Download or read book Researching Education Policy Public Policy and Policymakers written by Dan Gibton and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2015-10-05 with total page 239 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Researching Education Policy, Public Policy, and Policymakers is a theoretical and hands-on practical guide to conducting qualitative research on education policy and public policy, with an emphasis on studies that involve senior participants and high-status government and non-government organisations. Building on over a decade of extensive experience in qualitative research on education policy among the most senior policymakers, this book explores and illustrates successful approaches to working with senior policymakers through examples from both the UK and Israel. Whilst policy studies are traditionally either theoretical or quantitative, this book explains the theory, methodology, and ethics of harnessing qualitative methods to the study of senior policymakers and their settings. Key topics include: Designing and planning the qualitative policy study Document analysis as a policy research tool Interviewing policymakers and observing policy Mapping qualitative policy analysis methods Writing policy reports Ethics and trust This practical guide, built upon a sound theoretical framework, will prove both inspirational and helpful to academic and professional researchers across all disciplines involving public policy.

Download or read book Handbook of Education Policy Research written by Gary Sykes and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2012-09-10 with total page 1062 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Co-published by Routledge for the American Educational Research Association (AERA) Educational policy continues to be of major concern. Policy debates about economic growth and national competitiveness, for example, commonly focus on the importance of human capital and a highly educated workforce. Defining the theoretical boundaries and methodological approaches of education policy research are the two primary themes of this comprehensive, AERA-sponsored Handbook. Organized into seven sections, the Handbook focuses on (1) disciplinary foundations of educational policy, (2) methodological perspectives, (3) the policy process, (4) resources, management, and organization, (5) teaching and learning policy, (6) actors and institutions, and (7) education access and differentiation. Drawing from multiple disciplines, the Handbook’s over one hundred authors address three central questions: What policy issues and questions have oriented current policy research? What research strategies and methods have proven most fruitful? And what issues, questions, and methods will drive future policy research? Topics such as early childhood education, school choice, access to higher education, teacher accountability, and testing and measurement cut across the 63 chapters in the volume. The politics surrounding these and other issues are objectively analyzed by authors and commentators. Each of the seven sections concludes with two commentaries by leading scholars in the field. The first considers the current state of policy design, and the second addresses the current state of policy research. This book is appropriate for scholars and graduate students working in the field of education policy and for the growing number of academic, government, and think-tank researchers engaged in policy research. For more information on the American Educational Research Association, please visit: http://www.aera.net/.

Download or read book Intimate Accounts of Education Policy Research written by Camilla Addey and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2021-09-30 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What do we actually do when we research education policy and governance? Why do we tame the messy hinterland of research into smooth accounts and what do we lose in the process? In this volume, distinguished scholars in education policy and governance research discuss how the practice of methods is messy, subjective, and provisional. They approach methodology as riddled with tensions, doubts, troubles, and mundane decisions. Scholarship in this book shifts from recording the methodological hinterland to putting it to productive use as resources for thinking about the researched world and about research itself. This methodological openness helps to examine how research reproduces scholars’ metaphysics, how research is a deeply embodied process encompassing all senses, how scholars’ concerns interfere in the worlds they study, but also how these equally interfere with researchers. By challenging smooth methodological accounts which conceal the complex and provisional nature of research, this book offers new approaches in education policy and governance research that are more generative, insightful, and sincere. Offering new ways of thinking about research methodologies, the book will be of great interest to researchers, academics, and post-graduate students in the fields of education research and education theory, as well as social scientists interested in research methodologies more broadly.

Download or read book Between the State and the Schoolhouse written by Tom Loveless and published by . This book was released on 2021-04-13 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Between the State and the Schoolhouse examines the Common Core State Standards from the initiative's promising beginnings to its disappointing outcomes. Situating the standards in the long history of state and federal efforts to shape education, the book describes a series of critical lessons that highlight the political and structural challenges of large-scale, top-down reforms. Education policy expert Tom Loveless argues that there are too many layers between the state and the classroom for a national standards approach to be effective. Specifically, he emphasizes the significant gap between states' roles in designing education policy and teachers' roles as implementers of policy. In addition, he asserts that top-down policies are unpredictable, subject to political and ideological pressures, and vulnerable to the pendulum effect as new reforms emerge in response to previous ones. One of the most ambitious education reforms of the past century, the Common Core aimed to raise student success, prepare larger numbers of students for both college and careers, and close achievement gaps. Yet, as Loveless documents, a decade later there remains a lack of significant positive impact on student learning. Between the State and the Schoolhouse marks an important contribution to the debate over the standards movement and the role of federal and state governments in education reform.

