Local amenities,unobserved quality,and market clearing: Adjusting teacher compensation to provide equal education opportunities

Local school districts differ in their ability to pay for teacher quality, and in the amenities they offer as places to live and work. Market clearing with heterogeneous quality yields geographically varying teacher salary levels that confound scarcity with unobserved differences in quality. The paper discusses identification and estimation of a model of quality-adjusted teacher salaries in local markets with unobserved market-clearing prices. Exogenous variables in the model include community and district characteristics, job characteristics and working conditions, and individual characteristics. We apply the model to estimate the relative cost of providing comparably qualified teachers for urban and rural public schools in the state of Alaska, which has high geographic variation in amenities and local financial resources. The quality-adjusted geographic salary differentials implied by the results suggest much larger compensation differentials for isolated rural schools than most of these school districts can afford under current levels of state support.     

Assessing the impact of financial education programs: A quantitative model

Prior studies disagree regarding the effectiveness of financial education programs, especially those offered in the workplace. To explain such measurement differences in evaluation and outcomes, we employ a stochastic life cycle model with endogenous financial knowledge accumulation and investigate how financial education programs optimally shape key economic outcomes. This approach permits us to measure how such programs shape wealth accumulation, financial knowledge, and participation in sophisticated assets (e.g. stocks) across heterogeneous consumers. We apply conventional program evaluation econometric techniques to simulated data, distinguishing selection and treatment effects. We show that the more effective programs provide follow-up in order to sustain the knowledge acquired by employees via the program; in such an instance, financial education delivered to employees around the age of 40 can raise savings at retirement by close to 10%. By contrast, one-time education programs do produce short-term but few long-term effects. We also measure how accounting for selection affects estimates of program effectiveness for those who participate. Comparisons of participants and non-participants can be misleading, even using a difference-in-difference strategy when the common-trend assumption is unlikely to hold. Random program assignment is needed to evaluate program effects on those who participate.     

Massification of higher education and youth transition: skills mismatch,informal sector jobs and implications for China

This study adopts a nationwide survey data set between 2005 and 2013 (Chinese General Social Survey) to explore the influence of the massification of higher education on the transition of Chinese youth into the labour market. Data analysis reveals two major findings. First, the economic returns to college education of recent cohorts of university graduates (those who have graduated from universities not more than 3 years ago) are lower than the cohorts who graduated in 2005 and 2006. Second, recent cohorts of college graduates are likely to work in the urban informal sector, unlike their senior counterparts. These findings could partially be explained by skills mismatch in the labour market but a comprehensive understanding of graduate unemployment in China could be obtained by bringing the broader political economy perspective into the analysis.     

The education penalty: schooling,learning and the diminishment of wages,working conditions and worker power

Currently dominant human capital and knowledge economy rhetoric holds that education can raise wages, empower workers and enhance working conditions. Education, however, can also have the opposite impact in the workplace and labour market, an impact that has received only limited attention. In this article we draw together a broad range of literature focusing on youth and entry-level employment in order to analyse the different frames of status, process and promise in which education serves not as a ‘premium’ but as a ‘penalty’, used to diminish worker power and claims to good conditions of employment in the present.     

Bullying,education and earnings: Evidence from the National Child Development Study

We explore the effect of bullying at school on the educational attainment of a sample of individuals drawn from the British National Child Development Study (NCDS). Our empirical findings suggest that school bullying has an adverse effect on human capital accumulation both at and beyond school. Moreover; the impact of bullying on educational attainment at age 16 is found to be similar in magnitude to class size effects. Furthermore, in contrast to class size effects, the adverse influence of bullying on educational attainment remains during adulthood. In addition, being bullied at school influences wages received during adulthood as well as indirectly influencing wages via educational attainment.     

Assessing the impact of a wildlife education program on Japanese attitudes and behavioral intentions

Human–wildlife conflicts are common in agricultural communities and mountainous villages in Japan. Tochigi prefecture has one of the highest amounts of agricultural damage caused by wildlife in the country. To reduce conflicts, the Nature Preservation Division of Tochigi Prefecture launched a wildlife damage prevention program. We evaluated the effects of this program on residents’ attitudes and behavioral intentions by comparing a model district receiving the treatment program to a nearby control district. We conducted a survey of all households registered either in the residential organization or telephone book in each district (n?=?423), with a 46% response rate. The model district did not differ from the control except for greater perceived behavioral control regarding wildlife damage among residents in the model district (F?=?3.83, df?=?1, p?=?0.05). An unanticipated outcome was the development of a community-based wildlife group in the model district. In both model and control districts, subjective norm (perceived social pressure to engage or not to engage in a behavior) was the strongest predictor of behavioral intentions, unlike results of studies conducted in the US.     

