Dayton Daily News education reporter Scott Elliott writes about schools, kids, teaching and learning.
Home > Blogs > Get on the Bus > Archives > 2006 > April > 11 > Entry
Research PROVES it’s true!
While we wait anxiously for Oprah to tell us how to fix our schools I thought I’d bring up a topic that I think is very important but I wonder if any else does.
It’s a simple questions — how do we know what works in schools and who can we trust to give us that information honestly and independently?
I’ve been thinking about this question for some time, but today the issue was raised by Jay Mathews in the Washington Post. Mathews writes a story that probably not too many people outside of the education policy world care about — is Jack Jennings and the Center for Education Policy that he leads a truly independent group creating unbiased research, or do the group’s generally respected studies purposefully reinforce Jennings’ Democratic leanings?
OK, forget about Jennings and CEP. I think this issue translates out to all education research. Many, many times what a study says about what works in education can easily be predicted by looking first at who is funding the study.
Groups like the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation or the American Federation of Teachers may even do good research that is respected by all sides of a debate. But almost invariably, the solutions they suggest based on the research they perform simply reinforces their entrenched positions on whatever topic they are examining. They can turn a report their way just by using one methodology instead of another, by selecting a particular researcher or even by highlighting only what they found that works best for their argument. And partisan groups have PR machines that will contact every education reporter in the country to try to persuade them to write a story that shows their way is the right way.
I’ve even heard other education reporters say they avoid using any research in their reporting because they figure none of it can be trusted.
At least there’s universities. Can’t we look there for reliable, independent studies? Sometimes. But university research also is, at times, funded by groups with agendas. When there is good, independent research, it is often overlooked by the press, since it is almost exclusively published in trade journals and not promoted with the zeal of a partisan. And even good, independent studies done by university reseraches may not be terribly useful. The blogger and education PhD student Jenny D often complains that there is far too little study of what actually works in the classroom.
So beware when you see a claim that “research proves” something works in education. It’s almost always open to interpretation.
Permalink | Comments (5) | Categories: Schools and Politics
Comments
By Oldprof
April 11, 2006 11:42 PM | Link to this
Well, that’s actually not a research agenda that I disagree with. But you probably know from experience that if you try to look up research on even the simplest of school reform initiatives—say, uniforms or year-round—you’ll find almost all of the research is “here’s what we did and here’s how we felt about it” with no objective measures (nor even attempts at phenomenology). Just like most of the “how to teach” articles are “here’s a neat thing I did” with no direct measures. Now, when you insist that parents, students, professors, teachers, administrators all get involved in designing reform—note that back when American education was relatively successful and respected (say, pre-1960), teachers learned their trade primarily through mentoring from experienced teachers in their schools—their college work was content, not education-theory, oriented, and parents and students had bupkis to say about what went on in the schools. That extreme is probably also wrong, but too often I fear the tail is doing the wagging in education policy and procedures.By UDHarvardBC
April 11, 2006 9:45 PM | Link to this
Oldprof, you seem quick to judge the inferiority of educational research methods. This critique is not new. Nowever, as anyone who does research knows, pure quantitative methodologies have their limitations as do qualitative methods. Each has strengths and weaknesses. As with all data, it can be manipulated to serve the researcher intent. I advocate for a mixed methodological (and methods) approach to educational research, as they can each strengthen each other and inform questions that might emerge. In regard to school reform, it is crucial to involve all parties in the reform process—schools of education, administrators, teachers, students, and parents. Everyone has a stake in the process and collaborative projects from the grassroots can have positive results. Given the current climate of high stakes testing as the be-all-and-end-all in measuring student outcomes, it is difficult to negotiate and initate educational change when legislators and uninformed bureaucrats attempt to impose a one-size-fits-all model that does not fit all. Unless radical changes are made to NCLB, overall reform efforts will be stymied by the overemphasis on teaching to the tests.By Oldprof
April 11, 2006 7:51 PM | Link to this
How shall we list the ways the research fails? No randomization. No control of variables. No interaction effects. “How we feel about it” research questions. Deviation to the norm. There is some good research about effective education, but much of it is not in the education journals. But the question is far too complex to hash out in a short post on a blog—or even in a series of articles in a REificated news daily. :-)By charm
April 11, 2006 6:28 PM | Link to this
This is a great question. In order to find out what really works in schools, we need information from people who have hands-on experience in school reform/school matters. Parents are an integral part of this debate. They are often the ones working on school initiatives, and a parent at any given school has a huge incentive for THAT school to succeed. Of course, when these best practices are filtered through dubiously unbiased research sources, we have to take it with a grain of salt. But when parents are sharing success stories with one another, we can truly find out what works and what doesn’t.By Rick
April 11, 2006 1:02 PM | Link to this
Good question. Academia has become politicized. In addition, a researcher who starts out with a proposition is more likely to find “evidence” to support that proposition. Common sense should be the first guide. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably isn’t. Always examine the academic, political, and personal backgrounds of those researchers. E.g., I am not interested in any research by someone from NAMBLA.