FreshEd

What’s the relationship between test scores and gross domestic product? Do higher test scores lead to higher GDP? This question may seem a bit strange because most people think about the value of education on a much smaller, less abstract scale, usually in terms of “my children” or “my education.” Will my children earn a higher wage in the future if they do well on school examinations today? If I major in engineering, will I earn a higher income than if I majored in English? The answer to these question is usually assumed to be a resounding “yes.” Doing better on examinations or studying subjects that are perceived to be more valuable will result in higher wages at the individual level and higher GDP at the national level. Such a belief shapes educational policies and influences educational decision making by families. It has even resulted in a global private tutoring industry that prepares students for tests in hopes of getting ahead. But what if this assumption isn’t true? What if the relationship between test scores and GDP isn’t so straightforward? With me today are Hikaru Komatsu and Jeremy Rappleye. Recently they have been publishing numerous articles (see here, here, and here) challenging the statistical research supporting the conclusion that higher tests scores cause higher GDPs. Instead, they find that test scores don’t determine GDP by all that much. Hikaru and Jeremy were kind enough to give FreshEd a graph showing their results. You can find it on FreshEdpodcast.com. Hikaru Komatsu and Jeremy Rappleye are based at the Graduate School of Education at Kyoto University. Their most recent op-ed appeared in the Washington Post. www.freshedpodcast.com/komatsurappleye

Rwanda is perhaps most well-known for the genocide it experienced in the 1990s. In its post-conflict development, the country has had to balance colonial legacies, state centralizing tendencies, and the zeitgeist of neoliberalism. This has made for a careful balancing — one that has left the government regulating the society and economy while simultaneously reducing its responsibility to citizens. In education, this balancing act manifests in the government’s three aims: credentials, control, and creativity. The education system is based on credentials awarded through examinations, a colonial hangover, and teaches students control and order as part of the state’s centralization efforts; yet, somehow, the system promotes creativity so students can pursue a learner-centered education tailored to their own needs, preparing them for the 21st century labor market of precarious work. My guest today, Catherine Honeyman, has a new book that explores Rwanda’s opportunities, challenges, and paradoxes in post-conflict development through the policy of mandatory entrepreneurship education, which is believed to be the country’s beacon for economic growth. Catherine Honeyman is a visiting scholar at the Duke Center for International Development and Managing Director of Ishya Consulting. Her new book, The Orderly Entrepreneur, takes us inside both policy making circles and classrooms to understand part of Rwanda’s social transformation. The Orderly Entrepreneur received an honorable mention from the Globalization and Education SIG’s 2016 Book Award. http://www.freshedpodcast.com/catherinehoneyman/

What are Americans’ views of higher education? The common story is that people see higher education as an investment in the future of an individual. More education from the best university will result in high salaries in the future. In this story, the public doesn’t appear. It’s all about the private good of higher education. But what if this story is wrong? Or at least biased by the very questions being asked? Instead of asking if higher education is an investment in one’s future job prospects, what if we asked about higher education’s public value? Well, my guests today did just that. Noah Drezner and Oren Pizmony-Levy, together with Aaron Pallas, conducted a nationally representative survey in America on views of higher education. Their findings tell a new and powerful story. Noah Drezner is an Associate Professor of Higher Education at Teachers College, Columbia University, where Oren Pizmony-Levy is an Assistant Professor of International and Comparative Education. www.freshedpodcast.com/Drezner-Pizmony-Levy

Competition within and across universities is so common that it may not seem like a big deal. Professors compete for tenure. Students compete to get into a best universities. And universities compete for rankings. But what where does this competition come from and what effects is it having on higher education systems? My guest today is Rajani Naidoo, professor in higher education management at the University of Bath. In 2016, she edited a special issue of the British journal of the sociology of education looking at what she calls the competition fetish in higher education. The special issue brings together articles that show the varieties of competition and the various ways actors channel, reproduce, internalize and secure competition logics. Some of the articles address the consequences of competition. http://www.freshedpodcast.com/rajaninaidoo/