Making the transition from further to higher education: the impact of a preparatory module on retention,progression and performance

Articulation across the further education/higher education (FE/HE) interface is of vital importance in addressing the government's widening participation agenda. Many institutions are grappling with how best to prepare students to make this transition particularly when they are direct entrants and join ongoing cohorts of students who are already familiar with the HE environment. At one new Scottish university, the generic module ‘Next steps at university’ aims to prepare students for life at university and to help them acquire the necessary key skills for coping with HE delivery and assessment regimes. This paper presents an overview of the basis on which the ‘Next steps’ module curriculum was designed with respect to content, delivery methods and assessment then analyses the performance and progression outcomes for 103 students who successfully completed the module. These outcomes are set within the context of institutional figures and the beneficial impact of ‘Next steps’ is explored in quantitative terms with respect to progression, retention and performance statistics.     

Revisiting the impact of part-time work on adolescent adjustment: distinguishing between selection and socialization using propensity score matching

The impact of part-time employment on adolescent functioning remains unclear because most studies fail to adequately control for differential selection into the workplace. The present study reanalyzes data from L. Steinberg, S. Fegley, and S. M. Dornbusch (1993) using multiple imputation, which minimizes bias in effect size estimation, and 2 types of propensity score matching, to account for selection effects. In this sample (N = 1,792; Grades 10-11, M = 16.26), youth who begin working more than 20 hr per week evince declines in school engagement and increases in substance use and delinquency compared with youth who remain unemployed. Conversely, working 20 hr or less a week has negligible effects, positive or negative, on academic, psychological, or behavioral outcomes.     

The heterogeneity of new entrants and the selectivity of higher education institutions: Some results using data from the CHEERS project

This paper attempts to test whether there stillexist differences in selectivity between highereducation institutions. Data from the CHEERS(Careers after Higher Education: a EuropeanResearch Survey) project enables us to describethe differences in institutional selectivity ineach country across different fields. We askthe question: how selective are institutionstoday, particularly in the case of Europe andJapan?. In order to describe the selectivity ofhigher education institutions for each field ineach country, we use the entry grade given byeach graduate in the CHEERS data. Despite thedifferences in the grading references in thedifferent countries, these data can be used toassess the heterogeneity of the selectivity ofeach institution within the fields in eachcountry. To do so, we computed a mean for eachinstitution/department (using all graduatesfrom each institution in the sample). We thencomputed a mean for all the institutions/departmentsand the dispersion coefficient(which was multiplied by a hundred). Countrieswith a low dispersion coefficient appear to behomogeneous in terms of selection across thedifferent institutions, whereas those with ahigh one have institutions clearly moreselective than others. Using the example ofBusiness studies, it can be shown that theselection process of higher educationinstitutions is more or less heterogeneousaccording to countries. Differences betweentypes of institution also explain thedifferences in selectivity between institutionsin some countries but not in others.     

College impact,student impact: A reconsideration of the role of students within American higher education

American college students tend to be viewed in terms of inputs and outcomes, due in part to the assessment movement and long-standing interest in college impact. A more complete view is one in which the relationship between students and the college environment is both reciprocal and dynamic. This ecological perspective portrays students as actively shaping their educational environments, with these environments simultaneously providing the potential for transforming the individual. Data from the Cooperative Institutional Research Program (CIRP) are used to explore the ecological perspective.     

Society and citizenship education in transition: the case of Macau

From the end of World War II to the late-1980s, Macau was a Portuguese colony under Chinese patronage, together with an insulated bureaucracy and a passive political culture. Meanwhile, Macau was characterised by an official non-interventionist policy, a fragmentation of educational provision, and a lack of formal citizenship education. From 1987 onwards, Macau has been undergoing decolonalisation and an impending change of sovereignty, which resulted in the first official document concerning citizenship education issued by the government in 1995. But citizenship education has been less developed in Macau because of the problems of state capacity, autonomy and initiative in delivering education.     

Researching the impact of education policy: difficulties and discontinuities

The article examines the importance of effective secondary education for all children as Australian society embraces globalization. In a global era, where societal development will rely on the knowledge and skills of the workforce, an effective education will become even more important for socio‐economic engagement and equality. Students from disadvantaged backgrounds are the most vulnerable to globalization as they are less likely to achieve academically or go on to benefit from the restructured neo‐liberal economy. Education policy will need to continue to support the right of each individual to be prepared for life in general, and employment in particular. Opportunities for democratic pedagogy, curriculum and education policy to respond to risk are outlined and critiqued in relation to the ongoing need for justice in education systems. If adequate funding is not provided for secondary education and directed to ensure an effective education is available for all students, obtaining a quality education will increasingly shift from a right to a privilege in Australian society.     

Formal system and farmers' system: the impact of CIMMYT maize germplasm in South-Western China

Public agricultural extension services around the world are being pressured to adapt to new funding constraints and a changing agricultural sector. The global perspective on extension is no longer that of a unified public sector service, but of a multi-institutional network of knowledge and information support for rural people. This reality and its ensuing issues were discussed at an international workshop on ‘Extension and Rural Development’, sponsored by the World Bank and the U.S. Agency for International Development, in collaboration with the Neuchâtel Group, and held in November 2002 in the IFPRI headquarters in Washington, DC. One output of the workshop was the compilation of 44 edited case studies organized into sections as follows: (1) decentralization systems, (2) privatization of extension systems, (3) demand-driven approaches to agricultural extension, (4) revitalization within public sector services, and (5) national strategy and reform process. The case studies portray extension within the context of a wide rural development agenda; their composite view of extension recognizes the need for a sophisticated and differentiated set of services. From the policy standpoint it implies that governments need to act to redefine extension and implement coherent extension policies to advance pluralistic systems of extension providers. The authors believe that policymakers and extension practitioners and those in related disciplines will find the result of the World Bank/USAID/Neuchatel workshop relevant to the design of future reforms.     

