2014 AERA Annual Meeting
AERA Presidential Sessions: Key Addresses, Lectures, and Special Events
|
AERA Opening Plenary Session: Teresa A. Sullivan, President, University of Virginia
A Pipeline of Innovation: Education Research from K-12 to College
Thursday, April 3, 4:05 pm to 5:35 pm
Convention Center, Terrace Level - Terrace I
Session hashtag: #AERAInnovate
Session will also be live-streamed
Sullivan will speak about education research that is leading to innovative practices and policies at every level of education, from kindergarten through higher education, making the case for a continuum of innovation.
Link to session
Social Justice in Education Award (2014) Lecture: Michael A. Olivas, William B. Bates Distinguished Chair in Law, University of Houston Law Center
Drafting Justice: Statutory Language, Public Policy, and Legislative Reform
Thursday, April 3, 7:00 pm to 8:00 pm
Convention Center, 100 Level - 119A
Session hashtag: #AERASJ
Of all the dimensions of a full life as a professor—the opportunities and rewards of teaching, mentoring, scholarship, consulting, professional service, advising—one small piece has been more deliberate and purposeful. I rarely see this side of service and social justice acknowledged, so I have chosen as my AERA topic "Statutory Language, Public Policy, and Legislative Reform," for my involvement and satisfaction in statutory drafting and legislative reform, including its kissing cousin, regulatory reform and administrative law. If there is an advocacy-gene in me, it is likely one nurtured by experience and my legal training. I discuss my work on the Top Ten Percent Plan, state DREAM Acts, Sec. 529 college prepaid plans, and residency requirements for agricultural migrant workers.
Link to session
AERA Presidential Address: Barbara Schneider, AERA President; John A. Hannah Chair and Distinguished Professor in the College of Education and Department of Sociology, Michigan State University
Aligned Ambitions: What’s Behind the College Mismatch Problem?
Saturday, April 5, 4:35 pm to 5:35 pm
Followed by Champagne Reception – 5:35 pm to 6:20 pm
Convention Center, Terrace Level - Terrace I
Session hashtag: #AERAPres
Session will also be live-streamed
Every year over 150,000 low-income and minority on-time high school graduates choose to enroll in postsecondary institutions that are less selective than their grades, test scores, and aspirations predict. These choices have long-term consequences for the lives of the students’ and their future earnings; as well as, the contributions they could make to our society. Why is this case? What actions should be taken to change this? The College Ambition Program is a whole-high school quasi-experimental intervention designed to assist students in fulfilling their ambitions. After four years in the field, working with over 3,000 students, results demonstrate that there are concrete strategies that change college plans and enrollment with the potential for scale-up at a national level.
Link to session
The Wallace Foundation Distinguished Lecture: Catherine E. Snow, Henry Lee Shattuck Professor of Education, Harvard University
Rigor and Realism: Doing Educational Science in the Real World
Friday, April 4, 10:35 am to 12:05 pm
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201A
Session hashtag: #AERAReal
Session will also be live-streamed
Some educational researchers are adopting new models for doing educational research, models that start from problems of practice, prioritize the challenge of utility to educators, and presuppose partnership relationships between researchers and practitioners. In attempting to implement such approaches, we often find that attention to the conditions of real-world practice may compete with attention to the constraints of rigorous design. That familiar problem can be exacerbated by the conflicting epistemologies of real-world decision-making vs. rigorous scientific knowledge-building. This conflict, in its multiple forms only some of which will be discussed, is a dilemma rather than a problem; it demands careful consideration of approaches to balancing the desirable features of rigor and of realism when they conflict.
Link to session
Awards Ceremony Luncheon: 2014 Award Winners in Education Research
Saturday, April 5, 12:25 pm to 2:25 pm
Convention Center, Terrace Level - Terrace I
Session hashtag: #AERAAwards
Session will also be live-streamed
Link to session
AERA Distinguished Public Service Award Lecture (2014): Ruby Takanishi, Senior Research Fellow, New America Foundation
The Early Education Debates: Information Policy and Practice in Early Education Through Research
Saturday, April 5, 2:45 p.m. to 4:15 p.m.
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201C
Session hashtag: #AERAServe
Research on children began in the 1920s in university-based institutes to generate usable knowledge for education and child rearing in the United States. Early education and child development research were connected at their origins, but over ensuing decades, in the pursuit of scientific legitimacy and specialization, the fields became increasingly separate. Starting with the War on Poverty in 1964 to the present, early education and both developmental and evaluation research reengaged in controversies about public funding for the education of young children and its effectiveness. These decades provide ample cases to examine how research informed policy and practice in early education, cautionary tales, and remaining challenges.
Link to session
AERA Early Career Award (2013) Lecture: Michael Bastedo, Associate Professor, University of Michigan
Cognitive Repairs in the Admissions Office: New Strategies for Improving Equity and Excellence at Selective Colleges
Sunday, April 6, 8:15 am to 9:45 am
Convention Center, 200 Level - 202A
There are two paradoxes in selective college admissions: (a) Why do admissions officers claim that SATs are only one part of the decision, when research shows repeatedly that they are largely determinative? (b) Why do admissions officers claim to review applications in light of school and family context, when research shows that racial and socioeconomic stratification have failed to improve? I argue that these paradoxes result from cognitive biases and heuristics among admissions officers that create failures to improve access and equity even when there is the will to do so. Using fieldwork data from two flagship university admissions offices, I examine these cognitive biases, and the strengths and weaknesses of various "cognitive repairs” to address the problem. I conclude with an agenda for admissions reform based on this work.
Link to session
AERA Distinguished Contributions to Research in Education Award (2013) Address: Alan Schoenfeld, Elizabeth and Edward Conner Chair, Graduate School of Education, University of California, Berkeley
What Makes for Powerful Classrooms, and How Can We Support Teachers in Creating Them?
