Bilingual language proficiency: A comparative study

International Review of Education -     

The effect of technology funding on school-level student proficiency

This study presents new evidence on the effect of technology funding on school-level student proficiency. I exploit exogenous variation in school-level technology funding using the California Education Technology K-12 Voucher Program. The program provided eligible schools with technology vouchers to purchase qualifying hardware and software products and services. Using a regression discontinuity difference-in-difference design and data on voucher eligibility, voucher use, and school-level student proficiency, I find that voucher eligibility had no significant impact on school-level student proficiency, while voucher use had positive impacts on school-level student proficiency. The voucher use results are driven entirely by schools using the voucher funds for technology resources, but reallocating dollars initially earmarked for technology to other school inputs.     

Source-code plagiarism in universities: a comparative study of student perspectives in China and the UK

There has been much research and discussion relating to variations in plagiaristic activity observed in students from different demographic backgrounds. Differences in behaviour have been noted in many studies, although the underlying reasons are still a matter of debate. Existing work focuses mainly on textual plagiarism, and most often derives results by studying (small) groups of overseas students studying in a Western context. This study investigates understanding of source-code plagiarism (i.e. plagiarism of computer programmes) amongst university students in China. The survey instrument was a Chinese translation of a survey previously administered in English in the UK. This paper reports the results of the exploratory survey conducted in China, and compares these results to those from a parallel survey conducted in the UK. The results show that there is a significant difference in understanding between the respondents from the two surveys, and suggest topics which a future and more comprehensive study may focus on.     

Japanese and American student teacher voice: A comparative study of critical incidents

This study evaluates the effect of school district size on public high school graduation rates. The study calculates the graduation rate for each graduating class in each state between 1991 and 2002 and uses a fixed-effects model to examine the relationship between these graduation rates and changes in the size of each state's school districts during that period. The analysis indicates that decreasing the average size of a state's school districts by 200 square miles leads to an increase of about 1.64 percentage points in its graduation rate. To put this result into context, if Florida decreased the size of its school districts to the national median, it would increase its graduation rate by about 4.5 percentage points.     

Primary student teachers' perceptions of and motivations for comparative education: findings from a comparative study of an Irish and South African comparative education course

Comparative Education (CE) in Teacher Education (ITE) receives little attention in the literature, and this attention is mainly focussed on its decline in Western Countries. This article highlights, however, that it is not declining to the same extent in some countries in Asia, Eastern Europe and in South Africa. The study, upon which the article is based, explores a completely neglected aspect of CE in ITE – the perceptions of student teachers studying CE. The research was conducted among student primary teachers in Ireland and South Africa. Even though some similarities emerge, their perceptions are mainly divergent. It is in the analysis of this divergence, however, that a rich picture of student perceptions emerges. The main findings are: the Irish students knew much less about CE than their South African counterparts, and their main motivation for studying CE was to enable them to work abroad, whereas the South African students wanted to learn about other systems of education in order to improve Education in South Africa. Other findings concerning the extent to which CE is considered to enable student teachers to improve their teaching, are interesting and these are considered in the discussion section.     

Understanding the higher education student in Europe: a comparative analysis

Higher education is of considerable importance to policymakers across Europe. Indeed, it is viewed as a key mechanism for achieving a range of economic, social and political goals. Nevertheless, despite this prominence within policy, we have no clear understanding of the extent to which conceptualisations of ‘the student’ are shared across the continent. To start to redress this gap, this article explores four key aspects of contemporary higher education students’ lives, considering the extent to which they can be considered as, variously, consumers, workers, family members and political actors. On the basis of this evidence, it argues that, despite assumptions on the part of European policymakers that there are now large commonalities in the experiences of students across Europe – evident in pronouncements about Erasmus mobility and the operations of the European Higher Education Area – significant differences exist both between and within individual nation-states.     

