Science Education System Research Articles

SCIENCE AND HIGHER EDUCATION IN THE EUROPEAN UNION AND THE EURASION ECONOMIC UNION: COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS

Introduction. The article is a comparative study of the formation and functioning of science and higher education system in the European Union and the Eurasian Economic Union, conducted by defining comparison criteria. Materials and methods . Methodologically, the research is based on general scientific and special methods of cognition of political, social and economic processes, including analysis, synthesis, analogies, generalizations, comparison. The comparative method helped to develop parameters for comparing the scientific and educational complex of the two integration entities. Results of the study . The analysis revealed that the scientific and educational complex of the EU and the EAEU are comparable by a number of characteristics, which indicates their typological congeniality and the existence of similar principles of functioning. At the same time, there are some factors unique for the EAEU that influence science and higher education. These factors derived from the historical, geographic and national specific background allow the EAEU to effectively use the mechanisms of scientific, technical and educational cooperation. In addition, the comparative analysis unveils problems in this cooperation, which can be solved by drawing on European experience. Discussion and conclusion . Current scholarly literature pays insufficient attention to the potential of scientific and educational interaction for promoting integration processes in the EAEU. It is important to elaborate models for adapting the experience of the European Union in organizing and financing the European Research Area and the European Higher Education Area to create and develop similar models in the EAEU, taking into account local specific characteristics, as well as the achievements of the Asian system of science and education. In this regard, it is useful to carry out research in the field of networking between the academic community and innovative companies of the EAEU member states and Asian countries to find out new formats of communication.

Inquiry Science Learning and Teaching: a Comparison Between the Conceptions and Attitudes of Pre-service Elementary Teachers in Hong Kong and the United States

International studies of science education, such as the Trends in Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS), have revealed considerable national disparities in students’ achievements in science education. The results have prompted many nations to compare their science education systems and practices to those of others, to gain insights for improvement. Teacher training and professional development are key educational components that have not attracted as much attention as they deserve in international comparative studies. This study compares the conceptions and attitudes of pre-service elementary teachers (PSETs) in Hong Kong and the United States with respect to inquiry science learning and teaching at the beginning of the semester before the start of the science methods course. PSETs’ conceptions and attitudes in the two countries were compared by means of a questionnaire with both Likert-type and open-ended questions. Quantitative data were analyzed using exploratory factor analysis and inferential statistics, while qualitative data were analyzed through the systematic categorization of PSETs’ responses into broad themes and subthemes to reflect patterns in their conceptions of and attitudes toward inquiry science learning and teaching. The results revealed a complex interplay between PSETs’ conceptions of and attitudes toward inquiry science learning and teaching. The results shed light on the effects of sociocultural contexts and have important implications for the design of science methods courses.

On restructure of scientific and technological system in Russia － through reform of the Russian Academy of Science and higher education system

On restructure of scientific and technological system in Russia － through reform of the Russian Academy of Science and higher education system

A Journey within the Theory–Practice Nexus of Conflict Management: Contributions of IACM Rubin Award Recipient Benjamin Broome

AbstractIn this tribute to the 2016 recipient of the International Association for Conflict Management Jeffrey Z. Rubin Theory‐to‐Practice Award, we celebrate the work of Benjamin Broome. Each of us highlights a unique contribution of his work: specifically, in the areas of (a) applied communication, (b) intercultural communication, (c) conflict management and peacebuilding, and (d) well‐being, sustainability, and systems science education. We conclude our discussion of the four research areas by highlighting common themes suggested by this work. The article closes with words of wisdom from Benjamin Broome, who offers advice to doctoral students and scholars at various stages of their career.

Implementing Indigenous Knowledge in Western Science Education Systems and Scientific Research on Alaska’s North Slope

The inclusion of Indigenous knowledge, informal lessons, and place-based instruction in science curricula has shown many positive results in both the classroom and laboratory. Inviting Alaska Native Elders and researchers into local classrooms to co-instruct scientific concepts has increased student understanding and engagement. Field trips further expose students to research conducted on Alaska’s North Slope underlining the environmental and cultural implications of local community issues and the broader scientific concerns. Teaching students the traditional ways of knowing and the correlating Western science concepts develops an appreciation for both perspectives that directly strengthens students’ knowledge and reinforces cultural values.