Saturday, April 5, 10:35 am to 12:05 pm
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201C
Session hashtag: #AERAEd
Our sense of powerful classrooms is somewhat like Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart’s sense of pornography: we haven’t defined them, but we think we know them when we see them. Except that we don’t – opinions about “good instruction” differ, although research clearly says certain things are important. My R&D goal has been to do some ground clearing: to lay out a straightforward way of characterizing classrooms that produce students who are powerful thinkers, to test that characterization empirically, and then to fashion forms of professional development that supports teachers’ growth in the things that count. I’ll discuss proigress along those lines.
Link to session
AERA Distinguished Lecture: Anthony Bryk, President, Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching
Improving: Joining Improvement Science to Networked Communities
Sunday, April 6, 10:35 am to 12:05 pm
Convention Center, Terrace Level - Terrace I
Session hashtag: #AERAImprove
Session will also be live-streamed
For the past five years, the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching has been pioneering a fundamentally new vision for research and development that joins the discipline of improvement science with the capabilities of networks to foster innovation and social learning. This talk will illustrate the six principles of improvement that guide this work. It will introduce the idea of analytically and empirically rigorous practice-based evidence for advancing quality outcomes reliably at scale. In so doing, it reframes the work of applied educational research as an effort of systematically learning to improve. It stands as a counterpoint both to policy initiatives pressing rapid large-scale implementation and also autonomous efforts engaged in by individual teachers and schools seeking to improve.
Link to session
A Sampling of Key Sessions Listed By Date
Innovations in Access to and Success in College
Thursday, April 3, 12 - 1:30 pm
Convention Center, Terrace Level - Terrace I
Session will also be live-streamed |
Chair:
Lindsay Coleman Page
Discussant:
David Coleman
Participants:
Thomas R. Bailey
Sandy Baum
Benjamin Castleman
Lindsay Coleman Page
Bridget Terry Long
|
What innovations can we as a community of research and practice apply to meet the Obama administration’s charge to increase higher education access and success, particularly among low-income, first-generation college-going students? This AERA presidential session will investigate this question and provide evidence on several creative and cost-effective strategies to support students to and through college. Presenters will discuss topics such as college financing and affordability, challenges students face in the transition from high school to college, and the academic needs of students once they arrive on their college campus. Further, they will provide insights and evidence on policy, programmatic and curricular innovations to contribute to increased postsecondary success. David Coleman, President of The College Board, will reflect on the role of the College Board, member school districts and universities, and policy partners in shaping the conversation and in taking innovative steps to improve student outcomes.
Link to session
Climbing Out of the Ivory Tower: New Forms of Research–Practice Partnerships
Thursday, April 3, 2:15 p.m. to 3:45 p.m.
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201B |
Chair:
Thomas M. Smith
Participants:
Anthony S. Bryk
Suzanne Donovan
Lora A. Cohen-Vogel
Thomas M. Smith
Discussants:
William R. Penuel
Cynthia E. Coburn
|
Through its grants competitions, the Institute for Education Sciences (IES) has been pressing for more research to be conducted with districts, rather than just in districts. These initiatives recognize that researchers often work on issues of interest primarily to them rather than problems of practice identified by school and district leaders, and that teachers are usually too busy and often ill trained to conduct rigorous research. Federal grant programs, therefore, have begun to support long-term research-practice partnerships that work together to identify problems to be studied, to design and refine interventions aimed at addressing those problems, and to support the implementation and scale up of the designed intervention in particular school and district contexts.
Link to session
The Political Realities of Education Reform: What Is the Role for Educational Research?
Thursday, April 3, 2:15 p.m. to 3:45 p.m.
Convention Center, Terrace Level - Terrace I
Session will also be live-streamed |
Chair:
Erin McNamara Horvat
Participants:
Kathleen M. Shaw
Jeffrey R. Henig
Kent McGuire
Jeannie Oakes
Edward G. Rendell
|
Edward G. Rendell |
While much of the rhetoric of education reform focuses on what teachers and parents are or are not doing or on how different organizational models for schools (small schools, charter schools etc.), it can be argued that real reform in urban areas is more of a political question than a technical one. While we may get some gains in achievement with different models of schools or by changing how we train teachers, the vast funding disparities and demographic differences between urban schools and suburban schools are at the root of the problems politically isolated city schools face. Altering this landscape is a political issue. In light of this reality that much of education reform is a political problem, what role is there for researchers? How can research help to address a fundamentally political problem? What role can and should an organization like AERA play addressing the political reality of education reform? What do researchers need to do to successfully address education reform from this perspective?
Link to session
Rising to the Challenges of Quality and Equality: The Promise of a Public Pedagogy
Thursday, April 3, 2:15 p.m. to 3:45 p.m.
Convention Center, 100 Level - 121B |
Participants:
Diane Ravitch
Helen Gym
Chair:
Carl A. Grant
|
Helen Gym |
Diane Ravitch |
All children have a right to a quality education, but many children in today's world are being denied that right. Education research can help address this challenge. More scientific research that provides facts about schools and educational systems is needed. More methodological rigor, a wide diversity of research sites, and powerful analytical tools are needed. And more research that provides insight into values, ethics, and questions of goodness and justice is needed. The session will explore multicultural diversity, the ethical implications of research methods, and the quality of education especially for those who have been denied that right. Diane Ravitch will speak about her research on some of the unanticipated consequences of educational innovations. Helen Gym will speak about what educational research means for the lives of school children in Philadelphia.
Link to session
AERA Opening Plenary Session: Teresa A. Sullivan, President, University of Virginia
A Pipeline of Innovation: Education Research from K-12 to College
Thursday, April 3, 4:05 pm to 5:35 pm
Convention Center, Terrace Level - Terrace I
Session hashtag: #AERAInnovate
Session will also be live-streamed
Sullivan will speak about education research that is leading to innovative practices and policies at every level of education, from kindergarten through higher education, making the case for a continuum of innovation.