Download or read book Researching Education written by Kanka Mallick and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2005-07-19 with total page 225 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides the reader with an introduction to the world of educational research, helping the reader understand the terminology and issues and providing guidance on initiating and implementing research studies.

Download or read book Researching Higher Education written by Jennifer M. Case and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2015-10-14 with total page 266 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Research on higher education has yielded many insights that have improved our theoretical and practical understanding but there are still many themes that continue to appear on research agendas, provoking renewed focus on these complex questions and problems. Researching Higher Education explores these issues, examining topics such as equity in access and participation, the relationship between higher education and society, how and what students learn and the professional development of academics. In this volume, contributors from Europe, Australia, Africa and the US critically address ongoing issues with a set of key questions to guide their analysis: What do we know? What are the missing links and gaps in past research? What are the implications for further research? Key themes include: The nature of higher education Higher education and society Staff and students in higher education Teaching and learning Curriculum and assessment Critical, engaging and international in scope, Researching Higher Education will be a valuable guide for academics, researchers, postgraduate students and policy makers in the higher education community.

Download or read book Handbook of Research in Education Finance and Policy written by Helen F. Ladd and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012-08-21 with total page 786 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sponsored by the Association for Education Finance and Policy (AEFP), this groundbreaking new handbook assembles in one place the existing research-based knowledge in education finance and policy, thereby helping to define this evolving field of research and practice. It provides a readily available resource for anyone seriously involved in education finance and policy in the United States and around the world. The Handbook traces the evolution of the field from its initial focus on school inputs and the revenue sources used to finance these inputs to a focus on educational outcomes and the larger policies used to achieve them. It shows how the current decision-making context in school finance inevitably interacts with those of governance, accountability, equity, privatization, and other areas of education policy. Because a full understanding of the important contemporary issues requires input from a variety of perspectives, the Handbook draws on contributors from a variety of disciplines. While many of the chapters cover complex state-of-the-art empirical research, the authors explain key concepts in language that non-specialists can understand.

Download or read book Handbook of Research in Education Finance and Policy written by Helen F. Ladd and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-12-17 with total page 693 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sponsored by the Association for Education Finance and Policy (AEFP), the second edition of this groundbreaking handbook assembles in one place the existing research-based knowledge in education finance and policy, with particular attention to elementary and secondary education. Chapters from the first edition have been fully updated and revised to reflect current developments, new policies, and recent research. With new chapters on teacher evaluation, alternatives to traditional public schooling, and cost-benefit analysis, this volume provides a readily available current resource for anyone involved in education finance and policy. The Handbook of Research in Education Finance and Policy traces the evolution of the field from its initial focus on school inputs and revenue sources used to finance these inputs, to a focus on educational outcomes and the larger policies used to achieve them. Chapters show how decision making in school finance inevitably interacts with decisions about governance, accountability, equity, privatization, and other areas of education policy. Because a full understanding of important contemporary issues requires inputs from a variety of perspectives, the Handbook draws on contributors from a number of disciplines. Although many of the chapters cover complex, state-of-the-art empirical research, the authors explain key concepts in language that non-specialists can understand. This comprehensive, balanced, and accessible resource provides a wealth of factual information, data, and wisdom to help educators improve the quality of education in the United States.