Assessing students' disciplinary and interdisciplinary understanding of global carbon cycling

AbstractGlobal carbon cycling describes the movement of carbon through atmosphere, biosphere, geosphere, and hydrosphere; it lies at the heart of climate change and sustainability. To understand the global carbon cycle, students will require interdisciplinary knowledge. While standards documents in science education have long promoted interdisciplinary understanding, our current science education system is still oriented toward single‐discipline‐based learning. Furthermore, there is limited work on interdisciplinary assessment. This article presents the validated Interdisciplinary Science Assessment of Carbon Cycling (ISACC), and reports empirical results of a study of high school and undergraduate students, including an analysis of the relationship between interdisciplinary items and disciplinary items. Many‐faceted Rasch analysis produced detailed information about the relative difficulty of items and estimates of ability levels of students. One‐way ANCOVA was used to analyze differences among three grade levels: high school, college Freshman–Sophomore, college Junior–Senior, with number of science courses as a covariate. Findings indicated significantly higher levels of interdisciplinary understanding among the Freshman–Sophomore group compared to high school students. There was no statistically significant difference between Freshman–Sophomore group and Junior–Senior group. Items assessing interdisciplinary understanding were more difficult than items assessing disciplinary understanding of global carbon cycling; however, interdisciplinary and disciplinary understanding were strongly correlated. This study highlights the importance of interdisciplinary understanding in learning carbon cycling and discusses its potential impacts on science curriculum and teaching practices.

O doskonałości naukowej i uniwersytetach badawczych w związku z Ustawą 2.0

Od połowy 2016 r. w Polsce trwa debata na temat koniecznych zmian w systemie nauki i szkolnictwa wyższego. Jej elementem jest dyskusja nad tym, jak zwiększyć poziom doskonałości naukowej, rozpoznawanie polskiej nauki na świecie oraz jej umiędzynarodowienie. W tekście zaproponowano kilka rozwiązań pozwalających osiągnąć te cele. Chodzi w szczególności o zwiększenie liczby prestiżowych grantów międzynarodowych realizowanych na polskich uczelniach, w tym tych przyznawanych przez Europejską Agencję ds. Badań. Zaproponowano także kryteria wyboru uczelni, które mogłyby uzyskać dodatkowe finansowanie na przekształcenie się w uniwersytety badawcze. Byłyby one oparte na pokazaniu ścieżki zmian, jakie mogą zostać przeprowadzone, ale wymagają dodatkowego finansowania. Głównym celem tekstu jest zaproponowanie konkretnych rozwiązań, jakie mogłyby zostać zastosowane w nowej legislacji regulującej kwestie nauki i szkolnictwa wyższego.

コロキウム : 近年の大学・諸研究機関の「改組」にみる土壌学・植物栄養学教育, 研究の現状と課題 : 「大学改革」にみる土壌学・肥料学・植物栄養学教育, 研究の動向(その1)国立大学

コロキウム : 近年の大学・諸研究機関の「改組」にみる土壌学・植物栄養学教育, 研究の現状と課題 : 「大学改革」にみる土壌学・肥料学・植物栄養学教育, 研究の動向(その1)国立大学

コロキウム : 近年の大学, 所研究機関の「改組」にみる土壤学・植物栄養学研究の現状と課題 : 「大学改革」にみる土壤学・肥料学・植物栄養学教育, 研究の動向(その2)私立大学

コロキウム : 近年の大学, 所研究機関の「改組」にみる土壤学・植物栄養学研究の現状と課題 : 「大学改革」にみる土壤学・肥料学・植物栄養学教育, 研究の動向(その2)私立大学

Call for papers: Journal of Research in Science Teaching – Special Issue: A critical examination of the Next Generation Science Standards

Call for papers: <i>Journal of Research in Science Teaching</i> – Special Issue: A critical examination of the Next Generation Science Standards

Rethinking Environmental Protection: Meeting the Challenges of a Changing World.

Summary:From climate change to hydraulic fracturing, and from drinking water safety to wildfires, environmental challenges are changing. The United States has made substantial environmental protection progress based on media-specific and single pollutant risk-based frameworks. However, today’s environmental problems are increasingly complex and new scientific approaches and tools are needed to achieve sustainable solutions to protect the environment and public health. In this article, we present examples of today’s environmental challenges and offer an integrated systems approach to address them. We provide a strategic framework and recommendations for advancing the application of science for protecting the environment and public health. We posit that addressing 21st century challenges requires transdisciplinary and systems approaches, new data sources, and stakeholder partnerships. To address these challenges, we outline a process driven by problem formulation with the following steps: a) formulate the problem holistically, b) gather and synthesize diverse information, c) develop and assess options, and d) implement sustainable solutions. This process will require new skills and education in systems science, with an emphasis on science translation. A systems-based approach can transcend media- and receptor-specific bounds, integrate diverse information, and recognize the inextricable link between ecology and human health.