Link to session
Social Justice in Education Award (2014) Lecture: Michael A. Olivas, William B. Bates Distinguished Chair in Law, University of Houston Law Center
Drafting Justice: Statutory Language, Public Policy, and Legislative Reform
Thursday, April 3, 7:00 pm to 8:00 pm
Convention Center, 100 Level - 119A
Session hashtag: #AERASJ
Of all the dimensions of a full life as a professor—the opportunities and rewards of teaching, mentoring, scholarship, consulting, professional service, advising—one small piece has been more deliberate and purposeful. I rarely see this side of service and social justice acknowledged, so I have chosen as my AERA topic "Statutory Language, Public Policy, and Legislative Reform," for my involvement and satisfaction in statutory drafting and legislative reform, including its kissing cousin, regulatory reform and administrative law. If there is an advocacy-gene in me, it is likely one nurtured by experience and my legal training. I discuss my work on the Top Ten Percent Plan, state DREAM Acts, Sec. 529 college prepaid plans, and residency requirements for agricultural migrant workers.
Link to session
Teacher Evaluation Systems: Taking Stock of Their Impacts and Challenges
Friday, April 4, 8:15 a.m. to 9:45 a.m.
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201A |
Chair:
Peter A. Youngs
Participants:
Dan Goldhaber
Ellen B. Goldring
Heather C. Hill
Venessa Ann Keesler
John H. Tyler
Peter A. Youngs
|
Increased efforts to hold teachers accountable for their performance via statistical estimates of their impact on student achievement and redesigned observation and evaluation systems have been among the most important education policy shifts of the last decade. Despite the controversy surrounding these systems and the fact that researchers and practitioners are only beginning to understand the changes—positive and negative—these systems are creating, we see continued expansion not only of the data-gathering and evaluation systems themselves but of the use of those systems to promote accountability in other domains, such as teacher preparation. The goal of this session is take stock of what we know about the impacts and challenges of data-intensive accountability systems in some key educational areas. Researchers and policymakers will discuss how these systems are affecting teachers, leaders, and schools; identify what is known and unknown in these areas; highlight what we can and cannot learn from teacher evaluation systems; and make recommendations for states and districts moving forward with such systems.
Link to session
Landscape of Education Reform in Philadelphia
Friday, April 4, 10:35 a.m. to 12:05 p.m.
Convention Center, 100 Level - 115C |
Chair:
Jonathan A. Supovitz
Participants:
William R. Hite, Superintendent, Phil. Public Schools
Mark Gleason
Hiram Rivera
Kathleen M. Shaw
Lori Shorr
Paul Socolar
|
In this era of dwindling resources and tough choices, the School District of Philadelphia has gained national attention for school closings and an ongoing budget squeeze. This session brings together some of the City’s foremost educational leaders, innovators, and researchers – each with a different perspective on the City’s context and priorities – to discuss the ideas and challenges of improving one of the largest urban school districts in the country.
Link to session
Enriching Research and Innovation Through the Specification of Professional Practice: The Core Practice Consortium
Friday, April 4, 10:35 a.m. to 12:05 p.m.
Convention Center, Terrace Level - Terrace I
Session will also be live-streamed |
Chair:
Anthony S. Bryk
Presenters:
Deborah Loewenberg Ball
Francesca Forzani
Megan L. Franke
Magdalene Lampert
Pamela L. Grossman
Morva McDonald
Elham Kazemi
Mark A. Windschitl
Participants:
Bradley Fogo
Hala N. Ghousseini
Sarah Schneider Kavanagh
Matthew J. Kloser
Jamie O'Keeffe
Jessica J. Thompson
|
The lack of a specific and common understanding of key elements of teaching has impeded the progress of research and practice in teaching and teacher education for decades. The Core Practice Consortium takes an innovative view on the power of education research by collaboratively defining and enacting the core practices of teaching and teacher education across institutions. This work is highly relevant to researchers, teacher educators, teachers, and policy makers, as it focuses on the central activities of teaching.
Link to session
The Wallace Foundation Distinguished Lecture: Catherine E. Snow, Henry Lee Shattuck Professor of Education, Harvard University
Rigor and Realism: Doing Educational Science in the Real World
Friday, April 4, 10:35 am to 12:05 pm
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201A
Session hashtag: #AERAReal
Session will also be live-streamed
Some educational researchers are adopting new models for doing educational research, models that start from problems of practice, prioritize the challenge of utility to educators, and presuppose partnership relationships between researchers and practitioners. In attempting to implement such approaches, we often find that attention to the conditions of real-world practice may compete with attention to the constraints of rigorous design. That familiar problem can be exacerbated by the conflicting epistemologies of real-world decision-making vs. rigorous scientific knowledge-building. This conflict, in its multiple forms only some of which will be discussed, is a dilemma rather than a problem; it demands careful consideration of approaches to balancing the desirable features of rigor and of realism when they conflict.
Link to session
The Science of Learning and the Education Sciences: Strange Bedfellows or All in the Family?
Friday, April 4, 12:25 p.m. to 1:55 p.m.
Convention Center, Terrace Level - Terrace I
Session will also be live-streamed |
Participants:
David Klahr
Daniel L. Schwartz
Nora Newcombe
Bror Valdemar-Haug Saxberg
|
In 2002, the National Center for Education Research began. In 2003, NSF launched a Science of Learning Centers program. NCER aimed “to sponsor sustained research that will lead to the accumulation of knowledge and understanding of education”. The NSF Centers aimed to explore the cognitive and neural bases of learning to enable education to build on new discoveries. The aim of this symposium is to (a) reflect on the accomplishments of these initiatives, (b) consider prospects for a multidisciplinary science of learning and (c) explore the complex relationship between the science of learning and the education or learning sciences. Three of the participants represent 3 of the 6 Centers, and have participated in NCER projects as well, and a fourth participant gives a “user perspective” from an organization using research results to improve student success at scale.