Going beyond the syllabus: a study of A level Mathematics teachers and students

We explored teachers’ views and students’ experiences of going beyond the syllabus in Advanced (A) level Mathematics. Questionnaires were sent to teachers and students in a sample of 200 schools and colleges. Teachers were asked about the necessity, importance and benefits of additional teaching. Students were asked about the extra activities they undertook. Forty-seven teacher questionnaires and 299 student questionnaires were completed. Over half of the students claimed to undertake at least some extra activities. Although a few teachers thought teaching beyond the syllabus was unimportant and unnecessary, over 70% felt it should be undertaken if time allowed. Teaching efficacy was measured by comparing each teacher’s students’ Mathematics results with those students’ results in other A level subjects. Significantly more teachers with relatively high Mathematics results than with relatively low results believed teaching beyond the syllabus strengthens and expands students’ existing knowledge and adds interest to the course.     

Enhancing student engagement in student experience surveys: a mixed methods study

Background

Measuring the student experience is becoming increasingly important in higher education in the UK. Student experience surveys are used as indicators of quality and form the basis of rankings of higher education institutions. They are also used by them as tools to assist their quality enhancement initiatives. However, these surveys frequently suffer from low response rates, which can reduce the reliability and usefulness of their data. The UK Postgraduate Taught Experience Survey (PTES) is a relatively new survey and suffers from a low response rate. As this survey is new, little is known about why students do not respond to it.

Purpose

This study aimed to explore the reasons why postgraduate students do not respond to the PTES.

Sample

Three hundred and fifty-five postgraduate taught students from four health faculties in one UK higher education institution completed an online survey. Of these, seven participated in one of two focus groups.

Design and methods

The online survey was completed both by students who completed the PTES in 2011 and those who did not. This provided us with cross-sectional data to compare both groups’ knowledge of PTES and their reasons for completing or not completing it. We used multivariate regression analysis to explore which variables were associated with response to PTES. We led two focus groups to explore the themes that emerged from the survey in more depth. This data was analysed by two researchers using thematic analysis.

Results

The cross-sectional data found that students who were not clear about the purpose of PTES were less likely to respond, independent of other potential predictor variables. Focus group data indicated that if postgraduate students felt a stronger connection to the university community they may be more likely to respond to PTES.

Conclusions

This study suggests that higher education institutions may wish to review their strategies for advertising student experience surveys to focus more on their purpose rather than their impact.     

Exploring the contribution of professional staff to student outcomes: a comparative study of Australian and UK case studies

This paper reports on the second stage of a comparative study between two higher education institutions: one in Australia and the other in the United Kingdom, which explored the contributions of professional staff to student outcomes. The first stage acted as a scoping exercise to ascertain how the contributions of professional staff to student outcomes could be investigated. The second stage of the study aimed to undertake a more in-depth exploration of self-reported behaviours in a range of professional staff roles, within the two case studies. The main finding of the comparative study is the broad similarities between the case studies, in self-reported behaviours that contribute to successful student outcomes. Four key factors were identified, which enable or inhibit the contributions of professional staff to successful outcomes. Three of the four factors were found to be the same in both case studies, whereas technology was more important in the Australian case study.     

The impact of high-stakes testing on student proficiency in low-stakes subjects: Evidence from Florida's elementary science exam

An important criticism of high-stakes testing policies – policies that reward or sanction schools based on their students’ performance on standardized tests – is that they provide schools with an incentive to focus on those subjects that play a role in the accountability system while decreasing attention to those subjects that are not part of the program. This paper utilizes a regression discontinuity design to evaluate the impact of Florida's high-stakes testing policy on student proficiency in the low-stakes subject of science. We confirm prior results that students in schools facing more immediate sanctions under the policy made substantial gains in the high-stakes subjects of math and reading. Contrary to the crowding-out hypothesis, we find that students in these schools made substantial achievement gains in the low-stakes subject of science as well.     

The Time Perceptions of University Teachers: a comparative study

This study employs a multiple research methodology to investigate and compare the time perceptions of university teachers from two countries. In one sample, the university teachers were inaccurate in about 70% of their time estimates as compared with recorded data on how they actually spent their time. In the other sample, they were inaccurate in only about 40% of their estimates when compared with the actual figures. The nature of the errors committed by the two groups of university teachers were, however, very similar: 69% and 71% of the incorrect estimates were errors of overestimation. In addition, there were remarkable similarities in the activities on which they underestimated or overestimated spending their time. The findings of these similarities and differences in the time perceptions of university teachers from two different cultures are discussed and their implications for managerial practice and research explored.     

