2017年10月9日月曜日

EDU-JPN:Background of the success of Japanese PISA result compare to U.S -Part II

Education in Japan (Natalie Collor)

Discussion of PISA results

In the previous article, the most recent PISA results for the United States and Japan were given and compared in a general sense. Japan has much high scores than the U.S. on all three subject areas—science, math, and reading—of the PISA survey, and is one of the highest-scoring countries overall. A closer look at the results in each subject tells more about each country’s educational methods and how students feel toward the tested subjects. The first part of this article will provide a more detailed discussion of the results based on gender, while the second part will focus on what the socioeconomic status of students says about their performance on the PISA survey. Both parts will also speculate what the discrepancies in student performance say about education practices in both countries.

Gender

Gender differences are apparent in the PISA results of both countries. In the science and mathematics sections of the PISA test, boys scored higher than girls on average. When these students were asked about what field they expect to work in, a higher percentage of boys expected to be working in a science-related field than girls. The totals were 19% of Japanese boys vs. 18% of Japanese girls and 25% of American boys vs. 24% of American girls. Surprisingly, even though Japan’s average score in science is quite higher than that of the U.S., more students in the U.S. picture themselves in a science-related job later in life. This result suggests that students in the U.S. experience slightly more enjoyment in science-related activities, and further research may need to be done to figure out what exactly is the source of this difference.

A similar performance gap between girls and boys occurs in the math section of the test, but girls outperform boys in the reading section of the test in both countries. Although the performance gap is much less in the reading section, it is interesting that there is a flip in gender dominance when a non-scientific field is examined.




2017年10月2日月曜日

EDU-JPN: Background of the success of Japanese PISA result compare to U.S. -Part I

Education in Japan (Natalie Collor)

An Introduction to PISA

PISA is the acronym used by the Program for International Student Assessment, an organization that surveys education systems across the globe by testing hundreds of thousands of students in over seventy countries. PISA creates a two-hour test in the areas of science, math, and reading for students around the age of fifteen and administers the test to select schools and regions every three years to track educational developments worldwide. The results of the PISA surveys can be very useful in both domestic and international education spheres.

In addition to administering surveys to evaluate student performance in these three areas, PISA is also very involved in improving the state of education in low-income countries by helping students become better learners and teachers becoming better instructors.

Results of the 2015 PISA Survey

The first PISA survey was administered in 2000, and the most recent PISA survey was given in 2015. Countless interesting analyses are possible when comparing the results of all the countries participating in this survey; however, the current essay is concerned with the results of Japan compared to those of the United States. Although these two countries may have a lot in common economically and politically, the results of the PISA survey would suggest these two countries have significant differences in educational practices.

The results of the most recent PISA survey suggest Japan’s educational system is more suited to preparing students for tests and surveys like PISA, as Japanese students scored higher on average than American students in all three areas tested. Japan is one of the leading countries in science—trailing only Singapore—and has been for many iterations of the survey. Moreover, Japan has outscored the U.S. in all three areas tested on PISA surveys for many years.

2017年9月29日金曜日

国際シンポジウム「国際アセスメント時代における教育行政」のお知らせ

日本教育行政学会と韓国教育行政学会が隔年で主催する国際シンポジウムが以下の通り開催されます。シンポジウムは公開で行われますので、学会員でなくても申込不要・無料でご参加いただけます。ご関心のある方はぜひご参加ください。

※資料の残部があります。ご希望の方は実費にて郵送しますので、メールで送付先をお知らせください。(配布終了)

国際シンポジウム「国際アセスメント時代における教育行政」

日時: 2017年10月14日(土) 13:00~16:45

場所: 日本女子大学 目白キャンパス 香雪館401教室

趣旨: 近年、国際アセスメント、特にPISAが多くの国・地域の教育政策、教育改革に少なからぬ影響を与えている。「学力」の国際比較における優位性を獲得あるいは確保するために、教育内容のスタンダード化やテストとアカウンタビリティ政策を重視するようになった国・地域が多いが、対応の仕方は一様ではない。また、ある国や地域で功を奏したとされる改革や政策が外国に「輸出」されるという現象も現れている。本シンポジウムでは、このように児童・生徒の「学力」のみならず、各国及び地域の教育政策の効果も比較対象となる「国際アセスメント時代」の教育行政の課題をテーマに検討を行う。