Nanotechnology-oriented system of natural science education in secondary schools

Despite the fact that the demand for nanotechnology specialists is growing worldwide, nanotechnology-related jobs are still not in the top lists of young generations' dream jobs. If the situation remains the same, there will be a danger of stagnation in the development of nanoscale science and nanotechnology. To address this problem, we developed a new approach to natural science education in secondary schools, because, in general, people build their attitude towards sciences and make a career decision just at this particular educational stage. The paper presents a concept of development of a nanotechnology-oriented system of natural science education in secondary schools. The results of the implementation of the concept in Izhevsk Municipal Budgetary Educational Institution 'Lyceum No. 41' (Izhevsk, Russia) are reported.

Priority Areas and Potential Solutions for Successful Integration and Sustainment of Health Systems Science in Undergraduate Medical Education.

Educators, policy makers, and health systems leaders are calling for significant reform of undergraduate medical education (UME) and graduate medical education (GME) programs to meet the evolving needs of the health care system. Nationally, several schools have initiated innovative curricula in both classroom and workplace learning experiences to promote education in health systems science (HSS), which includes topics such as value-based care, health system improvement, and population and public health. However, the successful implementation of HSS curricula across schools is challenged by issues of curriculum design, assessment, culture, and accreditation, among others. In this report of a working conference using thematic analysis of workshop recommendations and experiences from 11 U.S. medical schools, the authors describe seven priority areas for the successful integration and sustainment of HSS in educational programs, and associated challenges and potential solutions. In 2015, following regular HSS workgroup phone calls and an Accelerating Change in Medical Education consortium-wide meeting, the authors identified the priority areas: partner with licensing, certifying, and accrediting bodies; develop comprehensive, standardized, and integrated curricula; develop, standardize, and align assessments; improve the UME to GME transition; enhance teachers' knowledge and skills, and incentives for teachers; demonstrate value added to the health system; and address the hidden curriculum. These priority areas and their potential solutions can be used by individual schools and HSS education collaboratives to further outline and delineate the steps needed to create, deliver, study, and sustain effective HSS curricula with an eye toward integration with the basic and clinical sciences curricula.

Impact of initiatives to implement science inquiry: a comparative study of the Turkish, Israeli, Swedish and Czech science education systems

This empirical study investigates factors that influence the implementation of science inquiry in the education systems of Turkey, Israel, Sweden and the Czech Republic. Data was collected by means of recordings of science experts’ discussions as part of an EU-funded project called Science-Teacher Education Advanced Methods (2009–2012). Results of the qualitative analysis reveal that the following general indicators provide insight into the extent of implementation of inquiry-based science education (IBSE): (1) curriculum (2) assessment (3) policy and (4) teacher professionalization systems. In a second step comparative analyses of the four countries’ education systems were conducted with regard to these indicators. To compare these factors we refer to both the framework of neo-institutional theories that explore the emergence of isomorphic educational models and to results from comparative studies emphasizing the influence of the countries’ individual structure and cultural practices on modifying global pressure to convergence. Results show that in each of the countries these indicators influence the implementation of science inquiry to varying degrees. Moreover, as a result of the comparative analyses further country specific factors important for implementing science inquiry were found: (5) the need to improve existing teaching methods, (6) predominant teaching patterns, (7) infrastructure that enables changes in education and (8) education system’s general goals that correlate with reforms.

AN ANALYSIS OF STUDENTS’ SKILL IN APPLYING THE PROBLEM SOLVING STRATEGY TO THE PHYSICS PROBLEM SETTLEMENT IN FACING AEC AS GLOBAL COMPETITION

The results of previous studies show that students of Physics Education (S1 and S2), FKIP Syiah Kuala University more than 50% do not understand the programs and roadmap of Pilar ASEAN Socio-Cultural Community as a part of the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC). The inference of those results to the implementation of learning physics and science education system needs to be implemented through a link and match learning model that can improve the ability to think critically and creatively, and students need to be trained to be problem solvers, not the problem makers.Based on these problems, through this research has been applied physics learning by using Problem Solving strategies on 25 students of Master of Physical Education and Science. At the end of the implementation study measured the ability of students to apply problem-solving strategies in accordance with Answer Sections of Problem Solving adopted from previous research. The results showed that the majority of students (78%) are able to implement the stage I (Focus on Problem) with a complete, almost all respondents (91%) was only able to implement the stage II (Describe the Physics) of about 40%, almost all respondents (91% ) can apply for the stage III (Plan The Solution) approximately 80% of all respondents have been able to implement the stage IV (Excute the Plan) perfectly, and all respondents have been able to apply the stage V (Evaluate the Answer) completely. It is expected that all staff of teaching Science materials (Physics), they are recommended strongly to implement Problem Solving as an alternative strategy for preparing students to face global competition in the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC).

