and three rounds of focus groups with the students. The chapter discusses how the iPad project was perceived by the students before and after the distribution of the iPads and how they were used for distance education during school closures. The chapter will argue that the project was successful for mitigating the immediate effects of school closures by helping the students to interact more with their teachers and structure their days better by following the school’s online classes. However, the students also raised serious concerns about the maintenance of the devices as well as the risks of surveillance by the teachers and the school administration.
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Rickinson, Mark, Lucas Walsh, Mandy Salisbury, Joanne Gleeson, and Connie Cirkony. "Using research evidence to improve practice." In Building Better Schools with Evidence-based Policy, 239–46. Routledge, 2021. http://dx.doi.org/10.4324/9781003025955-32.
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"A science of performance: Research and development partnerships." In Designing Better Schools for Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Children, 155–71. Routledge, 2011. http://dx.doi.org/10.4324/9780203835821-17.
Full textConference papers on the topic "Research for Better Schools"
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Kimbell, Richard. "Sharing and securing learners’ performance standards across schools." In Research Conference 2022: Reimagining assessment. Australian Council for Educational Research, 2022. http://dx.doi.org/10.37517/978-1-74286-685-7-6.
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Assessing learners’ performance makes very different demands upon teachers depending on the purpose and the context of the assessment. But common to all assessment is some sense of what ‘quality’ looks like. Most often teachers engage in formative assessments in the classroom, and the familiar standards of the classroom are adequate for this purpose. However if teachers are to undertake external, nationally regulated assessment then some sense of a national standard of quality is required. But there are very limited mechanisms by which teachers can acquire this understanding, so they use their best judgement, and standards vary from school to school not because anyone is attempting to cheat the system but simply because they cannot know what the real national standard is. It is for this reason that regulated examination bodies follow some process such as the following from the State Examinations Commission (SEC) in Ireland. ‘… teacher estimated marks will be subjected to an in-school alignment process and later a national standardisation process’. (SEC, 2021). How much simpler it would all be if teachers had – as a matter of normal practice – access to, and familiarity with, work from a national sample of schools, not just their own classroom. Adaptive Comparative Judgement (ACJ) is an online assessment tool that has been used for some years, principally as a formative tool for learners (e.g. Bartholomew et al., 2018; 2019). This presentation reports on a study of the new ACJ Steady State tool from the same stable. The purpose of the new tool is to solve the problem of variable standards across schools by enabling teachers to make paired judgements of work from multiple schools and thereby evolve and agree standards of performance beyond their own school. The current study is operating in Ireland with a group of schools, a university, and the SEC. The anticipated outcomes include 1) better consistency of performance standards across schools in the research group and 2) greater understanding of and confidence in assessment judgements by the teachers. If ACJ has proved to be a powerful formative assessment tool for learners, ACJ Steady State is designed to be a formative assessment tool for teachers, helping to inform and support their assessment judgements.
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Richardson, Sarah, and Sladana Krstic. "Using assessment data to improve equity: How teachers use insights from the Scottish National Standardised Assessments." In Research Conference 2021: Excellent progress for every student. Australian Council for Educational Research, 2021. http://dx.doi.org/10.37517/978-1-74286-638-3_10.
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Evidence-based decision-making is regarded as an important indicator of quality in schools around the world. Using data gathered from assessments, in conjunction with other insights, can help school leaders and teachers better meet the needs of learners. In schools that cater to disadvantaged learners, using data to design targeted interventions plays an important role in improving equity. In this paper we report on a study with five schools in Scotland. All schools had learner cohorts characterised by multiple layers of disadvantage. Informed by the theoretical underpinnings of sensemaking theory, we investigated how teachers and school leaders used data from the Scottish National Standardised Assessments (SNSA). Our findings suggest that teachers and leaders are adept at combining assessment data with other insights – including their own observations. All schools were active in using data to inform decision-making, both at the whole-school level and at the classroom level. They reported multiple uses of data, from validating their own instincts to targeting support to particular cohorts of learners. We suggest that the way in which SNSA is designed – explicitly providing data to teachers to help inform their professional judgement – is a factor in the positive approach to data usage among these schools.