Link to session
Reframing Immigrants and Immigration: The Promise and Possibility
Friday, April 4, 2:15 p.m. to 3:45 p.m.
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201A
Session will also be live-streamed |
Chair:
Kris D. Gutiérrez
Discussant:
Guadalupe Valdés
Participants:
Ruben Rumbaut
Vilma Ortiz
Lisa (Leigh) Patel
Marjorie Faulstich Orellana |
Link to session
How Housing and Neighborhood Contexts Shape Children’s Educational Outcomes
Friday, April 4, 2:15 p.m. to 3:45 p.m.
Convention Center, Terrace Level - Terrace I
Session will also be live-streamed |
Chair:
Ann Owens
Discussant:
Robert Halpern
Participants:
Stefanie A. Deluca
Kathryn Edin
Patrick T. Sharkey
Robert J. Sampson
Ann Owens
Brian Jacob
Jens Ludwig |
Link to session
The Politics and Research Around Principal Effectiveness and Principal Performance Evaluation
Friday, April 4, 2:15 p.m. to 3:45 p.m.
Convention Center, 100 Level - 119A |
Chair:
Michael D. Young
Participants:
Ellen B. Goldring
Jason A. Grissom
Andrew C. Porter
Kevin Huffman
Carol Johnson
|
Principal effectiveness and evaluation are emerging on the forefront of legislation and policy debates. Spawned by federal Race to the Top grants and the School Improvement Grants (SIGs) program authorized under Title I of the ESEA, state legislatures and districts are mandating that student growth and achievement must be part of principal performance evaluation. Major professional associations, such as the National Association of Secondary School Principals (NASSP) and major reform networks, such as New Leaders, have released blueprints for principal evaluation. These blueprints call for using multiple measures and various data sources, including measures of principal practice that rely on rubrics, surveys and observations from multiple stakeholders. However, the empirical research regarding the validity, feasibility and utility of these approaches is not well developed.
Link to session
A Proposed Revision to the Common Rule and the Protection of Human Subjects: Report on an NRC Consensus Panel
Friday, April 4, 2:15 p.m. to 3:45 p.m.
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201C |
Chair:
Robert M. Hauser
Participants:
Susan Fiske
Felice J. Levine
Celia Fisher |
Link to session
Choosing Homes, Choosing Schools: Mechanisms in the Reproduction of Educational Inequality
Friday, April 4, 4:05 p.m. to 5:35 p.m.
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201B |
Chair:
Kimberly A. Goyette
Discussant:
Sean F. Reardon
Participants:
Elliot B. Weininger
Annette Lareau
Felicia Butts
Lori Ann Delale-O'Connor
Mary Pattillo
Paul A. Jargowsky
|
This session creates a conversation among researchers from diverse specialties within education and the social sciences, including racial and socioeconomic segregation, education inequality, and school choice. We seek to provide a better understanding of how, and to what extent, school and housing choices are connected, and the consequences these connections have for racial and socioeconomic school and residential segregation. We contend that residential segregation cannot be understood without a concomitant understanding of how people make choices about schools, and that school segregation, correlatively, cannot be understood without a concomitant understanding of how people make choices about homes. In recent decades, black-white segregation has decreased modestly, economic inequality has grown in significance, and school choice programs have become more prominent. Yet, we have limited understanding of the actual ways in which parents do, and do not, use available information to guide school choice decisions.
Link to session
Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing
Major Changes and Implications to Users
Friday, April 4, 4:05 pm to 6:05 pm
Convention Center, 200 Level - 204A
Cosponsored by the American Educational Research Association, the American Psychological Association, and the National Council on Measurement in Education
Link to session
The Contributions of Research and Evaluation to the Educational Innovation Ecosystem: Lessons From Around the World
Friday, April 4, 4:05 p.m. to 5:35 p.m.
Convention Center, Terrace Level - Terrace I
Session will also be live-streamed |
Chair:
Stephan Vincent-Lancrin
Discussant:
John Q. Easton
Participants:
Paul Collard
Thomas R. Bailey
Rukmini Banerji
Shawn Powers
|
This session will discuss the role of research and evaluation in the innovation ecosystem of the education sector worldwide. Reflections will come from OECD and non-OECD countries, with some specific examples from India, the United Kingdom and the United States. The session will address the issue from the multiple perspectives of innovators, researchers, evaluators and policy makers, and highlight the different roles that research can play for innovation, taking into account differences in countries and institutional settings. Innovators will reflect on what researchers and evaluators have brought to their enterprise, while researchers and evaluators will discuss what they see as the contribution of their research to educational innovations. All these perspectives will be discussed from a policy perspective as well. The session will contribute to the field by framing the debate in comparison with other sectors than education, by showcasing interesting research or evaluation methods, and by broadening our thinking about the interplay between research, the design of educational innovation and the creation of the social conditions for its scalability.
Link to session
Innovative Validity Approaches for High-Quality Assessments: An Interaction
Saturday, April 5, 8:15 a.m. to 10:15 a.m.
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201A
Session will also be live-streamed |
Chair:
Barbara A. Chow
Participants:
Linda Darling-Hammond
Joan L. Herman
James W. Pellegrino
Li Cai
Eva L. Baker
Discussants:
Joseph L. Willhoft
Kent McGuire
Douglas F. Becker
Jeffrey Nellhaus
Jack Buckley
|
The major US educational reform now gaining momentum and a range of attention is the design and implementation of new assessments intended to measure the Common Core State Standards. Many States are involved in two major groups, and others are using their own designs to create assessments. This symposium addresses key validity criteria involving both assessment features and inferences drawn from data, how they support high-quality assessments measuring complex thinking and applicable domain learning. The symposia will include researchers who will describe the criteria and research needed to assure their use, as well as reactions from those in the consortia, commercial testing, and the policy community.
