Projects
Current Projects I Past Projects
Current Projects
 Inclusive Education for a Seamless Education System, Trinidad and Tobago
The study will be conducted under the auspices of Susan Peters, Associate Professor of Special Education, Michigan State University, project team leader, and Shirley Miske, President and Senior Consultant, Miske Witt & Associates, Inc. Other team members include Diane Prouty Harris, Fairfax, VA; Christopher Johnstone, David Johnson, and Greg Sales, Minneapolis, MN; as well as MSU doctoral students Kimberly Wolbers and Alicia Trotman.
Funded by the Inter-American Development Bank, the study will assess the needs of students and the efficacy of current programs for special education in this Caribbean nation. The team will make recommendations for all aspects of inclusive education from early childhood through secondary education: student diagnostic assessments, teacher education, curriculum, program evaluation, cost analysis, and community advocacy and outreach. For additional information, please contact Shirley Miske or Susan Peters.
Shirley J. Miske, President and Senior Consultant
Miske Witt & Associates, Inc.
2838 Lakeview Avenue
St. Paul, MN 55113
Tel: 651-481-0990
Fax: 651-481-7027
MSU Contact Person
Susan Peters, Associate Professor
College of Education
116K Erickson Hall
Michigan State University
East Lansing, MI 48824-1034
Phone: 517-432-1283
Fax: 517-432-2795 |
IEA TEACHER
EDUCATION AND DEVELOPMENT STUDY:
A CROSS-NATIONAL STUDY OF PRIMARY AND SECONDARY
MATHEMATICS TEACHER PREPARATION
TEDS-M 2008
TEDS-M
2008 is a comparative study of teacher education with a focus on the
preparation of teachers of mathematics at the primary and lower secondary
levels. TEDS-M will pay particular attention to the links between teacher
education policies, practices and outcomes. The study will provide participating
countries with a valuable opportunity to conduct research on their own
teacher education system and to learn from approaches used in other
countries. Teacher
education has become an area of considerable interest among policy makers
in many countries over recent years. This reflects a growing body of
research on the central importance of teacher knowledge and skill to
quality learning opportunities for students. It also reflects the need
to recruit and prepare a new generation of teachers as large numbers
of current teachers reach retirement age.TEDS-M
will address research questions of central interest to policy makers
who want to improve the effectiveness of their teacher education system,
such as:
| |
|
>
What are the characteristics of teacher education programs that
prepare future teachers of mathematics effectively? |
| |
|
>
What kinds of learning experiences are effective in transforming
beliefs of future teachers about teaching and learning mathematics? |
| |
|
>
What kinds of school experience are most effective in preparing
teachers effectively? |
| |
|
>
How can the outcomes of teacher education programs for teachers
of mathematics be measured in ways that are reliable and valid? |
| |
|
>
Under what conditions can national policies for the regulation or
accreditation of teacher education have a positive impact on the
quality of outcomes from teacher education? |
| |
|
>
What kinds of policies are proving to be effective in recruiting
teachers of mathematics from a diverse range of social and cultural
backgrounds? |
To read more about TEDS-M, please click here.
MSU Contact Person: Maria
Teresa Tatto: mttatto@msu.edu |
 |
Vietnam
Projects
In collaboration with Cantho University, Chris Wheeler (TE) is leading
a team of faculty from the College and across the university on
two complementary projects in the Mekong Delta of Vietnam. |
Shell
Project: Integrating Educational Improvement with Environmental Resource
Management to Reduce Poverty
Funded by the Shell Foundation for Sustainable Communities, this project
focuses on reducing poverty (including child malnutrition) in very poor
rural villages using resource management strategies that promote environmentally
sustainable practices.
Households are supported in a variety of ways to diversify sources of
family income, including projects in bio/gas, Integrated Pest Management
(IPM) rice growing, organic and naturally growing vegetable gardens,
integrated farming systems models (e.g., rice-fish and pig-bio/gas-fish
raising), aquaculture, and animal husbandry.
Schools that serve the children from these villages play a key role
in expanding and improving the effect of community development strategies.
School demonstration projects with organic gardens and IPM rice growing
projects help parents see the benefits of these activities. Student
knowledge and expertise then become important resources for families
who engage in such activities. These projects are linked to the community
development component and households are provided training, ongoing
technical support and small incentives to ensure success.
Linkage
Grant between MSU’s College of Education and CTU’s School
of Education: Education Reform and School-Community Linkages
Through faculty exchanges, intensive workshops and follow-up assistance,
this project assists CTU faculty in the School of Education to use more
interactive methods in training prospective secondary teachers, develop
closer links to K-12 schools, and improve faculty research skills. A
major goal is for new CTU graduates to use more active teaching methods
in their own classrooms after they graduate. In so doing this project
complements the goals of the Shell Project and contributes to making
changes initiated in schools in that project more sustainable.
MSU Contact Person: Chris Wheeler at cwheeler@msu.edu |
 U.S.-China
Research Center Established at Michigan State University
Michigan State University has established the United States-China Center
for Research on Educational Excellence with a $5 million grant from
the Hong Kong-based Sun Wah Education Foundation. The center partners
U.S. and Chinese scholars to research and develop effective models of
K-12 education that integrate strengths of both Eastern and Western
practices. The center's director is University Distinguished Professor Yong Zhao of
MSU's Department of Counseling, Educational Psychology and Special Education.