Beyond competition: a comparative review of conceptual approaches to international student mobility

The existing literature offers an instrumentalist approach that focuses on how economic rationality underlies international student mobility (ISM). In response to these instrumentalist accounts, a critical approach emerges and reemphasises the importance of humanity and human rights in ISM and the process of internationalisation of higher education. However, this paper argues that these critical perspectives are insufficient to address the non-instrumental values of ISM. To address this argument, the paper uses the capability approach to reframe the meanings of ISM, thereby broadening the conceptual approaches to this aspect of internationalisation of higher education. Specifically, the paper suggests that international mobility is a way to promote individual freedom. On the conceptual basis of the capability approach, the paper identifies three interrelated orientations for future research on the impact of mobility on international students.     

中美教育专业学位研究生培养模式比较研究

研究生培养模式的构成要素包括培养目标、培养过程和培养评价三部分,以此三要素来对比分析我国与美国的教育专业学位研究生教育,总结借鉴美国的成功经验,理出目前我国存在的问题,提出我国教育专业学位研究生教育应落实培养目标,细化落实程序;改革招生入学,强化责任承担;以实践为导向,调整课程与教学;增强培养方式的灵活性,打造导师指导特色;革新培养评价,严格学位授予。     

Computer-aided graphing: a comparative study

Abstract

Good practice with information and communication technologies (ICT) in teacher education is responsive to its society's needs. This article provides a complementary view to those from Europe and elsewhere in the world from the perspective of federal USA, with this nation's localised support for K-12 schools. It is part of the quick-scan study in 2002 led by Paul Kirschner of the Open University of the Netherlands. Five teacher education programmes were selected to illustrate best practice with technology (as ICT is called in the USA) in US teacher education. Although the ICT benchmarks described by Kirschner & Davis (this issue) were present in every case, a better distinguishing factor was that all had a mission to serve their diverse communities. In addition, these programmes provide complementary professional development in the schools in which pre-service students gain internships. The review of best practice comes after 3 years of significant federal funding provided through the Federal Department of Education's initiative: ‘Preparing Tomorrow's Teachers to use Technology’ (PT3∥. Strategic planning for this initiative by government agencies and professional organisations is also described. It is noted that there is still much work to be done towards social justice and digital equity within and beyond the USA.     

The impact of school self-evaluation upon student achievement: a group randomisation study

This paper investigates the impact of three different approaches to establishing School Self Evaluation (SSE) mechanisms upon student achievement. Using group randomisation, four groups of schools were created. Different types of support were provided to the first three groups of schools in order to help them establish SSE mechanisms, whereas no SSE mechanism was established in any of the schools of the fourth group. In the first group, school stakeholders were offered the opportunity to develop their own SSE mechanisms and design their own improvement strategies. The second group followed the same process in designing SSE mechanisms as the first, but before introducing this approach support was offered to the stakeholders in order to address and reduce their concerns about SSE. The third group was asked to develop SSE mechanisms and take decisions for their improvement strategies which were in line with the knowledge base of educational effectiveness research. All three experimental groups had better results than the control group, but the impact of the third approach on student achievement was higher than the impact of the other two approaches to SSE. Implications for research on SSE are drawn.     

The impact of national educational policies on student achievement: a European study

This paper investigates the impact of national policies for improving teaching and the school learning environment (SLE) on student achievement. In each participating country (i.e., Belgium/Flanders, Cyprus, Germany, Greece, Ireland, and Slovenia), a sample of at least 50 schools was drawn and tests in mathematics and science were administered to all Grade 4 students (N = 10,742) at the beginning and end of school year 2010–2011. National policies were measured through (a) content analysis of policy documents, (b) interviews with policymakers, and (c) head-teacher questionnaires. Multilevel analyses revealed that most aspects of national policies for teaching and SLE were associated with student achievement in each subject irrespective of the source of data used to measure them. Implications are, finally, drawn.