Link to session
Social-Emotional Factors in Educational Contexts
Saturday, April 5, 8:15 a.m. to 10:15 a.m.
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201C |
Chair:
Bryana Helen French
Discussant:
Kathy Nakagawa
Participants:
Melissa Stormont
Wendy Reinke
Keith Herman
Lori Newcomer
Becky Kochenderfer-Ladd
Brendesha M. Tynes
Clark McKown
Jeff Drayton Wolfgang
Cirecie A. Olatunji
Joan Lucariello
Sandra Graham
Rena F. Subotnik
|
A growing body of research clearly demonstrates that social-emotional (SEL) factors are vital to positive educational outcomes. The interdisciplinary nature of SEL research has led to significant advances in the field. Research conducted with students from ages 5 to 18 years old demonstrates that SEL programs can improve student motivation, classroom engagement, cooperation/collaboration, study habits, academic performance, and transitions into responsible adulthood. Moreover, SEL programs have been shown to decrease behaviors that hinder learning, such as negative school attitudes, absenteeism, truancy, and violence/aggression in schools. This session presents research from leaders in the fields of human development, counseling psychology, special education, and neuropsychology on the influence of social and emotional behaviors, cognitions, and well-being on student learning and achievement.
Link to session
The Need for Evidence-Based Understanding of Immigration and Its Consequences
Saturday, April 5, 10:35 a.m. to 12:05 p.m.
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201A
Session will also be live-streamed |
Chair:
Douglas Massey
Participants:
Douglas Massey
Roberto Gonzales
Joanna Dreby
Veronica Terriquez
|
The population characteristics of the U.S. are changing dramatically; the majority origin population is expected to continue to decline while those from immigrant and minority backgrounds are expected to increase. This changing demographic is having a significant impact on U.S. society, especially in schools where questions regarding the quality of education immigrant students receive is of major concern. Research indicates that many immigrant children are failing to gain the skills and knowledge that will lead them to education advancement, economic security, civic engagement, and social and emotional well-being. Schools and communities have been chided as unresponsive to the needs of immigrant students. This panel discusses what the evidence tells us about the changes in our U.S. population and the implications it is likely to have for immigrant children, including: how schools should work with undocumented students; how to accommodate the needs of transnational children; and what should be the responses to policies hindering the educational futures of immigrant children.
Link to session
The Institute of Education Sciences (IES): Promises and Challenges
Saturday, April 5, 10:35am to 12:05pm
Convention Center, 100 Level, 108A |
Chair:
Michael S. McPherson
Presenter:
John Q. Easton
Discussants:
Susanna Loeb
David J. Chard
Joan Ferrini-Mundy |
Link to session
AERA Distinguished Contributions to Research in Education Award (2013) Address: Alan Schoenfeld, Elizabeth and Edward Conner Chair, Graduate School of Education, University of California, Berkeley
What Makes for Powerful Classrooms, and How Can We Support Teachers in Creating Them?
Saturday, April 5, 10:35 am to 12:05 pm
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201C
Session hashtag: #AERAEd
Our sense of powerful classrooms is somewhat like Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart’s sense of pornography: we haven’t defined them, but we think we know them when we see them. Except that we don’t – opinions about “good instruction” differ, although research clearly says certain things are important. My R&D goal has been to do some ground clearing: to lay out a straightforward way of characterizing classrooms that produce students who are powerful thinkers, to test that characterization empirically, and then to fashion forms of professional development that supports teachers’ growth in the things that count. I’ll discuss proigress along those lines.
Link to session
2012 PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment) Results: Why We Should Care About International Comparisons
Saturday, April 5, 10:35 a.m. to 12:05 p.m.
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201B
Session will also be live-streamed |
Chair:
Martin Carnoy
Presenter:
Andreas Schleicher
Participants:
William H. Schmidt
Henry M. Levin
|
The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) assesses the extent to which 15-year-old students have acquired key knowledge and skills that are essential for full participation in modern societies. The assessment, which focuses on reading, mathematics, science and problem-solving, does not just ascertain whether students can reproduce what they have learned; it also examines how well they can extrapolate from what they have learned and apply that knowledge in unfamiliar settings, both in and outside of school. This approach reflects the fact that modern societies reward individuals not for what they know, but for what they can do with what they know. Andreas Schleicher, the Deputy Director for Education and Skills and Special Advisor on Education Policy to the OECD's Secretary-General will present the 2012 PISA results for 28 million 15 years olds in 65 participating countries.
Link to session
The Common Core State Standards: Views From the Bridge Between Research and Implementation
Saturday, April 5, 10:35 a.m. to 12:05 p.m.
Convention Center, 100 Level - 119A |
Chair:
Michael J. Feuer
Discussant:
Maria Ferguson
Participants:
Kaya Henderson
Abigail Smith
Gina Burkhardt
Joshua L. Glazer
Carl A. Cohn
Susan Fuhrman
Heather A. Harding
|
The widespread adoption and implementation of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) and aligned assessments represent one of the most significant developments in education policy in the last two decades. While each state’s efforts to implement the CCSS are unique, there is a larger national agenda that supports deeper, more rigorous standards for all schools and aligned assessments to measure student achievement. As a result, much hope -- and possibly outsized expectations -- have been built upon the notion that the CCSS and new assessments have the ability to transform teaching and learning in a majority of U.S. schools. Researchers recognize that the CCSS and assessments represent a unique opportunity to study the many facets of major education reform. This research has the potential to not only support state and local efforts to effectively implement the CCSS, but also inform a wide range of policy and advocacy agendas. This session will explore how researchers, policymakers, and practitioners can work together to ensure that a range of implementation research is being conducted and used to inform both policy and practice.
