Themes Cross-Cut International Boundaries
December 30, 2011
Has standards-based reform improved the quality of teaching and improved rates of retention? Does mass expansion of higher education lead to greater social equality? Does tracking help or hinder efforts to provide a quality education to all students?
Subjects like these concern educators in every country.
That’s why Adam Gamoran’s research involves collaboration with colleagues across the globe. In fact, his work has taken him to three continents in just the past year.
In August he presented a series of lectures in Australia. At the University of Newcastle he discussed U.S. efforts to hold schools and teachers accountable for student performance, including the degree of success of No Child Left Behind. He also reviewed research on grouping students to maximize learning and to minimize inequality. At Newcastle and at the University of Queensland he discussed a large scale study designed to assess the causal impact of family-school social capital on children’s social and academic development.
In September Gamoran spoke at an education summit convened by Israel’s Ministry of Education and Ministry of Finance. One 3 foreigners invited, he presented the latest findings on education’s effect on societies and economies and on ways to improve educational systems. Gamoran’s talk at the Taub Center conference on the Socioeconomic Impact of Education addressed, “Improving Education Systems - What Works?" The findings were presented to senior Israeli policymakers and to the general public.
Gamoran visited Germany’s Bamberg University in November to discuss the country’s National Educational Panel Study (NEPS). Researchers are studying how individual educational careers and competencies develop over a lifetime, and how they’re influenced by families, educational institutions, and work environments. The panel will survey 60,000 children, adolescents and adults per year, who are distributed across eight educational stages ranging from early childhood education to higher education and adult education.