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Stagg, Mackenzie, and Emily McGlohn. "Rural Studio and the Front Porch Initiative: The Opportunities and Challenges of Place-Based Research." In Schools of Thought Conference. University of Oklahoma, 2020. http://dx.doi.org/10.15763/11244/335063.
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Harnessing the applied student research developed through design-build projects at Auburn University Rural Studio, the Front Porch Initiative aims to develop a scalable, sustainable, and resilient process for delivering homes in underserved rural communities. Student research forms the basis for the Initiative’s work, which extends its reach and impact through collaboration with housing providers and policymakers. A unique process of prototype home development and versioning of the homes engages students in the research of home affordability at different points in their architectural education. Graduate students undertake a comprehensive project: designing, developing, and ultimately building a prototype home for a local client in Rural Studio’s West Alabama service area. Third-year undergraduate students then utilize those prototypes for in-depth study and development of a specific topic related to contemporary issues in housing, such as accessibility, energy performance, material research, or emerging building technologies. Faculty working through the Front Porch Initiative can synthesize that information and deliver it as products to housing providers outside of Rural Studio’s service area. Currently, student research is driven by the particular demands of creating housing in the rural communities of West Alabama. This provides students the opportunity to deeply investigate and respond to local conditions, a key component of Rural Studio’s teaching pedagogy. However, as the Front Porch Initiative continues to expand the geographic, climatic, and sociocultural footprint of the housing research, Rural Studio faces new and different challenges and opportunities presented by other localities. As the Studio moves forward, it works to better understand how the local and particular can inform a broader conversation on rural housing while educating the next generation of citizen architects.
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Onyewuchi, Francis A., Michael A. Adewusi, Peter Okebukola, Tokunbo Odekeye, Olasunkanmi Gbeleyi, and Fred Awaah. "Breaking the Backbone of Difficult Concepts in the New Secondary School Physics Curriculum in Africa." In 28th iSTEAMS Multidisciplinary Research Conference AIUWA The Gambia. Society for Multidisciplinary and Advanced Research Techniques - Creative Research Publishers, 2021. http://dx.doi.org/10.22624/aims/isteams-2021/v28n3p7.
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The new senior secondary school physics curriculum for Anglophone West African countries came into use in 2015. Since the beginning of its implementation, even though, the performance of the candidates has not been high, yet reported empirical studies on the difficulty level of the content, and specifically the topics or concepts have been scant. Moreover, there have never been any published studies which conducted an in-depth probe into the aspects of the topics students find difficult in physics and science in general, beyond mere cataloguing of such topics, nor have there been any, in which students were qualitatively engaged in making inputs towards the amelioration of the topic difficulty. This is a huge gap in literature which this study determined to fill. The effort is significant to the extent that understanding the areas of difficulties of the topics as perceived by the students is good pointer towards remedy by teachers and stakeholders. The study therefore undertook five missions: (a) to find out the topics in the new physics curriculum that secondary school students find difficult (b) undertake in-depth probe of the specific aspects of the topics for which students have learning difficulty. (c) probe the possible causes of or factors responsible for these difficulties (d) determine if school location, school ownership and students’ gender have impacts on students’ perception of physics topics difficulty; and (e) deriving from students’ views, suggest how physics can be made easy to learn. A sample of 1,105 students was drawn from 21 secondary schools in Nigeria and Ghana. These schools comprised 12 private and nine public schools randomly selected from rural and urban areas. 75% of the schools were urban while about 25% were rural. Randomly selected 10 students and five teachers were interviewed for qualitative data, while all the participants were involved in responding to the questionnaire. From data gathered, five top most difficult topics were refractive index, electromagnetism, radioactivity, curved lenses and sound: production, propagation and modulation. Rich qualitative data unique for this study, was reported. There was marked difference between urban and rural, private and public, but not in gender. Recommendations were made for better teaching and meaningful learning. Keywords: Backbone of difficult topics; meaningful learning of physics
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Mohamed, Hamda Ali. "Case Study of Teachers’ and Students’ Perspectives on Co-teaching Models used in Qatar’s Middle Schools." In Qatar University Annual Research Forum & Exhibition. Qatar University Press, 2021. http://dx.doi.org/10.29117/quarfe.2021.0186.
