What's in a rating?

We examine the relationship between the formal ratings that principals give teachers and a variety of observable teacher characteristics, including proxies for productivity. Prior work has shown that principals can differentiate between more and less effective teachers, especially at the tails of the quality distribution, and that subjective evaluations of teachers are strongly correlated with subsequent student achievement. However, whereas prior work has relied on survey data, we consider formal ratings from a setting in which the stakes are reasonably high. We find that the ratings are correlated with an array of teacher qualities including experience for young teachers, education credentials, and teacher absenteeism. Our finding that principals reward qualities of teachers known to be related to student productivity provides reason to be optimistic about policies that would assign more weight to principal evaluations of teachers in career decisions and compensation.     

Gender & Education Association: a case study in feminist education?

This article focuses on feminist activist academics who were instrumental in creating the UK Gender & Education Association at the turn of the twenty-first century. Drawing on my own intellectual biography (David, M. E. 2003. Personal and Political: Feminisms, Sociology and Family Lives Stoke-on-Trent. Trentham Books.) linked to the collective biography and life history of feminism in academia over the last 50 years, Feminism, Gender & Universities: Politics, Passion and Pedagogies (David, M. E. 2014. Feminism, Gender & Universities: Politics, Passion & Pedagogies. Farnham: Wheatsheaf.), I consider how we, as feminist educators, developed our pedagogies and professional approaches to gender and education. In so doing, I also look at three cohorts or generations of feminist academics, from the university pioneers of second-wave feminists like myself, through to those who might be considered third wave feminists. In this it is clear that whilst feminist values of women's liberation and/or gender equality shine through, there are clear differences of emphasis. This is in relation to personal, political and professional values, and approaches to education through teaching or the social sciences. Indeed, neither feminism nor gender was in the lexicon of higher education or public policy when we were starting out, and by the third cohort gender equality had become incorporated into forms of neo-liberalism. In reviewing the developments of feminisms in higher education, I also look towards what might be considered a feminist future in global higher education, given learning from previous waves to new waves of feminists such as fourth wave and beyond. Here I briefly consider the work of our EU Daphne funded research project (2013–2015) into challenging gender-related violence (GRV) through education and training for professionals working with children and young people.     

Do tuition fees affect enrollment behavior? Evidence from a ‘natural experiment’ in Germany

This paper uses the introduction of tuition fees in seven of the sixteen German states in 2007 as a natural experiment to identify the effects of tuition prices on enrollment probabilities. Based on information on enrollment decisions of the entire population of high-school graduates between 2002 and 2008, I find a negative effect of tuition fees on enrollment behavior. The effect is larger than in existing studies for European countries, but of a similar magnitude as effects identified with U.S. data. A potential spill-over effect of the policy intervention to the comparison group is accounted for by using the estimation results to calibrate a structural model of the enrollment decision.     

The Parenting Early Intervention Programme in England, 2006–2011; a classed experience?

Family policy was a key component of the ‘New’ Labour government's family, social and education policy, and a wide range of family focused initiatives and interventions designed to ‘support’ families and improve individual, family and social outcomes were introduced. The post‐May 2010 coalition government's family policy exhibits key elements of policy continuity. There have been strong, class‐based critiques of this approach to social policy, which have argued that policies were informed by a project to recreate the working class. A key English family policy initiative, the Parenting Early Intervention Programme (PEIP) ran from September 2006–March 2011. The national evaluation of the PEIP was a large scale combined methods study of the implementation of parenting programmes in all local authorities in England, and forms the evidential base of this article which was built upon the completion, by participating parents, of three standardised pre and post parenting course questionnaires (N = 4446). A sample of 133 participating parents was also interviewed using semi‐structured interview schedules. The evidence from the PEIP evaluation showed the heterogeneous class nature of the PEIP cohorts, which over the roll‐out of the initiative, incorporated a larger number of middle class parents. In addition, the qualitative data indicated that parents had strongly positive participant perceptions of PEIP courses, characterised by ‘mutual reach’, and did not experience the courses in classed terms.The evidence from the quantitative and qualitative data collected for the national evaluation suggests that it is difficult to conceptualise the PEIP, as an example of the Labour government's family policy, in class terms—such an approach requires, at the least, major qualification.     

Is calculus a failure in cryptography?

There is a fundamental distinction between the way numbers are viewed in calculus on the one hand and in number theory on the other. It is the number theorists’ view that is handy in cryptography. The suitability of calculus (or lack of it) for cryptography is discussed.     

Christian Schools in a Pluralistic Society?

The central question of this article is whether separate Christian schools are defensible in a pluralistic liberal democracy. This question is answered from the perspective of Christian parents and based on the premise that these parents want to send their children to separate Christian schools. We argue that Christian education and separate Christian schools can be compatible with civic education of children towards a liberal democratic citizen, but that for some Christian communities this will not be easily achieved.     

Financing access and participation in primary education: Is there a ‘fast-track’ for fragile states?

Despite moves to ‘fast-track’ progress towards universal primary education, few fragile states have been able to access Fast Track Initiative (FTI) funding facilities. Weak systems and capacity have made these countries a high-risk proposition for donor investment. The absence of credible education sector plans has meant that the majority of fragile states are not eligible for endorsement to receive financial resources via the FTI. The analysis presented in this paper suggests that the FTI has struggled to identify suitable channels for resourcing education in these difficult development environments. Importantly, it finds that procedural and governance issues in particular have presented obstacles that have stymied the promotion of wider access to education in fragile states under the FTI umbrella.     

Educational reform in North Cyprus—Towards the making of a nation/state?

