Do Teachers Matter?. A psychology study hit the headlines last Friday under the banner ‘Teacher quality makes little difference, study shows’. AN AUSTRALIAN study has cast doubt over the “teacher effect”, by suggesting differences between teachers play only a minor role in how well a child will learn. The global study, led by the University of New England, monitored 500 pairs…
Tag Archives Education
The Practical Trade off Between Class Size and Teacher Quality. My AFR oped today is on class size and teacher quality. Full text over the fold (with hyperlinks for anyone who wants more detail on the research). In a Class of Their Own, Australian Financial Review, 14 July 2009 Few education policies are more popular than class size reductions. Alongside…
As always, some very useful and timely links from Andrew Leigh. I would be interested in pursuing randomised trials in our Education Sector. Randomising in the UK. In 2003, the UK government started a major randomised evaluation of the Employment Retention and Advancement project (ERA), to test the effectiveness of interventions to improve job retention and advancement prospects for low…
Schools That Transform. - Andrew Leigh David Brooks reports on some surprisingly large impacts from a randomised trial of New York “Harlem Children’s Zone” schools. The effects are so big that I find it hard to imagine they’re readily replicable, but it’s tantalizing stuff. The fight against poverty produces great programs but disappointing results. You go visit an inner-city school, job-training program…
The National Quality Council has identified five Action Groups to work on achieving 5 priorities for 2009. They are: Vet Products for the 21st Century, Quality of Assessment Action Group, Skills for Sustainability Action Group, International VET Action Group, and National Consistency Action Group. National Quality Council agrees on priorities.
Building the education revolution. The Government has announced Building the Education Revolution, a $14.7 billion long term investment to improve the quality of facilities, like gymnasiums, libraries and science labs in Australian schools. Prime Minister of Australia, 3 February 2009. Comment: This appears to be a truly massive amount of money, I hope the expertise and coordination is equal to…
Protecting rural economies in Scotland. Scotland's rural schools can be fundamental to safeguarding small, fragile local economies and the Scottish Government is committed to protecting their often unique place in the community. [eGov monitor - A Policy Dialogue Platform - Education & Skills]
Declaration on Educational Goals for Young Australians. In the busy rush to Christmas, many members may have missed the developments related to the Australian Education Ministers’ First Biennial ... [Central Ranges LLEN News]
Staying at School Ain’t Silly. Andrew Leigh - Nicholas Gruen draws my attention to a piece on school completion by CIS researcher Peter Saunders (based on a longer paper here) [Broken Link - see below], who argues: Three-quarters of students currently stay to year 12, and most of them benefit from higher earnings and better job prospects as a result.…