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This research aims to have a substantial glance at the middle schools in Qatar, which adopted co-teaching models, where special education teachers and general education teachers collaborate to teach students in an inclusive environment. Therefore, we want to recognize the problems faced by teachers, along with students, in terms of the efficacy of the co-teaching model as a way of learning, and even though the model is successful globally, it is better to determine if there are any concerns locally about the model, so that we implement it locally with an efficient approach.
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Carballo, Fábio Peron. "Education – High school – And the importance of teaching didactics." In V Seven International Multidisciplinary Congress. Seven Congress, 2024. http://dx.doi.org/10.56238/sevenvmulti2024-022.
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The present study was based on a methodology permeated by bibliographical research and qualitative research, with the application of a questionnaire to high school students from two State Schools in the city of Divinópolis/MG. The objective of the research was to identify the factors that lead high school students to be interested in Physical Education classes, as well as seeking to understand the attitude of the Physical Education teacher in this reality. The results obtained pointed to a more detailed description and better assimilation of the study.
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Al-thani, Noora, Jolly Bhadra, Nitha Siby, Enas Elhawary, and Azza Saad. "Innovative Tool to Educate High School Students through Research Based Learning." In Qatar University Annual Research Forum & Exhibition. Qatar University Press, 2020. http://dx.doi.org/10.29117/quarfe.2020.0260.
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The need for enhanced engagement of school students for better behavioral outcomes in line with scientific learning and acquisition of science process skills have continually incited educators to strategize innovative teaching approaches. Meanwhile, innovations and research from the scientific community has consistently been prioritized, demanding highly skilled STEM labor in the global market, henceforth challenging educators to brace the next generation with high proficiency in STEM fields. The research study focuses on an out of school approach that caters to the industrial demands in STEM workforce, henceforth acquainting the high school students with research methodology for improving their technical efficiency and intellectual capacity in problem solving and critical thinking. The study program was conducted on 208 students from public schools in Qatar, who participated in 68 research projects, each project being engaged by a group students during a period of 2 months at Qatar University research laboratories. The performance of participants were analyzed by mixed methods implementing both quantitative data based on questionnaires and qualitative data based on feedback interviews from research mentors, schoolteachers and the participant students. The results of the program yielded positive outcomes from the stakeholders as the school students gained competences exhibited by under-graduate or graduate students like research self-efficacy, research skills and aspirations for scientific careers, accomplishing the objectives of the program. This study program henceforth was successful in bridging the gap between high school and university, as the participant students had an advantage in confidence over their peers in university laboratories and technical writing assignments.
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Waweru, B. W., H. K. Yap, K. Y. Phan, P. S. JosephNg, and H. C. Eaw. "Gamesy: How Videogames Serve as a Better Replacement for School?" In 2020 IEEE Student Conference on Research and Development (SCOReD). IEEE, 2020. http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/scored50371.2020.9250930.
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Lopes, Alessandro Souza, and Renata Schirrmeister. "Quality of life management at work in public schools: Inquiries in municipal schools." In VI Seven International Multidisciplinary Congress. Seven Congress, 2024. http://dx.doi.org/10.56238/sevenvimulti2024-042.
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Having systematic mechanisms for Quality of Life Management may not guarantee better conditions in the workplace, but it provides guidance and enables anticipation and control of what may negatively impact people's health and the organization's results. The absence of these mechanisms leads to reactive management without traceability of the origins of problems, in addition to not enabling organizational evolution. This article seeks to explore the reasons why a Municipal Department of Education does not have mechanisms for Quality Management in the Workplace. A qualitative study was conducted, with document analysis, and it was noted that the laws and standards that regulate the hiring of managers emphasize training in pedagogy, to the detriment of greater specialization in administration. And managers, on a daily basis, need to make management decisions. The study indicates, for further research, that the lack of training of management personnel impacts the environment and the quality of these decisions, generating several consequences for the effectiveness of schools.
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Khalimon, Ekaterina, Irina Brikoshina, and Artem Geokchakyan. "Ideological Leadership in Bani Environment." In 11th IPMA Research Conference “Research Resonating with Project Practices”. International Project Management Association – IPMA, Project Management Research Committee (PMRC), China and Hohai University, Nanjing, China, 2023. http://dx.doi.org/10.56889/icpm9485.