Download or read book Studying Educational and Social Policy written by Ronald H. Heck and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2004-07-19 with total page 475 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The overall purpose of this text is to introduce beginning researchers to the study of educational and social policy, how it has been examined from a scholarly perspective, and the salient issues to consider in conceptualizing and conducting policy research. The emphasis is on "introduce," as the various policy fields within the public sector (for example, education, energy, health, labor) are much too diverse to include in depth in a single volume on theoretical concepts and research methods. The focus is not so much on the substance of policymaking as on understanding the interplay between how policy is made and implemented and the various conceptual approaches and methods researchers can use to frame and conduct policy studies. The underlying assumption is that a critique of the substantive, theoretical, and methodological issues involved in studying policy can help researchers conduct policy studies that are more informative in guiding policy development and more effective in assessing the impact of policy reforms. *Part I acquaints readers with substantive issues and challenges related to the study of the policy process, and includes chapters on federalism and policymaking, and on studying policy development, implementation, and impact. *Part II examines different conceptual frameworks and theories for the study of policy, with chapters on political culture and policymaking, the punctuated-equilibrium theory and the advocacy coalition framework, economic and organizational perspectives, and new approaches (e.g., feminism, critical theory, postmodernism). *Part III focuses research methods for studying policy, covering research design, qualitative methods, multilevel methods for policy research, and growth modeling methods for examining policy change. *Part IV compares the diversity of approaches used by policy scholars with respect to their strengths and weaknesses, and presents a number of issues for further consideration in conducting policy research. This introduction to theories and methods of conducting policy research is intended to give prospective researchers an appreciation of the relationship among policy problems, empirical methods, and practice, and to contribute to building their skills in conceptualizing and conducting policy research that answers important questions. The text includes examples of studies to illustrate the diversity of methodological techniques, and discusses issues related to the design and conduct of original educational policy studies. Studying Educational and Social Policy: Theoretical Concepts and Research Methods is designed primarily for graduate courses in educational policy and educational research and is appropriate as well for research methodology courses in other disciplines, including statistics and research methodology in the social sciences, organizational studies, public policy, and political science

Download or read book Policy Research in Educational Settings written by Jenny Ozga and published by McGraw-Hill Education (UK). This book was released on 1999-11-16 with total page 162 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book argues for independent, critical research on education policy in the context of attacks on the quality and usefulness of educational research in general. It takes issue with the argument, promoted by government departments and agencies that education policy research should be limited to work that assists policy-makers. Against this position, the book advocates independent, critical research that scrutinizes policy in relation to its consequences for equality and social justice. It argues that practitioners and academic researchers should form a research community that develops its own knowledge base from which so-called evidence based policymaking in education may be assessed and challenged. The book offers guidance on the theoretical and methodological resources available to practitioners and others with an interest in doing research on policy and discusses some of the main issues and problems in doing policy research on education. It offers examples of research on policy at different system levels, pursuing themes such as globalization, changing governance of education, selection, choice and exclusion, managerialism and the feminisation of educational management. It argues for attention to the history of policy in education as a resource for understanding the present, and concludes with recommendations for future research in areas where contestation of official agendas is needed.

Download or read book When Research Matters written by Frederick M. Hess and published by . This book was released on 2008 with total page 332 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Research Matters considers the complex and crucially important relationship between education research and policy. In examining how and under what conditions research affects education policy, the book focuses on a number of critical issues: the history of the federal role in education policy; the evolving nature of educational policy research; the role of research in debates about reading, NCLB, and "out-of-field" teaching; how research affects policy by shaping public opinion, judicial rulings, and the decisions of district and school leaders; and the incentives that help explain the behavior of researchers and policymakers. "Renewed interest in the uses of social science evidence for public policy has prompted a vigorous debate about the quality and utility of education research. The essays in this volume contribute important insights into a range of complex and contested issues. Researchers, policymakers, and consumers of education scholarship need to have this book." -- Michael J. Feuer, Executive Director of the Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education in the National Research Council of the National Academies "The current devotion to 'scientifically based research' indicates great faith in the ability of research to influence policy. Yet the policy-research nexus has not been examined in recent years. Ironically, the messy complexities of the research-policy connection don't lend themselves to the research designs currently in most favor. Therefore, this book fills an important void. Under what circumstances and in what ways is research influential today? Can we create better incentives and support for the conduct and use of research that is both rigorous and relevant to policy? These and other questions make for fascinating reading." -- Susan Fuhrman, President, Teachers College, Columbia University "When Research Matters asks the questions that are rarely asked about the difficult road from research to policy. For the classroom educator, the unevenness of the road from research to policy makes the next leg of the journey--from policy to practice--that much more difficult. This volume gives us all a deeper understanding of the reasons research is often poorly translated into practice." -- Pascal D. Forgione Jr., Superintendent of Schools, Austin, Texas Frederick M. Hess is resident scholar and director of Education Policy Studies at the American Enterprise Institute. He is also executive editor of Education Next.