The Turkish Republic of North Cyprus (TRNC) aspires to take its place in Europe and the global ‘knowledge economy’. In order to do so, it needs not only to be politically recognised as legitimate and to develop the kinds of economic and governance structures that signify a functional state, but also to produce a cultural imaginary of itself as a nation. In this paper, we mobilise Appadurai's theorisation of deterritorialisation, flows and context generation in order to examine the ways in which the implementation of educational reforms in TRNC might contribute to this ambition. We show that the ethnoscape and financescape combine to make education reform difficult, with specific challenges arising from the mixed commitment of the workforce, the capacity of the education bureaucracy to align support with policy mandates, and the ‘fit’ between the policy and local needs. We conclude by suggesting that TRNC faces the dilemma of working with cultural heterogeneity: Appadurai identifies this as a key ideoscape challenge for all nation/states.     

What do secondary trainee teachers say about teaching as a profession of their “choice” in Malawi?

This interview-based qualitative study is concerned with the recruitment of secondary teachers in Malawi. This study shows a range of perspectives for pursuing a teacher training course: failure to follow a desired career, springboard to other careers, to upgrade, and teaching out of vocation. It shows that trainee teachers held a range of images about teaching: its ability to enhance knowledge; low pay with no incentives, low status profession, and lack of trust of male trainee teachers. Teacher educators and policy makers need to consider the perspectives of trainee teachers to reduce resource wastage and support trainee teachers appropriately.     

Sustaining a non-dominant activity in school: Only a utopia?

This article examines why an initially successful innovative pedagogical practice was not sustained. The innovative practice was a computer-mediated activity known as Fifth Dimension (5D) within a collaborative project between a university and a local elementary school. The analysis identifies conflicts and transitional actions which prevented participants from continuing the 5D and yet reveal that the 5D had an impact on the participants’ dominant activities. The analysis provides grounds for rethinking the sustainability of innovations in school as a process of interplay between dominant and non-dominant activities which includes conflicts and almost unnoticeable transitional actions.

“Wait—it’s a math problem,right?”: negotiating school frames in out-of-school places

Educational Studies in Mathematics - Designers in out-of-school spaces often negotiate the meaning of mathematics as part of the design process, determining what to include in classes and exhibits...     

Is There a Doctor in the House?

Doctor Jim Bruce was on night duty when the hospital received an urgent call.A doctor was needed at once to attend a birth.Jim was given a sheet of paper withthe address.Without delay,he hurried to his car and set off for the house,whichwas about ten minutes'drive from the hospital.He had been driving for about fiveminutes when his car broke down.Jim tried to start the engine again,but nothinghe did had any effect.He gave up trying and set off walking.     

The contribution of ‘shared education’ to Catholic–Protestant reconciliation in Northern Ireland: a third way?

Northern Ireland has achieved political stability and its devolved government is now tackling public policy issues neglected during periods of sectarian violence. Notwithstanding the prevailing political optimism, one legacy of the conflict is a deeply divided society. This is particularly manifest in the education system where around 90% of children attend either state (controlled) schools (de facto Protestant) or Catholic (maintained) schools, with integrated schools accounting for less than 6% of the school population. In an attempt to address this duplication of services, in the context of 85,000 empty desks, external funders have piloted an initiative entitled The Shared Education Programme (SEP) where schools working in cross‐community partnerships deliver shared classes and activities in order to improve education outcomes. This paper attempts to: quantify the educational returns for pupils participating in the SEP; articulate the qualitative reconciliation benefits from the perspective of teachers, parents and pupils; and, locate the findings of the research in the ongoing policy debate about restructuring education provision in Northern Ireland at a time of budget retrenchment and declining school rolls.     

Tool-use in a content management system: a matter of timing?

Given the rising popularity of content management systems (CMSs) in higher education, we investigated how students use the available CMS tools, as well as whether the moment of using a CMS tool affects students’ learning. This temporal dimension has been neglected in current research on CMS use. More insight into students’ tool-use is particularly important from an instructional design perspective because research has repeatedly revealed that a learning environments’ effectiveness depends heavily on students’ adaptive tool-use. Data were collected by logging the frequency and the time students (158) use the available tools within a CMS. Repeated-measures analyses revealed that students’ tool-use changed throughout the course, a dynamism that was different for each tool and was related to course-specific deadlines. Significant temporal student differences were found for some types of tools. Furthermore, students’ course performance was significantly impacted by the moment students used the course material outlines and the discussion board. In line with expectations, effects were different dependent on the tool. Hence, by examining students’ tool-use from a temporal perspective, this study highlighted that the timing of use matters. Furthermore, this timing depends on tool functionality. Consequently, the results have interesting implications for designing CMSs and they suggest implications for releasing some type of CMS tools at specific moments in the learning process.     

Latino Adolescents’ Ethnic Identity: Is There a Developmental Progression and Does Growth in Ethnic Identity Predict Growth in Self‐Esteem?

The current longitudinal study of 323 Latino adolescents (50.5% male; M age = 15.31 years) examined whether ethnic identity exploration, resolution, and affirmation demonstrated significant growth over a 4-year period and whether growth in ethnic identity predicted growth in self-esteem. Findings from multiple-group latent growth curve models revealed that exploration, resolution, and affirmation all increased significantly from middle to late adolescence for Latina girls. For Latino boys, only affirmation increased significantly. Furthermore, only growth in exploration predicted growth in boys' and girls' self-esteem. This research indicates that patterns of growth in ethnic identity vary by adolescent sex. Furthermore, findings underscore the need to examine the unique contributions of each ethnic identity component, rather than using a composite ethnic identity score.