Today we remember the late Geoff Whitty by replaying his 2017 interview. Last year Geoff and his colleague, John Furlong, co-edited a volume entitled Knowledge and the Study of Education: an international exploration. The volume explores these questions: How is education studied around the world? Are there different knowledge traditions to the study of education? Have there been changes over time? And what has been the impact of globalization? John Furlong is Emeritus Professor of Education at the University of Oxford and Geoff Whitty had an illustrious career in education, associated with the Institute of Education for 50 years. http://www.freshedpodcast.com/johnfurlong-geoffwhitty/

Today’s topic is space in educational research. My guest is Marianne Larsen, an Associate Professor at the Faculty of Education, University of Western Ontario. Dr. Larsen’s recent research focuses on the overall processes and effects of the internationalization of higher education. She has been researching how internationalization policies are taken up ‘on-the-ground’, as well as the role of higher education leaders in advancing internationalization agendas. Her most recent book, Internationalizing Higher Education: An Analysis through Spatial, Mobility and Network Theories, builds upon her work to advance the use of new spatial and mobilities theories in comparative education research. I spoke with Dr. Larsen in 2016 about how she and her colleague Jason Beech theorize the concept of educational space not as an object of study but as a set of relations between individuals and groups. http://www.freshedpodcast.com/marianne-larsen/

The FreshEd team is going on summer holidays. We’ll be back in a few weeks with new episodes. In the meantime, we’ll air some old episodes for you to enjoy. Today, Keita Takayama provides a critical reading of the so-called “PISA debate.” This debate started in May 2014 when a group of scholars published an open letter in the Guardian newspaper to Andreas Schleicher, the head of OECD’s education and skills division, criticizing PISA. Two subsequent response letters were published in the Wall Street Journal responding to the open letter and critiquing PISA in ways left out of the original letter. Keita Takayama, a professor at the University of New England in Australia, takes us through the arguments in these various letters. By looking at who wrote the letters, Prof. Takayama scratches the surface of the arguments to locate hidden agendas. In the end, he sees the so-called “PISA debate” as provincial. www.freshedpodcast.com/keitatakayama

Humans have been the center of Western philosophy and science for centuries, at least since the European enlightenment. With the rise of artificial intelligence, climate change and challenges to the very idea of subjectivity, are we moving into an era that is perhaps better labeled post-human? But what would posthumanism mean for education? My guest today is Stefan Herbrechter. A research fellow at Coventry University and a Privatdozent at Heidelberg University, Stefan has a new book chapter entitled “Posthumanist Education?” published in the International Handbook of Philosophy of Education. Full transcript available at http://www.freshedpodcast.com/stefanherbrechter/

Does social science as it is commonly understood and practiced work in post-socialist settings? That may sound like an absurd question, even a bit crude. My guests today, Alla Korzh and Noah Sobe, see limits to the very social imaginaries underpinning social science. They argue that the diversity of post-socialist transformations challenges the existing paradigms and frameworks of theory and method used in much social science today. Together with Iveta Silova and Serhiy Kovalchuk, Alla and Noah co-edited a 17-chapter volume entitled “Reimagining Utopias: Theory and method for education research in post-socialist context.” The book explores from many perspectives the shifting social imaginaries of post-socialist transformations to understand what happens when the new and old utopias of post-socialism confront the new and old utopias of social science.  Alla Korzh is an assistant professor of international education at the School for International Training Graduate Institute, World Learning. Noah Sobe is a professor of cultural and educational policy studies at Loyola University Chicago and past president of the Comparative and International Education Society. Full transcript available at www.freshedpodcast.com/korzhsobe

The images and stories of migrant families being separated by the United States government set off a global conversation about immigration, borders, and justice. If the political philosophy of liberalism is based on liberty and equality, then the events of the past few months have challenged the very core of liberal democratic states. My guest today is Bruce Collet. He researches migration and public schooling, with a special interest in migration, religion, and schooling in democratic states. He’s thinking through what we might call liberal multiculturalism as well as issues around security. Bruce Collet is an Associate Professor in Educational Foundations and Inquiry at Bowling Green State University in Ohio. He is the author of Migration, Religion, and Schooling within Liberal Democratic States (Routledge, 2018), and Editor of the journal Diaspora, Indigenous, and Minority Education. Full transcript available at: http://www.freshedpodcast.com/brucecollet/ ‎