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The topic of leadership remains one of the most relevant topics in various studies: from schools, colleges, universities, individual spheres of economic activity and ending with leadership on a global scale. During the preparation of this study, over 6000 scientific articles have been found over the past 30 years, which consider various types of leadership in targeting a specific country, field of activity and in experiments with students. The purpose of this study is to cluster different types of leadership in order to understand the general idea, as well as to explain the phenomenon of “ideological leadership”, which is relevant today for countries under sanctions pressure or in a state of war. The results of this study can serve as a basis for a better understanding, definition and justification of the phenomenon of ideological leadership for the possibility of determining the level of formation of such leadership, using and building it in projects, organizations, spheres of activity and at the state level.
Reports on the topic "Research for Better Schools"
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Das, Jishnu, Joanna Härmä, Lant Pritchett, and Jason Silberstein. Forum: Why and How the Public vs. Private Schooling Debate Needs to Change. Research on Improving Systems of Education (RISE), March 2023. http://dx.doi.org/10.35489/bsg-rise-misc_2023/12.
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“Are private schools better than public schools?” This ubiquitous debate in low- and middle-income countries is the wrong one to have. The foreword and three essays collected in this Forum each explore how to move past the stuck “public vs. private” binary. Jason Silberstein is a Research Fellow at RISE. His foreword is titled “A Shift in Perspective: Zooming Out from School Type and Bringing Neighborhood Education Systems into Focus.” It summarizes the current state of the “public vs. private” debate, outlines an alternative approach focused on neighborhood education systems, and then synthesizes key findings from the other essays. Jishnu Das has conducted decades of research on school systems in low-income countries, including in Zambia, India, and Pakistan. His essay is titled “The Emergence and Consequence of Schooling Markets.” It describes exactly what schooling markets look like in Pakistan, including the incredible variance in school quality in both public and private schools within the same village. Das then reviews the evidence on how to engineer local education markets to improve learning in all schools, including polices that have underdelivered (e.g., vouchers) and more promising policies (e.g., finance and information structured to take advantage of inter-school competition, and a focus on the lowest performing public schools). Das’ research on Pakistan is available through leaps.hks.harvard.edu, which also houses the data and documentation for the project. Lant Pritchett writes from a global lens grounded in his work on systems thinking in education. His essay is titled “Schooling Ain’t Just Learning: Controlling the Means of Producing Citizens.” It observes that governments supply, and families demand, education for many reasons. The academic emphasis on one of these reasons, producing student learning, has underweighted the critical importance of other features of education, in particular the socialization function of schooling, which more persuasively explain patterns of provision of both public school and different kinds of private schools. With this key fact in mind, Pritchett argues that there is a strong liberty case for allowing private schools, but that calls for governments to fund them are either uncompelling or “aggressively missing the point”. Joanna Härmä has done mixed-methods research on private schools across many cities and rural areas in sub-Saharan Africa and India, and has also founded a heavily-subsidized private school in Uttar Pradesh, India. Her essay responds to both Das and Pritchett and is titled “Why We Need to Stop Worrying About People’s Coping Mechanism for the ‘Global Learning Crisis’—Their Preference for Low-Fee Private Schools”. It outlines the different forces behind the rise of low-fee private schools and asserts that both the international development sector and governments have failed to usefully respond. Policy toward these private schools is sometimes overzealous, as seen in regulatory regimes that in practice are mostly used to extract bribes, and at other times overly solicitous, as seen in government subsidies that would usually be better spent improving the worst government schools. Perhaps, Härmä concludes, “we should leave well enough alone.”
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Marchais, Gauthier, Sweta Gupta, and Cyril Owen Brandt. Student Wellbeing in Contexts of Protracted Violent Conflict. Institute of Development Studies (IDS), September 2021. http://dx.doi.org/10.19088/ids.2021.055.
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In contexts of protracted violent conflict, school environments play a key role in children’s psychological, social, and emotional wellbeing. Research by the REALISE education project in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) provides a better understanding of how violent conflict penetrates schools; the relationship between school staff, students, parents, and the local community; and the role of children’s social entourage. It identifies key considerations for education projects operating in these contexts and how they can best support the wellbeing of children, including those who are extremely isolated or experience marginalisation on the basis of gender or minority status.