La ciencia de la educación en Lyon: entre iniciativa de Estado e historia pedagógica local, el injerto de una positividad científica en una tradición espiritualista (1884-1945)

El texto busca articular el cuadro político y administrativo que preside la instalación universitaria de la ciencia de la educación en la ciudad de Lyon y la actuación de los principales agentes intelectuales que participan en su construcción: Thamin, Chabot, Bourjade. Analizamos aquí las condiciones de la persistencia de la enseñanza de la ciencia de la educación en Lyon después de los años 1920, mientras desaparecía en la mayor parte de las universidades francesas. ¿Por qué la ciencia de la educación, en Lyon, no se ha visto afectada por el desencanto del proyecto político que, en tiempos de la reforma Ferry, había presidido su institucionalización? Las trayectorias de estos tres profesores, su arraigo en un espiritualismo explícito, su interés por la psicología del niño, la despolitización de sus concepciones les han llevado a desarrollar estrategias intelectuales e institucionales favorables a impulsar una cultura pedagógica capaz de responder a la vez a las exigencias teóricas universitarias y a preocuparse por anclarse en los terrenos profesionales.

Improving a Sample Lesson Plan for Secondary Science Courses within the STEM Education

The main goal of this study is to present a sample lesson plan on acids and bases based on Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematic (STEM) education for Turkish Science Education System. Determining the impact of instructional materials on learning outcomes of children as a pilot study before the main implementation is also another goal. Single group pre-test/post-test design was used in the study. 12 different 8th grade students were chosen for the population of the study. The instructional materials within the STEM education were organized in accordance with 5E learning cycle model in order to teach the subject to children. Primarily, in order to determine students’ knowledge on the subject, a survey of 10 open-ended questions were presented to the students. After determining their learning outcomes with teaching interventions, the same questions were restructured. Wilcoxon Signed Ranks Test for Paired Samples, non-parametric test and Cohen's Kappa test were used to analyze the data with SPSS 20.00 program at .05 significant levels. It was determined that achievement levels of the students on post- test were higher than the pre- test. Herewith, sample lesson plan was found to be quite effective on students’ levels of gaining the learning outcomes.

Further Democratizing Latin America: Broadening Access to Higher Education and Promoting Science Policies Focused on the Advanced Training of Human Resources

We focus this paper on the conditions to build reliable science, technology and higher education systems in Latin America, based on international comparative studies, fi eldwork and interviews conducted over the last three years. The analysis shows that science can have a major role in furthering the democratization of society through public policies that foster opportunities to access knowledge and the advanced training of human resources. Broadening the social basis for higher education promotes the quali fi cation of the labour force and contributes decisively to social and economic development. The need to guarantee higher education diversity, strengthening scienti fi c institutions and investing in a strong science base, is deemed as critical, but goes far beyond policies centred on innovation and industry-science relationships. It requires adequate training and attraction of skilled people, as well as promoting scienti fi c and technological culture among society.

Ecoliteracy in informal science education settings

Ecoliteracy in informal science education settings

Scenario-Based Observation Approach for Eliciting User Requirements for Haptic User Interfaces

As tactual information processing of visually impaired users has not been investigated sufficiently and there are few guidelines on the development of haptic user interfaces, development of haptic assistive system can pose many challenges. Despite the breadth and variety of tools available for elicitation of user requirements, no single tool adequately provides the needed information to develop such a specialized system for a unique user population where the understanding of user behaviors is limited. This article explores the state-of-art of requirements engineering, discusses the challenges in developing a haptic assistive system, and proposes a methodology of combining a controlled observation in a naturalistic setting with scenario-based design for effective and efficient user requirements elicitation. A case study of developing a haptically enhanced, collaborative learning-by-feeling science education system for visually impaired students was conducted to show validity and effectiveness of the proposed methodology. The case study showed that the methodology has a variety of benefits including the reduced uncertainty and a better fit to the natural behaviors of the user population.