Link to session
Awards Ceremony Luncheon: 2014 Award Winners in Education Research
Saturday, April 5, 12:25 pm to 2:25 pm
Convention Center, Terrace Level - Terrace I
Session hashtag: #AERAAwards
Session will also be live-streamed
Link to session
AERA Distinguished Public Service Award Lecture (2014): Ruby Takanishi, Senior Research Fellow, New America Foundation
The Early Education Debates: Information Policy and Practice in Early Education Through Research
Saturday, April 5, 2:45 p.m. to 4:15 p.m.
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201C
Session hashtag: #AERAServe
Research on children began in the 1920s in university-based institutes to generate usable knowledge for education and child rearing in the United States. Early education and child development research were connected at their origins, but over ensuing decades, in the pursuit of scientific legitimacy and specialization, the fields became increasingly separate. Starting with the War on Poverty in 1964 to the present, early education and both developmental and evaluation research reengaged in controversies about public funding for the education of young children and its effectiveness. These decades provide ample cases to examine how research informed policy and practice in early education, cautionary tales, and remaining challenges.
Link to session
Designing Teacher Evaluation and Support Systems: New Guidance for Educators and Policy Makers Emerging From the Measures of Effective Teaching Study
Saturday, April 5, 2:45 p.m. to 4:15 p.m.
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201A
Session will also be live-streamed |
Chair:
Robert Pianta
Participants:
Steven M. Cantrell
Erik Ruzek
Christopher Hafen
Bridget Kathleen Hamre
Robert Pianta
Ronald F. Ferguson
Charlotte F. Danielson
Kata Mihaly
Daniel F. McCaffery
Douglas Staiger
Thomas Kane
|
States and districts have launched unprecedented efforts in recent years to build new feedback and evaluation systems that support teacher growth and development. To that end, the Measures of Effective Teaching (MET) project set out to investigate how a set of measures could identify effective teaching fairly and reliably. This session highlights a selection of chapters from a new volume reporting original research using the MET data set.
Link to session
New Social Roles for Adolescents: Challenges and Opportunities
Saturday, April 5, 2:45 p.m. to 4:15 p.m.
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201B |
Chair & Discussant:
Josipa Roksa
Participants:
Ingrid Schoon
Katariina Salmela-Aro
Ulrich Trautwein
Richard A Settersten
|
This session will explore how adolescents globally are adopting to new social roles. Four papers will present empirical evidence on changing demands on young people making the transition to independent adulthood in different countries. The transition to independent adulthood is a major developmental task for young people who have to negotiate multiple role transitions, including the completion of full-time education, entry into paid employment, establishing a committed relationship, independent living and becoming a parent. How best to prepare young people for these challenges? What are the changes in demands and appropriate responses among young people? Moving beyond the assumption of homogeneous transition experiences (or a universal life stage of emerging adulthood) we explore diversity in transition experiences and different strategies in negotiating a successful transition to independent adulthood.
Link to session
60th Since Brown. . .50th Since the Civil Rights Act. . .A Symposium and Discussion Forum
Saturday, April 5, 2:45 to 4:15 p.m.
Convention Center, 100 Level - 114 |
Chair:
Charles M. Payne
Presenters:
James D. Anderson
Kenji Hakuta
Marta Tienda
|
The forthcoming AERA Annual Meeting in Philadelphia takes place in a landmark anniversary year. It is the 60th anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education and the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. These two significant markers of social reform—one judicial and one legislative—were directed to ending segregation and discrimination and fostering a more equal society, in particular for persons of color. Looking back and looking ahead, what progress is observable, and, equally as important, what embedded social and social structural conditions continue to create barriers for attaining equal opportunity and access. This Presidential symposium brings scholars who have studied our social history, patterns of stability and change, and the mechanisms that impede or promote meaningful transformations in educational practice and policy. In the quest for a just society, no challenge has been more formidable or subject to study than the nature of societal change and the fault lines that can perpetuate inequality.
Link to session
AERA Presidential Address: Barbara Schneider, AERA President; John A. Hannah Chair and Distinguished Professor in the College of Education and Department of Sociology, Michigan State University
Aligned Ambitions: What’s Behind the College Mismatch Problem?
Saturday, April 5, 4:35 pm to 5:35 pm
Followed by Champagne Reception – 5:35 pm to 6:20 pm
Convention Center, Terrace Level - Terrace I
Session hashtag: #AERAPres
Session will also be live-streamed
Every year over 150,000 low-income and minority on-time high school graduates choose to enroll in postsecondary institutions that are less selective than their grades, test scores, and aspirations predict. These choices have long-term consequences for the lives of the students’ and their future earnings; as well as, the contributions they could make to our society. Why is this case? What actions should be taken to change this? The College Ambition Program is a whole-high school quasi-experimental intervention designed to assist students in fulfilling their ambitions. After four years in the field, working with over 3,000 students, results demonstrate that there are concrete strategies that change college plans and enrollment with the potential for scale-up at a national level.
Link to session
AERA Early Career Award (2013) Lecture: Michael Bastedo, Associate Professor, University of Michigan
Cognitive Repairs in the Admissions Office: New Strategies for Improving Equity and Excellence at Selective Colleges
Sunday, April 6, 8:15 am to 9:45 am
Convention Center, 200 Level - 202A
There are two paradoxes in selective college admissions: (a) Why do admissions officers claim that SATs are only one part of the decision, when research shows repeatedly that they are largely determinative? (b) Why do admissions officers claim to review applications in light of school and family context, when research shows that racial and socioeconomic stratification have failed to improve? I argue that these paradoxes result from cognitive biases and heuristics among admissions officers that create failures to improve access and equity even when there is the will to do so. Using fieldwork data from two flagship university admissions offices, I examine these cognitive biases, and the strengths and weaknesses of various "cognitive repairs” to address the problem. I conclude with an agenda for admissions reform based on this work.
Link to session
Congress and Connecting Research to STEM Education and Innovation
Sunday, April 6, 9:00 a.m. - 10:15 a.m.
