Educational Research Expenditure in Switzerland: Overview and Analysis

Switzerland spends about 6% of its GDP on education. In the past few years, there have been carrying out important reforms in the educational field, for example introducing a vocational high school diploma and creating specialized higher vocational institution (hautes écoles). What is the extent of educational research in this context? There are very little data on this subject. To meet the need of information, we carried out a study examining expenditure on Swiss educational research from 1998 to 2000 and the link between sources of funding and research centres. The results of the above-mentioned study show that expenditure on educational research is modest compared with the overall cost of the educational system. It also reveals a distinct distribution of tasks amongst the institutions directly dependent on state educational administrations and universities. Although there are also other sources of funds, educational research relies mainly on public funding. This is disconcerting, as public budgets have been facing cuts in recent years, and new requirements for research needs will arise (future research is likely to involve such activities as evaluating reforms and participating in international survey). We conclude new funding strategies have to be found and researchers need to communicate their results more effectively.     

Associations between different forms of peer victimization and school absences: The moderating role of teacher attachment and perceived school safety

Given the significant negative impacts of peer victimization on youth development, studies have sought to understand what buffers against these consequences. To that end, the present study examined whether teacher attachment and perceptions of school safety moderated the associations between different forms of victimization and school absences over the course of an academic year among a sample of 272 high school students. Findings indicated that teacher attachment moderated the associations between relational and cyber victimization and absences, while perceived school safety moderated associations between relational victimization and absences. However, findings pertaining to cyber victimization were not as anticipated. Implications for prevention and intervention efforts in high schools are discussed.     

Telling Our Story: A Case Study of a Collaborative Departmental Blog at Syracuse University Libraries

ABSTRACT

This case study will take readers through the planning and publication process of a collaborative departmental library blog at Syracuse University, which is a large private, non-profit research intensive university located in central New York State. It will provide an overview of the history of the project and the mission of the blog. It will describe the technical aspects, developing a publication schedule, and the editorial responsibilities of maintaining the blog. The impact of the blog is documented. The blog has raised awareness of the librarians' expertise and this is explored alongside how posts have contributed to a number of wider conversations in librarianship.     

Administrative problems associated with regionalization

This paper focusses on the administrative problems related to the decision to regionalize the British Columbia Correspondence and Distance Learning Branch. The first pan of the paper provides background information about how the concept of regionalization developed both within the Branch and as a result of political pressures. The next part discusses the proposed changes in the administrative structure of the Branch once the regionalization process has been completed. This is followed by consideration of the problems occurring during the first transitional year. Particular attention is paid to the effects the changes are having on relationships between staff and management. Finally, in looking to the future, anticipated problems and changes after regionalization has been completed are considered.     

Constructing and understanding of place value in numerical notation

The purpose of this study was to investigate how children aged five to nine gradually build up an understanding of the characteristics of place-value inherent in the written number system. The task consisted in presenting collections of chips, asking children to produce the corresponding two-digit numerals, and then questioning them in a structured clinical interview about the possible numerical meaning (in terms of correspondence to a number of chips) of each of the digits in the numeral. Results show that the idea that parts of the notation must correspond to mutually exclusive parts of the collection is but slowly built up, and that subsequently it is fleshed out by the use of knowledge concerning oral numeration_— written numeration correspondences. Intuitions concerning «groups of ten» arise later. A fair proportion of eight-year-olds and all nine-years-olds saw the two-digits as corresponding to, on the one hand, a number of units, and on the other, a number of groups of units.     

Process over product: the next evolution of our quest for technology integration

Educational technology research and development - The purpose of this paper is to introduce the next evolution of our quest for technology integration, one that moves away from the product of...