How School Choice Is Framed by Parental Preferences and Family Characteristics: A Study of Western Area,Sierra Leone

This research set out to investigate how, in a post-conflict area, parental preferences and household characteristics affect school choice for their children. A multinomial logit is used to model the relationship between education preferences and the selection of schools for 954 households in Freetown and neighboring districts, Western Area, Sierra Leone. The increased economic well-being of a family tends to increase the likelihood of choosing a nongovernment school. As a child gets older parents are more likely to select government over nongovernment schools. For girls, parents are twice as likely to select a nongovernmental organization (NGO) school than a government one. Where parental preference for girls is a “safe environment” government is the preferred choice over a private proprietor school. Interestingly, the level of household education does not affect the likelihood of attending any school management type.     

Common core writing and language standards and aligned state assessments: a national survey of teacher beliefs and attitudes

A random sample of 482 teachers in grades 3 through 8 from across the United States were surveyed about (a) their perceptions of the version of the Common Core writing and language standards adopted by their state and their state’s writing assessment, (b) their preparation to teach writing, and (c) their self-efficacy beliefs for teaching writing. Regardless of grade, a majority of teachers believed that the adopted standards are more rigorous than prior standards, provide clear expectations for students that can be straightforwardly translated into activities and lessons, and have pushed them to address writing more often. However, many surveyed felt the new writing and language standards are too numerous to cover, omit key aspects of writing development, and may be inappropriate for struggling writers. Moreover, most did not feel that professional development efforts have been sufficient to achieve successful implementation, and nearly one in five respondents was not familiar with the standards. The respondents were generally less sanguine regarding their state’s writing test, with elementary teachers even less positive than middle school teachers on some aspects, though nearly a third were unfamiliar with their state test. A majority believed state writing tests, though more rigorous than prior tests, fail to address important aspects of writing development, do not accommodate the needs of students with diverse abilities, and require more time than is available to prepare students. Additionally, many teachers believed professional development efforts have been insufficient to help them understand measurement properties of the assessments and how to use test data to identify students’ writing needs. Teachers who were better prepared to teach writing and who held more positive personal teaching efficacy beliefs for writing exhibited generally more positive perceptions of their state’s standards. In contrast, only teacher efficacy beliefs made a unique contribution to the survey respondents’ attitudes and beliefs about their state’s writing test.     

Returning from earning: UK graduates returning to postgraduate study,with particular respect to STEM subjects,gender and ethnicity

It has been argued by some (e.g. the Confederation of British Industry [CBI]) that graduates lack the skills that render them employable. In particular, graduates of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) subjects are often portrayed as being unready for the world of work. This study uses three large-scale national data-sets from the UK to explore this assertion, including the results of the Destinations of Leavers from Higher Education surveys. It reports analysis of 22,207 individuals who graduated from their first degree in 2007, and works from the hypothesis that those entering the workforce and then returning for taught postgraduate study are primarily doing so due to underemployment in the period following graduation. The study uses binary logistic regression and finds that a range of educational, demographic and employment-based variables have a significant relationship with the propensity to return for taught postgraduate study. Of particular note, those returning tend to be high achievers from elite universities in low-skill work after graduation, as well as women and those from minority ethnic communities; this suggests a mix of individual and structural factors at work. In addition, STEM graduates were significantly less likely to return, apparently challenging the argument advanced by the CBI.     

Teaching About Sound: A Select Historical Examination of Research

The teaching of the science topic sound, a popular topic in science instruction, is selectively analyzed over the past century using evidence excerpted from a prominent teacher practitioner journal (School Science And Mathematics). Shifting innovative recommendations on how teachers of science should teach the sound topic are identified in the categories of content and pedagogy. Historical connections to the scientific development of sound, identification of what constitutes the subject matter of sound, recommended general pedagogical strategies, and best practices for teaching strategies associated with the sound concept are examined. Discussion relates to the influence of contextual factors in a given time period (social and theoretical) on the design of curriculum materials used to guide instructional practice. One implication for science teacher education is the need for science teachers to develop an historically and philosophically grounded perspective by examining both the teaching practices on a science topic over an extended time and the historical scientific development of the science topic.     

Searching the right database. A comparison of four databases for psychiatry journals

Journal coverage is one factor that affects the retrieval of relevant information from bibliographic databases. The aims of this study were to investigate the coverage of databases for psychiatry journals, and to assess the overlap between databases. Psychiatry journals were identified using Ulrich’s International Periodicals Directory and then analysed to see which bibliographic databases indexed the most journals. A total of 213 abstracting and indexing services were listed as indexing at least one of the 977 psychiatry journals identified. The four most frequently cited databases (PsycLIT, EMBASE, BIOSIS and MEDLINE) indexed 506 (52%) of the psychiatry journals. Of these 506 journals, PsycLIT indexed 367 (73%), EMBASE 337 (67%), BIOSIS 243 (48%) and MEDLINE 236 (47%). Combining the databases with the highest yields (PsycLIT and EMBASE) increased the number of journals indexed to 461 (91%). The four databases combined accounted for 90% of all psychiatry journals found to be indexed by at least one abstracting and indexing service. More than 400 journals were not indexed at all. Variations in the overlap between PsycLIT, EMBASE, BIOSIS and MEDLINE, and the high proportion (35%) of journals indexed in only one of these four databases emphasize the importance of searching more than one or even two databases to ensure optimal coverage of the literature.