Stichwort: Bildungsökonomie und Qualität der Schulbildung

Keyword: Education Economics and Quality of Schooling. With reference to an earlier keyword article from the same author, this contribution looks at recent developments in education economics. The focus is a critical review of the field‘s contribution to research on the necessary conditions for high quality schooling. Of particular interest at the moment are the institutional framework conditions in a school system, which set incentives for performance. These are judged to be better than resource-based strategies of quality assurance. The empirical basis is provided by estimates of production functions using data from international school performance studies. This article will point out the limited validity of evidence gained through these studies and the – in sum – contradictory empirical findings. For this reason, political recommendations on the basis of this approach should be more reserved.     

Media Logic and Political Logic Online and Offline

One aspect of the mediatization of politics is the idea that political actors adapt to the communication logic of news media to gain, for example, news media attention. Currently, this process may be influenced by the diffusion of the internet as a political communication channel, especially because online communication provides a new opportunity for political actors to communicate directly with citizens. Thus far, the adaptation to media logic by political parties has mainly been examined in the context of election campaigns. In order to transfer these findings to regular political communication, this study compares the use of media logic in the mass media and in direct political communication channels online and offline about the United Nations Climate Change Conferences 2011 and 2012. A quantitative content analysis of the conference protocols (input) and the presentation of the conference results in the seven most frequently used German offline news outlets (print and TV) and their online counterparts, as well as political offline and online communication channels like parliamentary speeches and websites of the six parties represented in the German parliament (output), was conducted. Results show that in the context of regular political communication, political actors seem to follow media logic to a lesser extent than in the context of election campaigns. Thus far, the influence of online communication on the mediatization of politics seems to be rather marginal. The causes and consequences of these findings are discussed.     

The Independence of Research—A Review of Disciplinary Perspectives and Outline of Interdisciplinary Prospects

Minerva - The independence of research is a key strategic issue of modern societies. Dealing with it appropriately poses legal, economic, political, social and cultural problems for society, which...     

Cognitive preconditions of early reading and spelling: a latent-variable approach with longitudinal data

The aim of the present study was to empirically disentangle the interdependencies of the impact of nonverbal intelligence, working memory capacities, and phonological processing skills on early reading decoding and spelling within a latent variable approach. In a sample of 127 children, these cognitive preconditions were assessed before the onset of formal education, whereas reading as well as spelling achievement was measured at the end of grade 1. The findings indicate that working memory does contribute to the prediction of early reading and spelling, and that this contribution outperforms that of general intelligence and phonological recoding from long-term memory during the early steps of reading and spelling acquisition. Moreover, the results show that phonological awareness mediates the effects of working memory capacities on early literacy outcomes. The role of working memory and phonological awareness as key cognitive preconditions of early reading and spelling are discussed.     

Internet in the Classroom: Effects on Reading Comprehension,Motivation and Metacognitive Awareness

This study examined the potential of entertainment-education (E-E) for promoting engagement with a science issue. It was assumed that certain entertaining features of a media experience increase viewers’ perceived knowledge about an issue. Drawing on different theoretical models of E-E and on persuasive effects of narrative media messages, three hypotheses and one research question were assessed in a survey among 103 participants, who were shown a movie about genetic engineering beforehand. Results suggested that the higher viewers’ transportation, identification, and enjoyment were, the more they actually felt informed. Viewers’ degree of transportation, though, revealed to be sufficient to explain their perceived knowledge.     

Ohne Schulabschluss in die Berufsausbildung: Ergebnisse einer Längsschnittuntersuchung

Young people who leave school without obtaining a secondary school certificate bear an increased risk of not completing vocational training and being excluded from stable employment in their working life. However, some of these young people do achieve access to vocational training and employment. Based on a longitudinal study of school-to-work transitions of a representative sample of graduates from Praxisklassen in Bavaria (a course especially designed for potential school drop outs at the lower secondary school – Hauptschule), patterns of transition that lead into vocational training and employment are compared with patterns that end up in exclusion from education, training and employment. Determinants of successful transitions, which can be targeted by pedagogical measures, are inter alia: participation in internships in enterprises during the last year of schooling, help and support received from parents and professional career guidance. However, besides these influential factors, regional labor market conditions are important for a successful school-to-work transition. This close link to the labor market ultimately limits the effects of educational interventions.     

The impact of participation in sports on educational attainment—New evidence from Germany

We analyze the impact of exercising sports during childhood and adolescence on educational attainment. The theoretical framework is based on models of allocation of time and educational productivity. Using the rich information from the German Socio-Economic Panel (GSOEP), we apply generalized ordered probit models to estimate the effect of participation in sport activities on secondary school degrees and professional degrees. Even after controlling for important variables and selection into sport, we find strong evidence that the effect of sport on educational attainment is statistically significant and positive.