Introduction of External,Independent Testing in “New Countries”: Successes and Defeats of the Introduction of Modern Educational Assessment Techniques in Former Soviet and Socialist Countries

A particular trait of the educational system under socialist reign was accountability at the input side—appropriate facilities, centrally decided curriculum, approved text‐books, and uniformly trained teachers—but no control on the output. It was simply assumed that it met the agreed standards, which was, in turn, proven by the statistics provided by authorities. The introduction of professional testing methods for national large‐scale assessment efforts and participation in international surveys such as Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) and Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) unveiled the myth of the traditional “all is good” message spread by the former party rulers. But another aspect of the introduction of external independent testing has probably even had a bigger impact: the fight against the pervasive corruption in student admission it became part of. If any, the successful use of independent external testing in this struggle has done a lot to have its methods accepted by the audience at large. The article describes the experiences of the author as a senior consultant to ministries and newly established testing institutes in former Soviet and socialist republics.     

Estimating the causal effect of R&D subsidies in a pan-European program

We investigate the effect of Europe's largest multilateral subsidy program for R&D-performing small and medium-sized enterprises. The program applied a specific budget allocation rule, referred to as Virtual Common Pot (VCP), which is designed to avoid cross-subsidization between participating countries. This rule creates exogenous variation in funding status and allows us to identify the causal effect of public R&D grants on firm growth. In addition, we compare the program's effect under the VCP rule with the standard situation of a Real Common Pot (RCP), in which program authorities allocate a single budget according to uniform project evaluation criteria. Our estimates suggest that R&D grants had no average effect on job creation and sales growth, but treatment effects were heterogeneous and positive for high-quality projects. Under an RCP the program would have created 53% more jobs and 48% higher sales.     

Do ‘liberal market economies’ really innovate more radically than ‘coordinated market economies’?: Hall and Soskice reconsidered

In Varieties of Capitalism; The Institutional Foundations of Comparative Advantage, Peter A. Hall and David Soskice (H&S) argue that technological specialization patterns are largely determined by the prevailing “variety of capitalism”. They hypothesize that “liberal market economies” (LMEs) specialize in radical innovation, while “coordinated market economies” (CMEs) focus more on incremental innovation. Mark Zachary Taylor [Taylor, M.Z., 2004. Empirical evidence against varieties of capitalism's theory of technological innovation. International Organization 58, 601-631.] convincingly argued that Hall and Soskice's empirical test is fundamentally flawed and proposed a more appropriate test of their conjecture. He rejected the varieties of capitalism explanation of innovation patterns. We extend and refine Taylor's analysis, using a broader set of radicality indicators and making industry-level comparisons. Our results indicate that Hall and Soskice's conjecture cannot be upheld as a general rule, but that it survives closer scrutiny for a substantial number of industries and an important dimension of radicality.     

Technology policy and the regions — the case of the BioRegio contest

Only recently, it has been argued that technology policy should give more attention to the regions as they could play a key role in the process of technological change. The German Federal Government has tried to do so by initiating a contest in which Germany's leading Biotech regions competed for a given amount of public funding. This paper reports on the aims, the conceptual design and the results of the BioRegio contest (BRC) and tries to place it into a broader theoretical context. It is shown that the new policy instrument cannot solve the fundamental information problem associated with government intervention into the process of technological change, but that it goes into the right direction by taking the regions seriously and giving prominence to the well-functioning interplay of the various elements of regional innovation systems.     

Effects of contrasting colour patterns of the ball in the volleyball reception

The effects of three different colour patterns on the surface of volleyballs (versus that of a plain white ball) on the behaviour of a reception player were examined by presenting sidespin volleyball serves. Expert (n = 10) and novice (n = 10) volleyball players intercepted volleyballs projected straight at them or at an initial angle of 9.5 degrees outwards but eventually curving towards the players' original position. In the latter trajectories, players generally took one or more steps laterally before returning to the landing position of the ball. These excursion patterns were significantly more pronounced with the white balls than the coloured balls. Differences between balls of different colour combinations were also observed. The first finding supports the thesis that next to a prospective type of control, such as on-line maintenance of a certain spatiotemporal relationship between the player and the ball, properties of the ball itself allow prediction of the future path of the ball. Differences between types of colour patterns are explained within the framework of the between-colours wavelength contrasts of each type of ball.     

East Meets West in Assessment Development: Western Technical Assistance to Eastern Needs. Part II: Project and Team Management in the AERo Project in Romania

This is Part II of a three-part series describing the consultancy and training demands that are encountered in technical assistance projects in Central and Eastern Europe. This part highlights project management and cooperation aspects in delivering support to the Romanian Assessment and Examination Service. Part I dealt with strategic issues for a successful delivery of "Western Technical Assistance to Eastern Needs." Part III will address training of Polish subject experts, preparing to take on responsibility for a decentralized and drastically changed final exam, the Matura.