Assumptions underlying educational intervention research: A commentary on Harris and Pressley

This response analyzes Harris and Pressley's position on improving the quality of educational intervention research. It contrasts two different approaches to the interpretation of such research—technology transfer and heuristic interpretations—and their underlying assumptions. Harris and Pressley's positions are generally supported, but within the heuristic rather than the technology transfer perspective.     

Assumptions underlying programs for cognitive growth in Australian pre-schools

An analysis of the work of Australian pre-school teachers shows the presence of underlying assumptions in three areas: the nature of education, the nature of the child, and the nature of the teacher's task. The assumptions in the third area occupy most of the teacher's attention. She sees her educational task as three problems: what developmental changes can be sought in children, what factors determine the choice of development for a particular child, and how are these obtained? The teachers' answers and necessary extensions stemming from research findings are considered.     

浅议定量研究与定性研究的对比与整合

定量研究和定性研究是教育科学研究领域的量大基本范式和方法,各自有着不同的概念,在本质、认识论、理论基础、研究程序和预先设计、研究目的、研究方法上也各不相同,本文在阐述两者的特点和优点的基础上,分析了两种研究范式结合的意义、条件和可能方式。     

Effective methods for institutional research: How important is institutional type?

Despite the view that institutional research is most successful when it is an extension of the administrators who need its products, most institutional research offices are centralized. In this paper a newly-organized, small college model that is both decentralized and integrated is described. Evaluation of the model is reported. Goals and activities are related to recently identified external and organizational factors that seem to contribute to the proliferation of institutional research.Susan H. Frost is director of institutional planning and research and adjunct assistant professor of education at Emory University. She holds degrees from Agnes Scott College and the University of Georgia. Since 1990 she has organized the first offices of institutional research at both a comprehensive college and at a research university. Currently she is investigating patterns of institutional decision making on university campuses.     

Science and institutional research: The links

Discussions of the functions of institutional research are common. However, discussions concerning the structures associated with disciplined inquiry, theresearch part of institutional research, have been rare. This paper compares the process and structure of institutional research with three ways in which science is conceptualized. These comparisons result in the recognition that although institutional research has much in common with science, it is distinct from science. This paper begins the process of identifying the structures and assumptions that form the basis of institutional research.Presented at the Thirty-First Annual Forum of the Association for Institutional Research, San Francisco, May 26–29, 1991     

Ghosts of research past: institutional memory and its implications for educational research

Not all research projects progress according to plan. When a project culminates in a published piece that the research participants do not support, what are the effects and for how long do they endure? Using a retrospective case study, this article explores what memory can teach us about the long-term ramifications of research conducted in schools. Results suggest that for as long as 25 years after the publication of a controversial article, memory traces of the piece may survive at the research site, even if they have largely faded from view at the researchers' institution. The article argues that such memory stores expose much about institutional identities and practices, and that they contain important lessons for how we should approach, carry out, and conclude research in schools.     

Is the debate on quantitative versus qualitative research really necessary?

Recent writings suggest that educators have become locked in contentious arguments about types of research and about research methods when they might more productively concentrate upon the development of research confidence and a research culture in education. From this the rigorous and appropriate application of differing methodologies to achievement of research and policy goals and intentions will naturally follow. We need to look more closely at why the debate on qualitative versus quantitative research is seen to be meaningful, let alone necessary, and this takes us into the realms of wider social and political values and understandings. The article argues that the debate about methodologies reflects a confusion about intentions and purposes in educational research, especially with regard to policy needs and applications, and that what is needed now is a complete ‘upfront’ review of research goals and values in education, and in relation to other subject disciplines.     

Seven maxims for institutional researchers: Applying cognitive theory and research

The paper presents seven institutional research maxims that are based on research and theory about how people cognitively process information: (I.) More may not be better. (II.) Augment humans with models. (III.) Chunk your data wisely. (IV.) Know your decision makers. (V.) Heuristics are not always helpful. (VI.) Arrange tables by patterns. (VII.) Negative evidence and new hypotheses are okay. Cognitive findings underlying each maxim are given, with concrete examples of how institutional researchers can apply the maxims to improve the collection, analysis, and especially the presentation of information for decision makers.     

