Not just another evaluation: a comparative study of four educational quality projects at Swedish universities

In this study, four recent self-initiated educational quality projects at Swedish universities are compared and analyzed. The article focuses on how the universities have handled the tension between external demands and internal norms. The aim is to contribute to an improved understanding of quality management in contemporary universities. On the one hand, the projects are found to be built on similar rationales associated with accountability, reputation building and strategic management. This is interpreted as a response to the shared external policy context. They are also found to mirror similar ambitions regarding raising the status of education. On the other hand, the projects are found to differ considerably in their actual design, methodology, implementation, stakeholders and outcomes. This is interpreted as an active adaptation to the unique internal academic norms and cultures that exist in each university.     

ICT tools in environmental education: reviewing two newcomers to schools

United Nations of Education Scientific and Cultural Organisation’s (UNESCO’s) founding statements about environmental education (EE) in the 1970s positioned it as a multidisciplinary field of inquiry. When enacted as such, it challenges traditional ways of organising secondary school education by academic subject areas. Equally, according to UNESCO, EE requires various forms of integrated and project-based teaching and learning approaches. These can involve hands-on experimentation alongside the retrieval and critical analysis of information from diverse sources and perspectives, and with different qualities and statuses. Multidisciplinary and knowledge engagement challenges are key considerations for an EE curriculum designed to harness information and communication technologies (ICT) to support and enhance student learning, which also challenge traditional instructional priorities that for example are largely based on textbooks. This review summarises research that has sought to integrate ICT and digital tools in EE. A key finding is that while there is a rich variety of such tools and applications available, there is far less research on their fit with and implications for student learning. The review calls for further studies that will provide models of productive forms of teaching and learning that harness ICT resources, particularly in developing the goals and methodologies of EE in the twenty-first century.     

Defining student diversity: categorizing and processes of marginalization in Swedish schools

The article presents an analysis of how diversity is defined and attended to in Swedish schools. The research reported has been carried out as a case study of categorizing practices that concern the uses of neuropsychiatric diagnoses, notably ADHD. The data were collected as part of a larger study. The interaction over a two-year period between the parents of a boy (William, aged 5.5 years) and representatives of the school (school psychologist, principal, teacher etc.) has been analysed. It is shown that parents and professionals provide different accounts of William’s difficulties. The parents, while not denying that their son causes problems in class, argue that the boy will mature and that the problems will disappear. The representatives of the school try to convince the parents that a neuropsychiatric examination of the boy will be beneficial to all parties. The long process of negotiation can be understood as a rhetorical drama, where the category ‘ADHD’ serves as the resolution of a complex institutional problem in the modern welfare state.     

Von der Lehrerausbildung in den Beruf – Fachbezogenes Wissen als Voraussetzung für Wahrnehmung,Interpretation und Handeln im Unterricht

The transition from teacher training into the teaching profession is seen to be key in the biography of a teacher. Yet there is a lack of enquiry into the development of the content knowledge (CK) and pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) held by teachers at the end of their education, and into the significance of this knowledge for situational and behavioural cognition. On the basis of data from the international comparative study TEDS-M 2008 and the Germany-based 2012 follow-up, this contribution investigates the knowledge and skills development of teachers during the transition from teacher training to the teaching profession in a four-year longitudinal study with n = 171 mathematics teachers. Three test formats (paper-and-pencil, video-vignettes and speed tests) are used to examine various indicators for teacher expertise. In addition to the analysis of changes in mathematical CK and PCK levels, path analysis is used to determine the extent to which this knowledge functions as a predictor for the perception and interpretation of classroom situations, the decision-making in these situations, and the quick identification of student mistakes. The results show only small changes in the group mean (for MCK there is a small loss, whereas MPCK remains constant), but high fluctuation (i. e. weak correlation) in the MPCK ranking between the two measurement occasions, pointing to differential learning effects gained from teaching practice. There are also significant differences in predictability: MCK is important for the speed indicators of teacher expertise; MCK and MPCK for the perception and interpretation of situations, and for the generation of action strategies. These findings can on the one hand help to facilitate the evaluation of beginning teachers’ need for support and, on the other hand, they indicate the necessity for the early integration of practice-based elements into teacher training programmes with the aim of developing PCK and related skills.     

Mobilisieren und Optimieren

Looking at the conflictual constitution of educational systems by equality and excellence, this paper examines the discursive formation of two political rationalities in the contemporary German educational system that are directly opposed. While early childhood and primary education discourses are dominated by a terminology of equity, tertiary education institutions such as universities are described with a terminology of excellence that has become a reference point for political interventions and institutional reform processes.Taking up the theoretical position of hegemony-theory, governmentality studies and system theory, the paper analyzes the rules of justification these hegemonic discourses refer to by employing a discourse analysis of strategic, conceptional, and institutional texts of the German education policy discourse between 2003 and 2010. The paper puts forth the thesis that mobilizing and optimizing represent the common principles of equality and excellence as rationalities of the maximal mobilization of educational ressources.     

风浪对洪泽湖区航行安全的影响

在调查和研究洪泽湖区最近10多年的船舶事故原因和有关因素的基础上,明确引起洪泽湖区船舶事故的主要因素是风浪.根据湖区的环境因素,综合计算在正常水位条件下5个风级、8个方位的波浪情况,由此可清楚地了解船舶在湖区内遭遇不同风级作用时的波浪要素,并结合航线方向计算洪泽湖区航行船舶遭受风浪时的几种摇摆运动形式,进而对船舶事故进行分析,为船舶安全保障提供参考依据.     

Volkserziehung in Peru: Die Wiedergewinnung des Alltäglichen

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