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Pautz Stephenson, Stefani, Rebecca Banks, and Merijke Coenraad. Outcomes of Increased Practitioner Engagement in Edtech Development: How Strong, Sustainable Research-Practice-Industry Partnerships will Build a Better Edtech Future. Digital Promise, June 2022. http://dx.doi.org/10.51388/20.500.12265/158.
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A new participatory research model, Research-Practice-Industry Partnerships (RPIP), presents a unique value proposition. Design processes have typically placed professional designers, not the end users, at the center of the work. RPIPs create an intentional feedback loop that transforms the knowledge, action, or goals of all involved parties (Baker et al., 2022). RPIP aims to create better designs for scalable technologies that both meet the needs of educators and incorporate research from the learning sciences. This yields a product more likely to be used, used appropriately, and have the desired impact for learners. Digital Promise partnered with edtech startup Merlyn Mind and the University of California, Irvine (UCI) in an RPIP. This white paper describes our engagement and suggests that this model can yield positive impacts and new learning for all participants. Surveys and interviews with participants showed that engagement was mutually valued among all parties, practitioners learned more about AI and edtech in general, and Merlyn Mind staff learned more about working with schools and educators. Practitioners also benefited from the networking and collaboration that participation in the RPIP brought and felt it helped them grow professionally.
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Emerson, Sue, Lesley Ferkins, Gaye Bryham, and Mieke Sieuw. Young People and Leadership: Questions of Access in Secondary Schools. Unitec ePress, September 2016. http://dx.doi.org/10.34074/ocds.0291.
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There is seemingly an abundance of leadership opportunities available to youth within school environments, including sport captaincy, sport coaching, prefect roles, and assigned arts or cultural leadership. For many students, the opportunity to captain a sports team, or lead an event or activity is perceived as their first taste of leadership action. However, as evidenced in a growing body of literature (Jackson & Parry, 2011), leadership is increasingly being conceived as much more than an assigned formal position. Furthermore, there is some evidence to suggest that formal leadership roles may be presenting barriers for students wishing to access leadership opportunities in a more informal capacity (McNae, 2011). In this conceptual article, we examine the value and nature of informal leadership practices, and from this, identify questions of access to leadership for youth in secondary school settings. Specifically, the aim of our paper is to advance current conceptualisations about youth leadership and to offer future research directions (via questions) to establish a deeper evidence base for better understanding access to leadership for youth. To achieve this, we explore three interrelated themes: leadership practices and accessibility for youth; learning through leadership for youth; youth access and the notion that leadership belongs to everybody. As a result of the platform provided by our conceptualising, a series of questions are presented for future research. Directions for future research relate to understanding more about formal and informal leadership opportunities in the secondary school context, what we will hear when we listen to the student’s voice about access to these opportunities, and how informal leadership opportunities might influence overall access to leadership for students.
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Bano, Masooda. The Missing Link: Low-Fee Private Tuition and Education Options for the Poor – The Demand-Side Dynamics in Pakistan. Research on Improving Systems of Education (RISE), September 2022. http://dx.doi.org/10.35489/bsg-risewp_2022/113.
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Low-fee private schools are today recognised as important players in the education market in developing countries, as they are argued to provide at least marginally better education than is on offer in the state schools. Leading international development agencies have begun encouraging governments in developing countries to include them within the policy-planning process. Based on fieldwork in two urban neighbourhoods in Pakistan, this paper shows that low-income parents are keen to secure good-quality education for their children, but they have to choose not only between state schools and low-fee private schools but also from among an array of low-fee tuition providers in their immediate neighbourhood to ensure that the child can cope in class, complete daily homework assignments, and pass exams in order to transition to the next grade. The evidence presented in this paper suggests that whether their child is enrolled in a state school or in a low-fee private school, the parents’ dependence on low-fee tuition providers is absolute: without their services, the child will not progress through the primary grades. Yet the sector remains entirely under-researched. The paper argues for the need to map the scale of this sector, document the household spending on it, and bring it within policy debates, placing it alongside low-fee private schools and state schools in order to provide access to primary education to all and improve the quality of education. At the same time it complicates the existing debates on low-fee private schools, by showing that parents on very low incomes — in this case households where mothers are employed as domestic workers and fathers are in casual employment — find them inaccessible; it also shows that household spending on education needs to take into account not just the charges imposed by low-fee schools, but also the cost of securing religious education, which is equally valued by the parents and is not free, and also the cost of paying the low-fee tuition provider. When all these costs are taken into account, the concerns that low-fee private schools are not truly accessible to the poor gain further traction. The paper also shows that mothers end up bearing the primary burden, having to work to cover the costs of their children’s education, because the core income provided by the father can barely cover the household costs.