Convention Center, Terrace Level - Terrace I |
Participant:
Chaka Fattah (US House of Representatives)
Chair:
Barbara Schneider
Discussants:
Jacquelynne Eccles
Shirley Malcom |
Rep. Fattah |
Link to session
AERA Distinguished Lecture: Anthony Bryk, President, Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching
Improving: Joining Improvement Science to Networked Communities
Sunday, April 6, 10:35 am to 12:05 pm
Convention Center, Terrace Level - Terrace I
Session hashtag: #AERAImprove
Session will also be live-streamed
For the past five years, the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching has been pioneering a fundamentally new vision for research and development that joins the discipline of improvement science with the capabilities of networks to foster innovation and social learning. This talk will illustrate the six principles of improvement that guide this work. It will introduce the idea of analytically and empirically rigorous practice-based evidence for advancing quality outcomes reliably at scale. In so doing, it reframes the work of applied educational research as an effort of systematically learning to improve. It stands as a counterpoint both to policy initiatives pressing rapid large-scale implementation and also autonomous efforts engaged in by individual teachers and schools seeking to improve.
Link to session
Promoting Innovation and Building Research Foundations at the National Science Foundation: Priorities and Perspectives
Sunday, April 6, 10:35 am to 12:05 pm
Convention Center, 100 Level - 120A
Joan Ferrini-Mundy, National Science Foundation
Link to session
Research and Innovation With Children and Families in Urban Schools and Communities
Sunday, April 6, 10:35 a.m. to 12:05 p.m.
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201B |
Chair:
Luis C. Moll
Discussant:
Vivian L. Gadsden
Participants:
John Fantuzzo
James Earl Davis
Kathleen M. Shaw
|
Educational research in urban settings constitutes a particularly important and complex body of work that includes research questions, methodological approaches, and conceptual frameworks that capture the critical issues facing these communities. Such research contributes to our understanding of how to bring about change, in educational outcomes and classroom practices, for both the students who are affected and the structures and systems of which they are a part. Panelists in the session will draw upon ongoing research in Philadelphia schools and communities to highlight the range of issues being addressed, approaches and conceptual frameworks being used, and possibilities that have emerged to support and improve learning, teaching, and schooling.
Link to session
Universal Preschool: What Have We Learned, and What Does It Mean for Practice and Policy?
Sunday, April 6, 12:25 p.m. to 1:55 p.m.
Convention Center, Terrace Level - Terrace I
Session will also be live-streamed |
Chair:
Rachel A. Gordon
Discussant:
Libby Doggett
Participants:
William S. Barnett
Dale C. Farran
Rachel A. Gordon
|
Scholars, practitioners, and policymakers from many disciplinary backgrounds and political persuasions point to the promise of preschool. Economists and developmental scientists, for example, highlight the ways in which early interventions cascade into numerous long-term payoffs, and identify positive benefit-to-cost ratios from classic preschool interventions. Educators recognize how reducing school readiness gaps can better position schools to teach all students, especially important in an era of accountability. In this session, several prominent scholars will share new research; and, a leading federal policymaker will discuss the findings’ relevance, including what they mean as the Obama administration proposes greater investments in state pre-k at the same time that states -- facing budget constraints -- are asking whether recent expansions have paid off.
Link to session
Strengthening R&D’s Role in Preparing an Education Workforce
Sunday, April 6, 2:15 p.m. to 3:45 p.m.
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201C |
Participants:
James G. Cibulka
Suzanne Donovan
David H. Monk
Marquita Grenot-Scheyer
Timothy Waters
Anthony S. Bryk
|
Schools of education face three serious, interrelated challenges in preparing a future workforce for America’s P-12 student population. First, they are widely criticized for not preparing an appropriate supply of qualified teachers and leaders for today’s increasingly diverse P-12 student population and the college and career ready expectations for those students. Schools of education often ignore or undervalue the needs of school districts they serve, which aggravates this workforce problem. Second, preparation programs suffer from an uneven, in some cases weak, research base on effective practices for preparing school professionals. The wide variations in candidate characteristics, curricula, clinical experiences, entrance and exit requirements, and other features are not grounded in empirical evidence of candidate performance, particularly once they are in the classroom. Third, most current research models suffer from serious shortcomings. They have produced too little innovation, insufficient attention to which preparation program practices work in what circumstances, and are too slow to drive required transformations in preparation programs. New R & D/innovation models are needed to respond to the urgency and magnitude of the challenges facing university-based preparation programs.
Link to session
Conceptual and Statistical Considerations in Estimating College Value-Added to Learning
Sunday, April 6, 2:15 p.m. to 3:45 p.m.
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201B |
Chair:
Richard J. Shavelson
Discussants:
Stephen W. Raudenbush
William H. Schmidt
Participants:
Edward W. Wiley
Jeffrey T. Steedle
Ernesto San Martín
Adriana Molina
Benjamin W. Domingue
|
While the economic value to college education has been establish, the learning value is contested. The Voluntary System of Accountability in the U.S., for example, seeks to report learning measures and value-added (VA) estimates for participating colleges, but most colleges do not provide this information. Presenters will address the policy context and assessment-system construction for VA estimation, conceptual issues in modeling VA, and statistical issues in VA estimation.
Link to session
Analysis of Social Networks of Educators: Empirical Findings, Practical Applications, New Directions, and Theoretical Issues
Sunday, April 6, 4:05 p.m. to 5:35 p.m.
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201A
Session will also be live-streamed
|
Chair:
Min Sun
Discussant:
Cynthia E. Coburn
Participants:
Kenneth A. Frank
Min Sun
Alan J. Daly
Kara S. Finnigan
James P. Spillane
Megan Hopkins
William R. Penuel
|
This session features social network analysis as it is used to study intra and inter school knowledge production and school leadership arrangements. Talks will 1) review findings concerning how educators are influenced by network members and how they select with whom to interact; 2) present research concerning networks of central office administrators as they engage research on district-wide reform; 3) describe efforts to develop tools intended to help states and districts identify the location of expertise relevant to curriculum, assessment, and professional development needed to implement Next Generation Science Standards; 4) present new directions in network analysis including two-mode network data (e.g., students and the courses they take), dynamic network processes and agent based simulations to study the emergence of network properties; and 5) discuss some fundamental epistemological and methodological challenges in using SNA to study knowledge production and school leadership and management.