MSU
Contact Person: Yong Zhao at zhaoyo@msu.edu |
|
|
International Studies in Education
By integrating international perspectives into its teaching, research and public service, the College of Education seeks a comparative understanding of educational policies, institutions and practices. The goal is to find ways to enhance the learning of children, teachers, and other adults in the United States while contributing to the worldwide effort of educators to meet the economic, environmental, social, cultural and political challenges of our time
|
 The
Faculty of Education Reform (FOER) project is a USAID funded
education reform effort that works for the high academic achievement
of all students at all levels, kindergarten through college. Its basic
principle is this - all children will learn at high levels when they
are taught to high levels. This project has a primary responsibility
for engaging Faculty of Education (University entity) and Ministry of
Education (MOE) personnel in strengthening their capacity to prepare
new teachers. Capacity strengthening will occur through building a standards-based,
decentralization-oriented reform of the following components of the
school system: in-service training system, supervisory system, and new
teacher induction programs. This partnership between Michigan
State University's College of Education, seven Egyptian universities
as well as local schools in the seven focal Governorates implemented
activities related to the above-noted three areas of responsibility.
The project was also committed to bringing Egyptian faculty members and
teachers together around action research projects to enhance
their collaborative efforts while innovative research was conducted.
The backbone for opening the doors of communication was an e-Strategies
model that was led by the College of Education VITAL team; it is through
this mechanism that innovation and development occur.
MSU
Contact Person: John Schwille at jschwill@msu.edu. |
Reaching and Educating At-risk Children (REACH) in India. The aim
of the Reaching and Educating At-risk Children (REACH) in India project
is to attract and retain disadvantaged children in quality educational
programs by strengthening the capacity of Indian NGOs in selected urban
and rural areas. A key concern of the project is to overcome constraints
to the participation of girls in education, both in- and out-of-school.
The first facet of the implementation approach is to improve service
delivery of a core group of NGOs while the second facet supports the
efforts of established NGOs to build the capacity of smaller and less
experienced NGOs to provide basic education services to vulnerable children.
MSU's role in the project is to help provide technical assistance to
partner NGOs in the areas of technology, and action research.
MSU
Contact Person: Punya Mishra at punya@msu.edu. |
 |
EQUATE:
Achieving Equality in Education
|
MSU’s
College of Education, together with the Office of Women and International
Development, were partners in this project which aimed to enhance the
capacity of USAID missions and their country partners to provide quality
basic education for girls and boys.Through
funding from USAID’s Office of Women in Development, USAID missions
throughout the world could request assistance in strengthening their capacity
to institute gender-equitable practices and policies in basic education
activities. This assistance could take many forms, and was guided by the
specific needs of the country making the request. The purpose of EQUATE was to develop
practical tools and deliver demand-driven training and technical assistance
to enhance the ability of Field Missions to design, implement, monitor,
and evaluate projects contributing to gender equality in basic education
as a means of improving children’s attainment of basic education,
especially for girls. A gender-equality perspective can also provide
a substantive analysis for the causes and necessary responses to situations
in which the educational outcomes for boys are noticeably lower than
those for girls. EQUATE
offered a wide range of possible support, including the following:
·
Design interventions to help girls enter and complete secondary school;
· Identify strategies to retain boys in school where they have
disproportionately higher drop-out rates than girls;
· Train teachers in gender-equitable teaching techniques and
classroom behavior;
· Design non-formal skills training programs; and
· Develop gender equality compliance criteria for policy, project,
and program formulation
EQUATE
was a Task Order under the Women in Development IQC, primed by MSI in
partnership with Michigan State University.
MSU Contact Person: Anne Schneller at annes@msu.edu
|
 |
|
Educational
Quality Improvement Program (EQUIP) award #1 (EQUIP1) from USAID to the
American Institute for Research (AIR) consortium is for work with schools
and teachers to improve the quality of basic education. EQUIP1 is a multifaceted
program designed to raise the quality of classroom teaching and the level
of student learning by effecting school-level changes. EQUIP1 serves all
levels of education from early childhood development to the provision
of life-skills. Activities range from teacher performance to community
involvement to improve school management and infrastructure. Initial MSU
work for this program was in India.
EQUIP
award #2 (EQUIP2) to the Academy for Educational Development (AED) consortium
is for policy level work on the same issues. The EQUIP2 mechanism combines
technical leadership activities and "buy-in" awards from USAID
missions and bureaus. This innovative program was designed to facilitate
access to technical expertise and resources to support the goal of building
educational quality in the national, sub-national, and cross-community
levels. The Leader activities provide policy analysis and research,
strengthen international networks, and build regional and national capacity.
The Associate Awards are a "buy-in" mechanism enabling USAID
bureaus and missions to access technical support quickly and easily
from the EQUIP2 partnership. Initial MSU work for this program was in
Egypt.
|
 |
Thailand:
Social Forestry, Education and Participation Project |
Collaboration with Thailand’s Ministry of Education has
resulted in an environmental project that links rural schools and communities
in northern Thailand in new ways. Thai students in primary and lower
secondary schools study local forest-related problems and work with
adults in their communities to address the effects of deforestation
through a variety of small-scale social forestry projects. This innovative project has influenced the direction of
15 other similar projects throughout Thailand that use a case study
approach to learning.
MSU Contact Person: Chris Wheeler at cwheeler@msu.edu |
MSU's
College of Education operated the U.S. national center for this international
educational assessment of the 1990s, with over 50 countries participating
in the study. This study was the largest to date in a series of international
studies sponsored by the International Association for the Evaluation
of Educational Achievement (IEA). The study looks at national systems
of science and mathematics education, instructional resources available,
and provides detailed descriptions of students' achievement at various
grade levels. The project is supported by funds from the National Science
Foundation and National Council of Educational Statistics. The MSU role
in it has been completed.
MSU Contact Person: William Schmidt at bschmidt@msu.edu |
|
