Globalization and growth of international education assessment - Notes

Paul Fischer

8/18/2016

Notes

Globalization and growth of international education…

David H. Kamens and Connie L. McNeely

“International acceptance of testing comes from key ideological forces in the world polity that are associated with the accelerating globalization of national and international cultural, economic, and political structures.” 5

• Int. Org. and regional associations -> mediate and adapt
• Subnational movements introducing pressures for change that may favor more national assessment.

⅔ of students will not be using international testing brings to mind limits to the trend of increasing levels of testing

• The number has more than doubled from 1995 to 2005 as 28 countries carrying out learning assessments has increased to 67
• Developing countries have nearly doubled the rate of learning assessments from 28% to 51%
• “In transition” countries have the lowest levels of assessments, increasing from 0 [10?*] to 17, an increase of 43%
• Among “fragile states” 15 of 35 (43%) have begun to carry out national assessments with half located in East Asia and the Pacific by 2005.

Testing has increasingly become viewed as an “obligation of nation-states” using ministries of education as the agents imposing such activity

• “While comparative interest in national examination systems actually dates back to the late 19th century, formal international testing is largely a post-World War II project”
• Tech. advances
• Availability of sophisticated testing methods and computing capabilities that have made large-scale data collection and analysis possible.

Technological capability and assessments:

• National educational systems are viewed as unique in structure, history and purpose while international testing would have little plausibility
• This view dominated during first international math and science testing through the IEA in the 1960s
• Husen (1967): “purpose of these studies as investigating national differences in educational systems, which he argued were due to unique educational and cultural histories” >> convergence of testing and assessment comparison outcomes

Association for the Assessment of the Quality of Education - Founded 1994

• 19 members
• Other similar organizations include SACMEQ and CONFEMEN

Ideology of education

Both as an individual and a collective good

Males and females, rich and poor, urban and rural people - all have the right and the obligation to get more education

Societies have an obligation to provide these opportunities for all

“Mass higher education has already become a near reality in many affluent countries and is certainly an aspiration internationally, such that higher education itself may be on its way to becoming mass education”

Robert Fiala: fundamental changes in educational aims of 161 countries using international documents from the period 1955-65 and 1980-2000

1. “Higher levels of interest in individual ‘personal and emotional development’ and in ‘citizenship’ as concrete national development aims and of themselves in 1980-2000”
2. “Greater emphasis on the development of ‘national identity’”
3. “More stress on ‘equality’ and ‘democracy’ as goals of education”
4. “Increased interest in education for ‘world citizenship’”
5. “Dramatically less focus on education for economic development and on the single-minded concern with education for ‘employability’”

Moritz Rosenmund: “In our account of mass education… education is not an end in itself… but is a means for human beings to cope with change and to act as responsible citizens - and for society to develop wealth, democracy, and equity”

Managed society

• “Management models of organization fuel the belief that there are standard solutions to education problems”
• “Models of success often come from countries that do well in international tests”
• One example is Finland where cross-group equality in results gives an advantage