Call for papers
November, 18th,2016,
Moscow School of Social and Economic Sciences
Inpartnershipwith
Russian Academy of National Economy and State Service,
National Research University “Higher School of Economics”
and Moscow City Pedagogical University»,
with participation of
thepublishing house “September»
and the main information sponsor
The project "Social Navigator" (Media Group «Rossia segodnya»)
are inviting you to participate in the 14th annual conference
«Trends of Education Development»
StandardsinEducation: whobenefitsfromtheirexistenceand how can their quality be appraised
Moscow, February 16-18th, 2017
Dear friends, colleagues,
In February 2017 the Moscow School will be hosting its 14th educational conference. And we hope you will be able to join it this time.
The topic we have selected is of relevance to educators across the globe. While educational standards exist in almost every developed country, they may take very different shapes and stimulate very different attitudes. Discussions about their purpose and value never cease. Do they celebrate diversity or nurture the culture of compliance? Do they treat education as an industrial process or do they set a framework which invites creative teaching? Highly respected people like Ken Robinson, Peter Hill, Michael Barber or Diane Ravitch have very different answers to those questions. Some tend to blame standardization for being a straight jacket for individual needs of a child, others believe that in highly centralized systems standards can play a rather liberating role and that we cannot avoid setting standards in the epoch of globalization because they are the pre-requisite for student mobility.
Federal educational standards have been introduced in Russia rather belatedly – only a decade ago. But in Soviet days the content of education was prescribed in a much more authoritative way – teachers had to follow teachers guides step by step without violation. Most of them did not – it was impossible to predict what will happen at each lesson, but if an inspector called into a classroom he could penalize teachers for non-compliance. We would like to discuss how new culture is different from the Soviet one, how much freedom it gives to a teacher and to a student. Wewouldbeinterestedtofindouthowmuchfederalstandardsareobserved, what problems did ECE and primary school teachers encounter implementing them and whether indeed these standards that were first to be introduced have influenced educational outcomes. Ifso, in which way we will also look at professional standards for teachers and school leaders, because the quality of a teacher directly affects the quality of students’ outcomes. Thus we will continue the dialogue started at the previous conference. Amongtheconferenceorganizerstherearemanypeoplewhohaveparticipatedinthedevelopmentofstandards. Theywillbeinterestedingettingfeedbackfromthosewhousethemandtoconsiderwaysinwhichtheyneedtobeimproved.
We would be interested to hear from practitioners whether their schools and kindergartens have changed with the introduction of new standards and whether they still need help in their mastery. We also would like to hear from education leaders as to how satisfied they are with the standards introduction and what measures they take to make sure that every child meets these standards. We would like to hear how much parents know about the nature of new standards and how much they trust them. Also we would like to talk about preschool and school curriculum and textbooks and their relevance to state standards. Finally, we would like to hear from our foreign guests about their experience in standards setting and their plans for the future.
Like at the previous conferences we would like to have less speeches, but more round table discussions which would result in concrete recommendations to decision-makers in federal and local Ministries of education. The programme committee therefore will give priority to those applications for presentations which would contain research-based analysis of the situation, policy recommendations and specific ideas about necessary changes.
As in 2016 we hope that our conference will be followed by similar events in our partner regions where we have plenty of Moscow School graduates which would result in discussions about federal and regional standards and how those can be reconciled.
The Conference will consist of
- Several keynote and plenary presentations devoted to the priority issuesof the conference (35-40 minutes each)
- A series of roundtable discussions to analyze different aspects of standards setting and assessment practices, aspects of professional standards and teacher assessment and role of standards in improvement of the quality of teaching and learning (the inputs no longer than 7 minutes each)
- Aseriesofparallelpanelsessionsto discuss some of the issues in depth (inputs no longer than 25 minutes each)
Weparticularlywelcomeplenary presentations on thefollowing topics:
- Standards and standardization: how did our understanding of the purpose of standards change within the last 30 years.
- Successful models of school and preschool national standards and their main characteristics.
- The role of professional standards in schoiool and preschool educational standards implementation.
- Do educational standards have a future and what is our vision for it.
Potential plenary speakers may suggest another topic that they consider important. Presentations concentration on a specific sector of education are welcome.
Thefollowingquestionsaresuggestedforpanelsessionsandroundtablediscussions (the exact list of roundtable discussions will be finalized by the end of January based on the degree of interest in particular topics)
- How did our thinking about the purpose of educational standards change in the last 30 years in Russia and worldwide?
- Did we manage to overcome compartamentalization of school curriculum?
- Why do some teachers ignore standards?
- ECE standard and ECE teacher training: what is changing and what needs to change?
- Whydothe majority of kindergartens’ teams choose traditional curricula and how can we change the situation?
- Is the educational system ready for the introduction of new professional standards?
- How new professional standards for teachers and school leaders support the introduction of federal educational standards?
- How can implementation of new standards be measured? Areteststheonlyway?
- What new outcomes do we expect from new standards and why?
- How can we measure personal qualities required by the standard and should they be measured?
- Why school textbooks play such a big role in Russia?
- How can textbooks compliance with standards be measured and who should measure it?
Youmaychooseanyoftheproposed topics or choose your own. Ifyoucansuggestaresearchoramanagementprojectwhichwouldcontribute to planning and development of teaching potential in Russia as well as in the world community this will be greatly appreciated.
The languages of the conference are Russian and English. Synchronic translation will be provided.
Pleasesendusyourapplicationsandabstractsofyourpresentations. Thedeadlineforsubmissionsis January, 12, 2017.
The application can be submitted electronically and contain your first and last name, the exact name of the organization you represent, a brief abstract of your presentation (up to 250 words), andthe proposed format of your presentation (plenary, panel session, roundtable discussion). Please let us know if you need help in booking hotel accommodation and airport transfer.
The registration opens on December,1st
If you have any queries regarding your conference participation, please channel those to the program committee at:
Key contacts: Andrey Samoylov, Konstantin Zavertyaev