科学管理与院校研究

院校研究代表了管理决策的科学部分,是提高高校科学管理水平的一个有效途径。作为一种特定的研究范式和工作模式,系统收集数据,科学分析数据,为学校管理提供决策支持,是院校研究的三个基本特征。在我国发展院校研究,必须树立科学发展观,在高校中大力倡导科学管理;依靠国家和社会的力量,建立具有统一统计口径的数据库,实现数据资源共享;加快院校研究人员的培养,促使大多数高教研究所(室)转变功能,将院校研究作为主要的工作任务。     

The teaching:research nexus : a model for institutional management

Teaching and research lie at the heart of higher education. The interaction between teaching and research has therefore attracted the attention of both researchers and policymakers. Much has been written about this relationship, looking in particular at the perceived mutual benefits between teaching and research. This paper presents some findings from a research project which, using a comparative approach, aimed to examine the nature of the teaching:research nexus and, in particular, to consider the response of institutional management. Based on the observations collected through the project, a new model is proposed for institutional management of the teaching:research nexus. This model is based on a range of contextual factors, classified as ideological or environmental, and two contrasting approaches to institutional management of the relationship between teaching and research, active and passive. This model offers a new approach to understanding the operation of the teaching:research nexus within institutions of higher education.     

中国大学与院校研究

高等教育大众化、市场化和国际化,是当今世界高等教育发展的共同趋势。中国高等教育和高等学校必须尽快改变传统的管理方式,建立新的管理与工作模式。这些变化使得中国迫切需要院校研究。当前中国发展院校研究,应当坚持“有用、有效、开放、创新”的基本原则,从建立有利的高等教育公共治理环境和高等学校管理制度,建立专业研究人员培养制度和着手解决当前高校管理中的重大问题入手,从而站在一个正确的起点上。     

Emerging learning environments in higher education: Implications for institutional change and academic developers

Abstract

Wright and O'Neil's (1995) international survey of promising teaching improvement practices in higher education (HE) placed the existence of teaching support centres close to the top of the thirty‐six item scale. One conclusion that may be drawn from their findings is that many of the responding institutions see the role of academic developer as significant in helping to monitor trends and planning activities that can lead to quality of educational provision. This paper outlines several scenarios relating to learning environments potentially emerging in HE, describes implications for institutional change, and defines key assumptions for bringing about a development culture. Additionally, the paper reviews how these contextual factors may impact on the role of academic developer and concludes with a suggestion for a ‘developers’ curriculum’ that may merit consideration by members of the International Consortium for Educational Development in Higher Education (ICED).     

The Control-Value Theory of Achievement Emotions: Assumptions, Corollaries, and Implications for Educational Research and Practice

This article describes the control-value theory of achievement emotions and its implications for educational research and practice. The theory provides an integrative framework for analyzing the antecedents and effects of emotions experienced in achievement and academic settings. It is based on the premise that appraisals of control and values are central to the arousal of achievement emotions, including activity-related emotions such as enjoyment, frustration, and boredom experienced at learning, as well as outcome emotions such as joy, hope, pride, anxiety, hopelessness, shame, and anger relating to success or failure. Corollaries of the theory pertain to the multiplicity and domain specificity of achievement emotions; to their more distal individual and social antecedents, their effects on engagement and achievement, and the reciprocal linkages between emotions, antecedents and effects; to the regulation and development of these emotions; and to their relative universality across genders and cultures. Implications addressed concern the conceptual integration of emotion, motivation, and cognition, and the need to advance mixed-method paradigms. In closing, implications for educational practice are discussed.

Environmental Education Research as Profession,as Science,as Art and as Craft: Implications for guidelines in qualitative research

The view taken by any particular educational researcher of the desirability and potential usefulness of guidelines for qualitative research seems likely to depend upon the way in which the activity of 'doing educational research' is itself conceptualised. The implications of a number of possible positions on this question are examined. It is argued that the existence of such a range of positions is likely to continue, but that there may be, nevertheless, a limited role for generally applicable research guidelines if their purpose is appropriately defined.