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Bano, Masooda. Low-Fee Private-Tuition Providers in Developing Countries: An Under-Appreciated and Under- Studied Market—Supply-Side Dynamics in Pakistan. Research on Improving Systems of Education (RISE), August 2022. http://dx.doi.org/10.35489/bsg-rise-wp_2022/107.
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Although low-income parents’ dependence on low-fee private schools has been actively documented in the past decade, existing research and policy discussions have failed to recognise their heavy reliance on low-fee tuition providers in order to ensure that their children complete the primary cycle. By mapping a vibrant supply of low-fee tuition providers in two neighbourhoods in the twin cities of Rawalpindi and Islamabad in Pakistan, this paper argues for understanding the supply-side dynamics of this segment of the education market with the aim of designing better-informed policies, making better use of public spending on supporting private-sector players to reach the poor. Contrary to what is assumed in studies of the private tuition market, the low-fee tuition providers offering services in the Pakistani urban neighbourhoods are not teachers in government schools trying to make extra money by offering afternoon tutorial to children from their schools. Working from their homes, the tutors featured in this paper are mostly women who often have no formal teacher training but are imaginative in their use of a diverse set of teaching techniques to ensure that children from low-income households who cannot get support for education at home cope with their daily homework assignments and pass the annual exams to transition to the next grade. These tutors were motivated to offer tuition by a combination of factors ranging from the need to earn a living, a desire to stay productively engaged, and for some a commitment to help poor children. Arguing that parents expect them to take full responsibility for their children’s educational attainment, these providers view the poor quality of education in schools, the weak maternal involvement in children’s education, and changing cultural norms, whereby children no longer respect authority, as being key to explaining the prevailing low educational levels. The paper presents evidence that the private tuition providers, who may be viewed as education entrepreneurs, have the potential to be used by the state and development agencies to provide better quality education to children from low-income families.
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Lavadenz, Magaly, Sheila Cassidy, Elvira G. Armas, Rachel Salivar, Grecya V. Lopez, and Amanda A. Ross. Sobrato Early Academic Language (SEAL) Model: Final Report of Findings from a Four-Year Study. Center for Equity for English Learners, Loyola Marymount University, 2020. http://dx.doi.org/10.15365/ceel.seal2020.
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The Sobrato Early Academic Language (SEAL) Model Research and Evaluation Final Report is comprised of three sets of studies that took place between 2015 and 2019 to examine the effectiveness of the SEAL Model in 67 schools within 12 districts across the state of California. Over a decade ago, the Sobrato Family Foundation responded to the enduring opportunity gaps and low academic outcomes for the state’s 1.2 million English Learners by investing in the design of the SEAL Model. The SEAL PreK–Grade 3 Model was created as a whole-school initiative to develop students’ language, literacy, and academic skills. The pilot study revealed promising findings, and the large-scale implementation of SEAL was launched in 2013. This report addresses a set of research questions and corresponding studies focused on: 1) the perceptions of school and district-level leaders regarding district and school site implementation of the SEAL Model, 2) teachers’ development and practices, and 3) student outcomes. The report is organized in five sections, within which are twelve research briefs that address the three areas of study. Technical appendices are included in each major section. A developmental evaluation process with mixed methods research design was used to answer the research questions. Key findings indicate that the implementation of the SEAL Model has taken root in many schools and districts where there is evidence of systemic efforts or instructional improvement for the English Learners they serve. In regards to teachers’ development and practices, there were statistically significant increases in the use of research-based practices for English Learners. Teachers indicated a greater sense of efficacy in addressing the needs of this population and believe the model has had a positive impact on their knowledge and skills to support the language and literacy development of PreK- Grade 3 English Learners. Student outcome data reveal that despite SEAL schools averaging higher rates of poverty compared to the statewide rate, SEAL English Learners in grades 2–4 performed comparably or better than California English Learners in developing their English proficiency; additional findings show that an overwhelming majority of SEAL students are rapidly progressing towards proficiency thus preventing them from becoming long-term English Learners. English Learners in bilingual programs advanced in their development of Spanish, while other English Learners suffered from language loss in Spanish. The final section of the report provides considerations and implications for further SEAL replication, sustainability, additional research and policy.