報告者: 金 龍      清州教育大学 (韓国)
             Bob Lingard    The University of Queensland (オーストラリア)
             Eva Forsberg    Uppsala University (スウェーデン)(登壇なし)
             Daniel Pettersson    University of Gävle (スウェーデン)
             澤野 由紀子    聖心女子大学
司会:    小島 優生   獨協大学
ファシリテーター: 林 寛平    信州大学

シンポジウムの詳細・発表資料等については以下のリンクをご覧ください。
http://www.jeas.jp/act/conf/

また、翌日(10月15)には、一部報告者を招いて小規模な研究会を開催します。併せてご参加ください。(こちらは、10月6日までにお申込が必要です)
http://nordiskutbildning.blogspot.jp/2017/09/201710.html

【報告者略歴】
Bob Lingard: クイーンズランド大学教授、社会学的視点から教育政策を研究し、Global Education Policyやテスト政策について、多くの論文・著作を発表。主な近著に、Globalizing Educational Accountabilities (Routledge, 2016), The International Handbook of Global Education Policy (Wiley, 2016), National Testing in Schools: An Australian Assessment (Routledge, 2016)など

Eva Forsberg: ウプサラ大学教授、数々の研究プロジェクトのリーダーを歴任する中で、教育ガバナンスやアセスメント文化の研究を進めている。主な近著に、Mølstad, C., Pettersson, D. & Forsberg, E. (forthcoming) A Game of Thrones: Organising and Legitimising Knowledge through PISA Research. European Educational Research Journal.

Daniel Pettersson: イェヴレ大学准教授、Dr. Eva Forsbergとともに、現代における国際アセスメント指標の活用実態と歴史についての研究を進める。主な近著にLindblad, S., Pettersson, D. & Popkewitz, T.S. (forthcoming) Numbers, Education and the Making of Society: International Assessments and Its Expertise. Routledge: London & New York.

金 龍: 清州教育大学教授、教育改革や規制緩和改革について、批判的検討を行い、研究を進めている。主な近著に、Tracing the discourse of autonomy around the education reform of the 1990s in Korea: A critical discourse analysis (Journal of Educational Administration and Policy, v.1.n.1. 2016. pp.41-52)

澤野 由紀子: 聖心女子大学教授、主な研究課題は、ヨーロッパの生涯学習政策とその効果、能動的市民性を育む教育内容・方法の国際比較研究、北欧諸国の子ども行政システム、ロシア・CIS諸国の教育改革。主な著書に、『揺れる世界の学力マップ』(明石書店、2009年、共編著)、『教育改革の国際比較研究』(ミネルヴァ、2007年)等。

※本研究はJSPS科研費 JP16K13521, JP16H05960の助成を受けたものです。

2017年9月26日火曜日

教育動向:「禁書週間」始まる

アメリカの教育動向(久原みな子)

米国図書館協会(American Library Association, ALA)が毎年9月の最終週に開催する「禁書週間(Banned Books Week)」が9月25日より始まった。この1週間は、前年に「挑発的な本」として学校や図書館の本棚からの除去や利用規制の申し立てが届けられた本を通して、読む権利と情報アクセスの自由の価値を考える期間となっている。図書館協会によれば、2016年には323件の申し立てがあり、その多くが親や図書館利用者からのものであった。2016年の申し立てが多かった本トップ10には、絵本やグラフィック・ノベルなど、子ども・ヤング・アダルト向けの本もランクインしており、LGBTに関連したトピックを主題にしたものが目立つ。図書館協会は読む権利と自由を擁護する立場であり、実際にはこうした異議申し立ての多かった本が本棚から除去されることは少なく、今も入手できる状態であることを祝福している。図書館協会が発表した最も異議申し立ての多かった本トップ10は以下の動画や図書館協会のウェブサイトで確認できる。




2017年7月25日火曜日

EDU-JPN:Kake Gakuen Scandal: Maekawa’s Word against Prime Minister Abe’s

Education in Japan (Natalie Collor)

For more than a decade, MEXT has not granted approval for any higher education academic institution’s wish to create a veterinary program with the belief that more programs would create unnecessary competition in the field. Last November, however, Prime Minister Abe approved Kake Gakuen’s request for a veterinary program. Abe, who is publically known to be good friends with the institution’s chairman Kotaro Kake, granted this special permission only to Kake Gakuen and all other institutions were denied their expansion requests.