Church,State and Education: Catholic education in Hong Kong during the political transition

Roman Catholic schools represent an important sector in Hong Kong's education system, both in terms of number and historical significance. As in many colonies in other periods of history, the Roman Catholic Church, in addition to other Christian Churches, had a partnership relationship with the colonial government in the provision of education in Hong Kong. Was there any change in this relationship during the political transition to 1997? Did the prospective return of Hong Kong to the People's Republic of China (PRC) affect Catholic educational policies? This article examines these two questions in relation to the experience of other places in the world and in relation to the special nature of the Catholic Church in Hong Kong, namely its link with the Vatican and its relations with China where Church schools no longer exist.     

Sexual resourcefulness and the impact of family,sex education,media and peers

Building on a recently developed theoretical model of sexual self-control, 178 undergraduate women completed measures of learned resourcefulness, reasons for consenting to unwanted advances, and sexual self-efficacy – variables consistently shown to be unique predictors of sexual resourcefulness. Additional measures assessed in this investigation included media internalisation, peer values, parental and school discussions of sexual topics, body image preoccupation, body image satisfaction, and perceived timing of pubertal development. Along with the aforementioned unique predictors of sexual resourcefulness, receiving more information from the mother about dealing with unwanted sexual advances emerged as another direct contributor. Also in concurrence with past research, it was found that women scoring lower in sexual resourcefulness and having more reasons for consenting were more likely to engage in unwanted non-coercive sexual activities, with greater media pressures, higher appearance orientation and lower learned resourcefulness having a shared impact. Implications, limitations, and directions for future research are discussed.     

E-learning technology and higher education: the impact of organizational trust

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to analyze the impact of trust perceptions on teachers’ intention to continue using e-learning technology in higher education. Drawing on the model of organizational trust and the information systems continuance model, a new research model is developed and tested using data from a university college based on a survey of 401 university teachers. We find that teachers’ perceptions of system-based trust and trust in management exerted strong direct effects on intention to continue using an e-learning system. Additionally, system-based trust affects perceived usefulness, and thus fully mediates the influence of perceived usefulness on teachers’ intentions to use e-learning technology. Our findings clarify the relationship between trust and teachers continued use of e-learning technology and have implications, theoretical as well as practical, for trust-building structures that could improve the implementation of e-learning technologies in higher educational settings.     

E-learning technology and higher education: the impact of organizational trust

Tertiary Education and Management - The aim of this paper is to analyze the impact of trust perceptions on teachers’ intention to continue using e-learning technology in higher education....     

Assessing the organisational impact of external quality assurance: hypothesising key dimensions and mechanisms

The aim of the article is to provide a framework in which the organisational impact of external quality assurance (EQA) can be assessed. Based on existing studies of the impact of EQA in universities and colleges it is suggested that greater systematisation of how impact is measured is needed for a better understanding of how EQA can be used as a policy instrument. The article identifies key dimensions with respect to the categorisation of organisational impact of EQA. It discussing the possible links between different types and forms of EQA and their relation to organisational change and development. It also provides some reflections on elements of hypothetical mechanisms for organisational impact of EQA.     

Guiding the design of lessons by using the MAPLET framework: matching aims,processes, learner expertise and technologies

This paper introduces the MAPLET framework that was developed to map and link teaching aims, learning processes, learner expertise and technologies. An experimental study with 65 participants is reported to test the effectiveness of the framework as a guide to the design of lessons embedded within larger units of study. The findings indicate the potential of the MAPLET framework and reinforces the need to take a fresh approach to the design and development of curriculum that makes more effective use of the diminishing time available. It provides a conceptual model and working procedure that places the learner and the process of learning at the forefront of decisions.     

The redistributive equity of affirmative action: Exploring the role of race,socioeconomic status,and gender in college admissions

This paper contributes to research on affirmative action by examining issues of equity in the context of racial quotas in Brazil. We study the experience of the University of Brasilia, which established racial quotas in 2004 reserving 20% of available admissions slots for students who self-identified as black. Based on university admissions data and a student survey conducted by the authors, we find evidence that race, socioeconomic status, and gender were considerable barriers to college attendance and achievement. For example, first-difference regressions involving pairs of siblings indicate that black identity and gender had a negative effect on entrance exam scores. Moreover, we compare displaced and displacing applicants and find that racial quotas helped promote equity to some extent. Nevertheless, the scale and scope of redistribution were highly limited, and the vast majority of Brazilians had little chance of attending college, suggesting that more still needs to be done.