INTERNATIONAL STUDIES IN EDUCATION

Jack Schwille, Assistant Dean

In the wake of September 11, the College of Education has become more sensitive to the importance and difficulties of our international work, leading to a year of recommitment and renewal, including important new initiatives and new publications.

September 11 Follow-up Committee

After September 11, Dean Carole Ames formed a committee to enhance understanding of the events and to foster international and intercultural understanding within the college. The committee was co-chaired by Jean Baker (CEP) and Jack Schwille (ISE). An Evening of Artistic Response to the events of September 11, and a teach-in on the responses of educators to these events were part of the college’s response. A monthly breakfast for our international and American students and faculty assured international students of our support and encouraged communication on a variety of issues. Project LATTICE, with help from Muslim students, devoted several of its monthly sessions to helping K-12 teachers and other LATTICE participants understand Islam and other related factors while the book club, a separate LATTICE activity, discussed works dealing with similar issues. Sally McClintock (ISE) coordinated Project LATTICE’s efforts, with assistance from Jack Schwille (ISE), Anne Schneller (ISE), John Metzler (African Studies Center) and Kurnia Yahya (ISE), among others.

New International Research

IEA Teacher Education Study (TEDS). MSU was selected by the IEA consortium in a competition to provide leadership for a new world-wide empirical, TIMSS-type study of teacher education. We are collaborating with the Australian Council for Educational Research in the design and management of this study. The focus is on the preparation and induction of teachers for mathematics and science teaching in elementary and lower secondary school. At least 30 countries are expected to participate. This will be the first IEA study of teacher education and therefore the first to rely on national probability samples of future and beginning teachers. Jack Schwille and Teresa Tatto (TE) were selected as the PIs for this project. Initial development work on the project will be done with a $1.4 million NSF grant that William Schmidt (CEP) and Teresa Tatto have received.

Other research leadership. The Comparative and International Education Society, a major professional association for scholars who do research in comparative and international education, selected Reitumetse Mabokela (EAD) to be the national chair to call for proposals and to plan the program for the 2003 CIES meeting in New Orleans, which will bring participants from throughout the world. MSU will be co-hosting this meeting with Dillard University. Mabokela recruited a team of MSU graduate student volunteers to help with the conference and learn how to organize such a complex endeavor.

New International Development Initiatives

Vietnam: Working in collaboration with Cantho University, Christopher Wheeler (TE) has taken the lead in establishing two complementary projects to develop more sustainable communities and to improve teaching in the surrounding region of Vietnam. One project, funded by Shell Foundation, aims to develop more sustainable communities and to reduce poverty and child malnutrition in target hamlets in the Mekong Delta. The other project is a linkage grant to help Cantho University foster the new approaches to teaching needed for schools in such communities. Other MSU faculty having worked in Vietnam on at least one of these projects include: Thomas Bird (TE), Annelise Carleton (FCE), James Gallagher (TE), William Hug (TE), Stephen Kaagan (EAD), Susan Melnick (TE), and Phu Nguyen (FOR).

Ethiopia: In a collaborative five-year project aimed at strengthening teacher education at the primary school level in Ethiopia, MSU is working with four other U.S. universities to strengthen the twenty Ethiopian teacher-training colleges and to offer intensive summer workshops for Ethiopian teacher educators. A unique aspect of this project will bring MSU doctoral students to teacher training institutions in Ethiopia to teach and collaborate with teacher educators. Anne Schneller in collaboration with Teresa Tatto and Jack Schwille has been the main MSU leader in this USAID-funded program.

USAID Leader with Associates Awards (LWA). MSU is participating as a partner in consortia that competed successfully for three USAID LWAs in the education sector: (1) Educational Quality Improvement Program (EQUIP) award #1 to AIR consortium for work with schools and teachers to improve quality of basic education, (2) EQUIP #2 to AED consortium for policy level work on same issues, and (3) DOT.COM award to EDC consortium for educational technology work. All of these awards have to be funded through future mission buy-ins.

Expanded Study Abroad Programs

New programs in several world areas were offered this year. An innovative master’s level program provided the opportunity for College of Education graduates to teach for six weeks in South African schools before returning to Michigan for their 5th year internships. This program, co-directed by Margaret Holtschlag and Anne Schneller, has been featured in Education Week, the national weekly of record for K-12 education. An undergraduate program on teaching and teacher leadership in Australia was co-directed by Christopher Dunbar (EAD) and BetsAnn Smith (EAD). A semester-long exchange program between MSU’s Department of Kinesiology, the College of Ripon, and York St. John in England had a successful first year under the leadership of John Haubenstricker (KIN). Linda Roberts (TE) designed a new program in Ecuador aimed at teachers of Spanish, which will be offered in 2003. These new programs join the existing college study abroad programs in Japan, Netherlands, and South Africa.

International Outreach

Study visit for policymakers. Outreach Director Barbara Markle (K-12 Outreach) and University Distinguished Professor William Schmidt collaborated in design of an international study visit for state-level superintendents of education, directors of curriculum, and the like to help them understand better the policies and context which enable the Netherlands and Flemish Belgium to do so well on international tests of mathematics and science. The visit drew heavily on the research findings of the Third International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS).

Graduate Studies in Education Overseas (GSEO), under the direction of Susan Melnick (TE) and Sandy Bryson (GSEO), established new sites for master’s programs overseas. In addition to the MA in Curriculum and Teaching which is offered in France and Thailand, a new site for the master’s in Educational Technology was established at the University of Plymouth, England, and a Master’s degree in Educational Administration is now offered in France.

Major New Publications

Among the most significant publications that appeared or went to press during the year are the following: William Schmidt and colleagues were the authors of Why Schools Matter: A Cross-national Comparison of Curriculum and Learning (Jossey-Bass, 2001), based on TIMSS data; Jack Schwille co-edited New Paradigms and Recurring Paradoxes in Education for Citizenship (Elsevier, 2002), based on the IEA cross-national study of civic education; Lynn Paine (TE) and colleagues authored Comprehensive Teacher Induction: Systems for Early Career Learning (Kluwer, in press), based on their NSF funded field research in five countries (France, Switzerland, China, Japan and New Zealand).

For More Information Contact:
Jack Schwille , Assistant Dean
Anne Schneller, Specialist
Marlene Green, Secretary
517 Erickson Hall
Michigan State University
East Lansing, MI 48824
Phone: 517-355-9627
Fax: 517- 353-6393