Download or read book Researching Education Policy written by David Halpin and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2005-08-04 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The methodology researching of educational policy is the subject of this book. It takes a "behind the scenes" look at the conducting, the analysis and the interpretation of research carried out into educational policy issues revolving around the 1988 Education Reform Act.; The contributors draw on their project research experience to demonstrate the breadth of issues lionked with such policy research, and cover the gender and power balance between interviewer and interviewee, the difficulties resulting from different ideological stances of researchers and researched, and difficulties in finding links between research and policy.

Download or read book Intimate Accounts of Education Policy Research written by Camilla Addey and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2021-09-30 with total page 236 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What do we actually do when we research education policy and governance? Why do we tame the messy hinterland of research into smooth accounts and what do we lose in the process? In this volume, distinguished scholars in education policy and governance research discuss how the practice of methods is messy, subjective, and provisional. They approach methodology as riddled with tensions, doubts, troubles, and mundane decisions. Scholarship in this book shifts from recording the methodological hinterland to putting it to productive use as resources for thinking about the researched world and about research itself. This methodological openness helps to examine how research reproduces scholars’ metaphysics, how research is a deeply embodied process encompassing all senses, how scholars’ concerns interfere in the worlds they study, but also how these equally interfere with researchers. By challenging smooth methodological accounts which conceal the complex and provisional nature of research, this book offers new approaches in education policy and governance research that are more generative, insightful, and sincere. Offering new ways of thinking about research methodologies, the book will be of great interest to researchers, academics, and post-graduate students in the fields of education research and education theory, as well as social scientists interested in research methodologies more broadly.

Download or read book Research Handbook on Adult Education Policy written by Marcella Milana and published by Edward Elgar Publishing. This book was released on 2024-06-05 with total page 383 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bringing together an impressive array of esteemed and emerging academics, the Research Handbook on Adult Education Policy addresses how adult learning and education policies are made, and the theories and methodologies which can be mobilised to study its developments.

Download or read book Researching Education written by Kanka Mallick and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2005-07-19 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides the reader with an introduction to the world of educational research. A two-pronged approach is adopted: to help the reader understand the concepts and terminology widely used in educational research and a range of methodological issues; and to provide the reader with guidance on initiating and implementing research studies. In this highly accessible book, the authors consider the perspectives, concepts and techniques in common usage in the field of research, and the variety of approaches that may be taken in researching different subjects. A glossary is also provided covering the relevant terms and concepts referred to and used in current educational research.

Download or read book Researching Education Through Actor Network Theory written by Tara Fenwick and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2012-03-06 with total page 146 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Researching Education Through Actor-Network Theory offers a new take on educational research, demonstrating the ways in which actor-network theory can expand the understanding of educational change. An international collaboration exploring diverse manifestations of educational change Illustrates the impact of actor-network theory on educational research Positions education as a key area where actor-network theory can add value, as it has been shown to do in other social sciences A valuable resource for anyone interested in the sociology and philosophy of education

Download or read book Being Reflexive in Critical Educational and Social Research written by Geoffrey Shacklock and published by Psychology Press. This book was released on 1998 with total page 238 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book brings together a collection of case studies and readings on the subject of doing research in education. It differs from other texts in taking a personal view of the experience of doing research. Each author presents a reflexive account of the issues and dilemmas as they have lived through them during the undertaking of educational research. The collection fills the space often referred to in critical research as the phenomenon of the 'missing researcher'. Coming from the researcher's own perspectives, their positions are revealed within a wider space that can be personal, political, social and reflexive. With this approach, many issues such as ethics, gender, race, validity, reciprocity, sexuality, class, voice, empowerment, authorship and readership are given a much needed airing.