Jumping to Conclusions—The PISA Knee-Jerk: Some Remarks on the Current Economic-Educational Discourse

Ever since PISA studies have been constantly present in mainstream media, a close relation between academic achievement and economic outcome has been routinely presumed. This essay takes a closer look at some of the most common lines of argument, then goes on to outline a critique of the assumptions underlying the alleged causal relationship between educational achievement and macro-economic performance, bringing out a lack of complexity in said assumptions, as well as (polemically) showing up their conformist bias.     

How the institutional environment affects collegial exchange about teaching at German research universities: findings from a nationwide survey

Tertiary Education and Management - This paper examines the relationship between the institutional environment and collegial exchange about teaching at German research universities. With the help...     

Phonemic awareness and learning to read

European Journal of Psychology of Education -     

Long-term habituation is produced by distributed training at long ISIs and not by massed training or short ISIs inCaenorhabditis elegans

To begin an investigation of the cellular processes that underlie long-term memory in the nematodeCaenorhabditis elegans, it is first necessary to determine thatC. elegans is capable of retention over 24 h, and to investigate the factors that may influence the expression of long-term memory. In the present study, the effects of stimuli number, interstimulus interval (ISI), and training procedure on long-term retention of habituation were tested inC. elegans. At a long (60-sec) ISI, distributed training sessions produced long-term habituation retained for 24 h, whereas massed training sessions or training with few stimuli did not. When training was performed at a short (10-sec) ISI, long-term habituation was not detectable with testing at either a 10- or a 60-sec ISI. The long-term habituation observed after distributed training sessions at a 60-sec ISI was consistently expressed when the training procedures were varied. Thus it is clear thatC. elegans can reliably express long-term retention for distributed training sessions at a 60-sec ISI, making the system a candidate for further investigations into the cellular processes supporting memory.     

Milieuspezifische Bildungsstrategien in Familie und Gleichaltrigengruppe

Zusammenfassung Der Topos Bildungsungleichheit hat in der jüngsten Zeit eine Renaissance erfahren. Wie im Anschluss an den so genannten Sputnik-Schock und die Diskussionen der 1960er-bis 70er-Jahre wird durch den PISA-Schock die Frage nach der Qualit?t von Bildung erneut virulent. Gleichzeitig jedoch scheint die heutige bildungstheoretische Debatte zu eingeengt. Sie reduziert sich auf institutionalisierte schulische Bildung und vernachl?ssigt die zentrale Bedeutung au?erschulischer Bildungsprozesse, die sozialstrukturell variieren. So lassen sich aufgrund der — allerdings trotz sozialwissenschaftlicher Dauerbeobachtungen bis heute leider dünnen — Forschungsbasis deutliche Differenzen in milieuspezifischen Bildungsstrategien von Heranwachsenden und ihren Eltern feststellen. In Familie und Gleichaltrigengruppe herrschen demnach erfahrungsbezogene Bildungsinhalte und Strategien vor, die mit den in der Schule dominierenden Leistungs- und Qualifikationsanforderungen auf sehr unterschiedliche Weise zusammentreffen. Die vorgelegte mesotheoretische Bestimmung von Bildungsstrategien weist auf M?glichkeiten einer differenzierten Analyse von Bildungsprozessen hin, die an die makrostrukturellen Pr?missen des Systems sozialer Ungleichheit ebenso anschlussf?hig ist wie an mikrostrukturelle, lebensweltliche Erfahrungsbezüge der Schülerinnern und Schüler.

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Summary Milieu-specific Educational Strategies in Families and Peer Groups “Educational disadvantage” is experiencing a renaissance as a topic of educational debate. Just as following the so-called Sputnik-Shock and discussions in the ’60s and ’70s, PISA has renewed the debate on the quality of education. At the same time, the perspective of current educational theory seems too narrow. It focuses on institutionalized school education and overlooks the central importance of educational processes outside of the school, which vary according to social structure. Despite continuous observations within this field, scientific research is weaker than might be expected. However, differences in milieu-specific strategies for education are clearly identifiable between young people and their parents. We propose that experience-based educational content and strategies predominate in both families and peer groups, and that these coincide with the achievements- and qualifications-based educational demands within schools in quite different ways. The following meso-theoretic investigation of educational strategies points to the potential of analyses, which can integrate both the macro-structural conditions of systems of inequality and the experiential, micro-structural reference points of pupils.

     

The network of innovators in Jena: An application of social network analysis

We apply social network analysis methods to describe the evolution of the innovator network of Jena, Germany in the period from 1995 to 2001. We find this evolution to be directed towards an increasing focus on core competencies of the network. Further we analyse the network resulting from R&D cooperations and explain - by means of network regression techniques - that the job mobility of scientists and the technological overlap between the actors, rather than past cooperations, can best predict the resulting structure.     

Didactic material confronted with the concept of mathematical literacy

This paper reflects on the use of didactic material in mathematics classes. It focuses on the mathematical activities of students and the didactical activities of teachers. Its point of departure is a critique of technical-managerial approaches to teaching, learning, and innovation. Based on this critique, fundamental tensions between the development of new didactic material and the cognitive style and daily routines of practising teachers are identified. In the last part of the paper, the concept of mathematical literacy is introduced in order to set the crucial relationship between didactic material for mathematics instruction and the ways in which it is used in the classroom on new and fertile grounds.     

Expression of a fusion protein of human ciliary neurotrophic factor and soluble CNTF-Receptor and identification of its activity

Ciliary neurotrophic factor (CNTF) has pleiotropic actions on many neuronal populations as well as on glia. Signal transduction by CNTF requires that it bind first to CNTF-R, permitting the recruitment of gp130 and LIF-R, forming a tripartite receptor complex. Cells that only express gp130 and LIF-R, but not CNTF-R are refractory to stimulation by CNTF. On many target cells CNTF only acts in the presence of its specific agonistic soluble receptors. We engineered a soluble fusion protein by linking the COOH-terminus of sCNTF-R to the NH₂-terminus of CNTF. Recombinant CNTF/sCNTF-R fusion protein (Hyper-CNTF) was successfully expressed in COS-7 cells. The apparent molecular mass of the Hyper-CNTF protein was estimated from western blots to be 75 kDa. Proliferation assays of transfected BAF/3 cells in response to CNTF and Hyper-CNTF were used to verify the activity of the cytokines. The proliferative results confirmed that CNTF required homodimerization of the gp130, CNTF-R and LIF-R receptor subunit whereas Hyper-CNTF required heterodimerization of the gp130 and LIF-R receptor subunit. We concluded that the fusion protein Hyper-CNTF had superagonistic activity on target cells expressing gp130 and LIF-R, but lacking membrane-bound CNTF-R. Project supported by the Scientific Research Foundation for the Returned Overseas Chinese Scholar, Zhejiang Province, China and SFB415, TP B5, Germany.     

Delivering NEET policy packages? A decade of NEET policy in England

This article explores the way in which government policy shapes the lives of young people who are not in education, employment or training (NEET). In particular it examines how the concept of NEETs is set within a specific infrastructure and discourse for managing and supporting young people. The article provides a brief history of the NEET concept and NEET initiatives, before moving on to scrutinise the policies of the Coalition Government. A key distinction is made between those policies and practices that seek to prevent young people becoming NEET from those that seek to re-engage those who are NEET. It is argued that the Coalition has drawn on a similar active labour market toolkit to the previous Labour administration, but that this has been implemented with fewer resources and less co-ordination. It concludes that there is little reason to believe that Coalition policy will be any more successful than that of the previous government, and some reason to be concerned that it will lead to young people becoming more entrenched within NEET.