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Freeman, Nerelie. What schools could do to better support neurodiverse girls. Edited by Grace Jennings-Edquist. Monash University, July 2024. http://dx.doi.org/10.54377/2ce7-a3f6.
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Artuso, Filippo, Katrina Barnes, Duncan Green, and Irene Guijt. Emergent Agency in a Time of COVID-19: Research report. Oxfam GB; Atlantic Fellows for Social and Economic Equity, LSE, February 2023. http://dx.doi.org/10.21201/2022.8885.
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The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic was an unprecedented event in the modern era. Earlier studies demonstrated how ‘critical junctures’, which comprise major historical events and emergencies, often play an essential role in social change. This paper seeks to explore whether the COVID-19 pandemic would prove to be a similar pivotal moment, and what lessons and insights we could gather for positive social change. The research set out to find key insights on how individuals, communities, and organizations in civil society were responding to the pandemic in low-income populations at the intersection of multiple inequalities. These lessons could inform how donors, governments and NGOs might reshape their efforts to reduce emerging or deepening inequalities, and how civil society organisations and community-based organisations could amplify their positive impacts. Over 18 months, from September 2020 to March 2022, the ‘Emergent Agency’ research convened a global conversation between activists, development practitioners, researchers, and academics to better understand the phenomena that were taking place in response to the pandemic. The research collected more than 200 case studies and held a series of webinars and conversations in thematic clusters to uncover what these responses could teach us. The research project was enabled with funding from The Atlantic Fellows for Social and Economic Equity programme (AFSEE) of the London School of Economics.
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Ogwuike, Clinton Obinna, and Chimere Iheonu. Stakeholder Perspectives on Improving Educational Outcomes in Enugu State. Research on Improving Systems of Education (RISE), November 2021. http://dx.doi.org/10.35489/bsg-rise-ri_2021/034.
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Education remains crucial for socioeconomic development and is linked to improved quality of life. In Nigeria, basic education has remained poor and is characterised by unhealthy attributes, including low quality infrastructure and a lack of effective management of primary and secondary schools. Access to education is a massive issue—according to the United Nations, there are currently about 10.5 million out of school children in Nigeria, and 1 in every 5 of the world’s out-of-school-children lives in Nigeria despite the fact that primary education in Nigeria is free. A considerable divide exists between the northern and southern regions of Nigeria, with the southern region performing better across most education metrics. That said, many children in southern Nigeria also do not go to school. In Nigeria’s South West Zone, 2016 data from the Nigerian Federal Ministry of Education reveals that Lagos State has the highest number of out of school children with more than 560,000 children aged 6-11 not going to school. In the South South Zone, Rivers State has the highest number of out-of-school children; more than 900,000 children aged 6-11 are not able to access education in this state. In Enugu State in the South East Zone, there are more than 340,000 children who do not have access to schooling (2016 is the most recent year high-quality data is available—these numbers have likely increased due to the impacts of COVID-19). As part of its political economy research project, the RISE Nigeria team conducted surveys of education stakeholders in Enugu State including teachers, parents, school administrators, youth leaders, religious leaders, and others in December 2020. The team also visited 10 schools in Nkanu West Local Government Area (LGA), Nsukka LGA, and Udi LGA to speak to administrators and teachers, and assess conditions. It then held three RISE Education Summits, in which RISE team members facilitated dialogues between stakeholders and political leaders about improving education policies and outcomes in Enugu. These types of interactions are rare in Nigeria and have the potential to impact the education sector by increasing local demand for quality education and government accountability in providing it. Inputs from the surveys in the LGAs determined the education sector issues included in the agenda for the meeting, which political leaders were able to see in advance. The Summits culminated with the presentation of a social contract, which the team hopes will aid stakeholders in the education sector in monitoring the government’s progress on education priorities. This article draws on stakeholder surveys and conversations, insights from the Education Summits, school visits, and secondary data to provide an overview of educational challenges in Enugu State with a focus on basic education. It then seeks to highlight potential solutions to these problems based on local stakeholders’ insights from the surveys and the outcomes of the Education Summits.