The documents, including transcripts from the approval meetings, as well as the influence of Prime Minister Abe’s opinion on this matter, hold great weight in this scandal, but MEXT first announced that it could not locate the documents. Soon after this, bureaucrat Kihei Maekawa stated publically that he knew for sure that the documents existed, suggesting that MEXT was hiding something in their inability to produce the documents.

An interesting twist to this scandal involved a Yomiuri Newspaper article outing Kihei Maekawa for going to a risqué bar. For a national newspaper to focus on the personal life of a politician is very rare, and the public may be wondering why such an article was written. Did Yomiuri, a newspaper in support of Prime Minister Abe’s Administration, want to scare off Maekawa and his claims concerning Abe’s statements in the official documents? The public knows so little about the hidden interactions involved in this matter, so the best they can do is speculate.

Upon a second search, MEXT found the documents that Maekawa spoke of. The words of Prime Minister Abe in these transcripts have since been scrutinized by the media and other politicians. Was he overly persuasive in encouraging his inferiors to approve this request for personal gain, or was he so passionate in his speech because he truly believed Kake Gakuen would benefit from the expansion?

While details from this scandal are still being released and the public may never know Abe’s true intentions or motives, there is one alarming implication from this scandal. If the suspicions about Abe’s personal interests in this matter, as well as Yomiuri’s intentional outing of Maekawa are true, Japan would become yet another country whose government leaks private information in order to protect its own interests. Although this is primarily speculation, many Japanese people—even politicians—are in disbelief that such questionable behavior could possibly occur in this country.

2017年7月8日土曜日

教育動向:州司法長官らがデヴォス教育長官を提訴




アメリカの教育動向(久原みな子)

コロンビア特別区と18州の司法長官は6日、連邦教育省とデヴォス教育長官を提訴した。オバマ政権下で決定していた、悪質あるいは違法な手法で営利目的大学に勧誘され、質の疑わしい教育や学位のために多額の学生ローンを負うことになった学生を救済するための規則(“the Borrower Defense Rule”)が7月1日付で有効になるはずであったが、これをデヴォス長官が突如延期したのは違法であると司法長官らは訴えている。悪質な勧誘と巨額の学生ローンの被害にあっている学生の多くは、2015年に倒産したコリンシアン・カレッジ(Corinthian Colleges, Inc.)のような営利目的の大学経営チェーンの学生である。オバマ政権が定めた規則は、こうした被害に合った学生が連邦政府ローンを返済できない場合、それを納税者ではなく大学に負わせることや、大学が学生に対し大学を相手取った訴訟を起こさないことを誓約させることを禁止するというものであったが、デヴォス長官はこの規則を改訂するために準備中であるとしている。






2017年7月3日月曜日

EDU-JPN:Moritomo Gakuen Scandal Part 2: The latest developments

Education in Japan (Natalie Collor)

One major development in the Moritomo Gakuen scandal is the loss of official documents. At the beginning of this month, it was revealed that the written documents and digital data from official land purchasing negotiations between Moritomo Gakuen and the government had been destroyed by the Ministry of Finance. Because of this event, the ministry had to update its information systems by the 2nd of this month.

Therefore, NEC, the company entrusted with the ministry’s data and documents has begun its efforts to retrieve them. One worry is that without these documents, getting to the truth of this scandal will become nearly impossible. The Ministry of Finance is requesting that NEC retrieve physical data by July 31st of this year. On the other hand, the opposition party worries that, in its honest efforts to bring back the original data for the sake of this investigation, the public will think they are concealing information and develop a negative view. Therefore, one representative, Mr. Takashi Takai, was hoping for a freeze on the data retrieval, but the Ministry of Finance did not grant his request.

It has also become a court order for Moritomo Gakuen employee computer data to be restored on the belief that today’s technology is so advanced that even if all the data was once deleted, there are ways to retrieve it. The attorney involved in this case believes there is certainly a way to retrieve the data and that this data from the official negotiations is the key to understanding what really happened between Moritomo Gakuen and the government. 

Both the communist and democratic parties want to protect the transparency of this issue, so they jointly submitted a revised record of their national assets to the House of Councilors. Since news of this scandal has come to light, more than four months have passed. However, an accurate explanation of what truly happened and an appropriate resolution for the parties involved are likely still months away.