Link to session
Noncognitive Factors Affecting Student Success: State of the Science and Opportunities for School Improvement
Sunday, April 6, 4:05 p.m. to 5:35 p.m.
Convention Center, Terrace Level - Terrace I
Session will also be live-streamed |
Chair:
David Scott Yeager
Discussants:
Anthony S. Bryk
Carol Dweck
Participants:
Angela L. Duckworth
Cybele Raver
David Scott Yeager
Geoffrey L. Cohen
Gregory Mariotti Walton
|
In recent years there has been a flurry of activity regarding so-called “non-cognitive” factors affecting student success, referring to the non-IQ factors that cause learning and persistence. Broadly, interventions to increase self-regulation and to redirect student beliefs have had promising effects, in some cases causing lasting improvements for children across multiple domains of development. But what is truly known about these factors? How do their effects vary across contexts or age groups? And, perhaps more importantly, how can these insights from basic research be implemented in school settings to reliably improve student success? This session will present findings from some of the leading researchers on so-called non-cognitive factors affecting students, followed by a discussion of the implications of this research for school improvement and for broader theories of child development and student learning.
Link to session
Restoring Opportunity: The Crisis of Inequality and the Challenge for American Education
Sunday, April 6, 4:05 p.m. to 6:05 p.m.
Convention Center, 100 Level - 122 |
Chair:
Diana E. Hess
Participants:
Greg Duncan
Marina Boni
Merilee Valentino
Richard J. Murnane
|
This interactive session demonstrates how five common building blocks of strategically targeted interventions and supports can help schools significantly improve the life chances of low-income children; surfaces the challenges of implementing policies and practices to support these building blocks; and provides participants with an opportunity to engage in facilitated discussion with others about the ideas presented. Increases in family income inequality have reduced opportunities for children from low-income families to obtain the skills needed to thrive in a rapidly changing U.S. economy. Interventions in the domains of early childhood, elementary school, high schools, and family supports have proven effective in increasing the life chances of low-income children. In Restoring Opportunity, Murnane and Duncan describe the building blocks for making such interventions part of the life experiences of more low-income children. This session will feature videos from three of the schools highlighted in the book and remarks from leaders in those schools.
Link to session
Scaling Up Effective Reforms: Findings From the i3 Scale-Up Grants
Sunday, April 6, 4:05 p.m. to 5:35 p.m.
Convention Center, 200 Level - 201B |
Chair & Discussant:
Mark Berends
Participants:
Philip Gleason
Melissa Clark
Jerome V. D'Agostino
Robert Slavin
|
The Investing in Innovation Fund (i3) was established to provide competitive grants for innovative reforms to improve student achievement and attainment. Over 100 grants have been awarded since 2010, and a few especially large grants (up to $60 million each) have been dedicated to scaling up effective programs. This session will highlight four of these programs being brought to scale: the Knowledge is Power Program (KIPP), Teach for America, Reading Recovery, and Success for All. At various stages of research, the presenters will describe the scale up process, the research designs to establish effectiveness at scale, and findings regarding implementation and early effects on student outcomes.
Link to session
Eco-Cultural Frames: Examining Challenges of Race, Ethnicity, and Class for Youth Learning, Development, and Resilience
Monday, April 7, 8:15 a.m. to 9:45 a.m.
Convention Center, 100 Level - 119A
|
Chair:
Yolanda J. Majors
Discussant:
Barbara Rogoff
Participants:
William F. Tate
Nailah Suad Nasir
Kihana Miraya Ross
David Philoxene
Carol D. Lee
Kris D. Gutiérrez
|
These four symposium papers offer different lenses through which policy, practice and research can take into account ecological and cultural issues that are central to human learning and development. In addition, they offer innovative theoretical and methodological approaches to examining complex learning within and across settings in ways that take culture and identity as central. The papers also demonstrate interdisciplinary methods from epidemiology; mixed methods approaches to studying interplays among individuals and their contexts and to studying interplays among identity, perceptions, and learning; and critical multi-site ethnography for examining institutional, political, and social contradictions that youth, especially from non-dominant communities, must wrestle with as part of their life course development within and across settings.
Link to session
Value-Added Meets the Schools: The Effects of Using Test-Based Teacher Evaluation on the Work of Teachers and Leaders
Monday, April 7, 10:35 a.m. to 12:05 p.m.
Convention Center, 100 Level - 113A |
Chairs:
Carolyn D. Herrington
Douglas H. Harris
Discussants:
Stephen W. Raudenbush
Linda Darling-Hammond
Participants:
Dan Goldhaber
Ellen B. Goldring
Jennifer Jennings
Susan Moore-Johnson
|
Rapid expansion in the use of value-added measures for teacher accountability could potentially have far-reaching effects. While much has been written about the statistical properties of value-added measures, we know much less about their effects on teaching and learning. Three presentations will address a number of critical issues: What effects might value-added have on the teacher workforce? How are state and district leaders interpreting and using these methodologies for decision making? How are teachers making sense of the new evaluation systems, and how is it affecting the way they teach? The Symposium will provide initial insights into this dramatic experiment and the impacts on the key actors and components in the system. It will also help develop a future research agenda to explore the policies now being implemented across the country. The papers are part of a group of studies to be published in a special issue of Educational Researcher.
Link to session
Changes in the Relationship Between Philanthropy and Education Research
Monday, April 7, 12:25 p.m. to 1:55 p.m.
Convention Center, 100 Level - 119A |
Chair:
Ellen B. Goldring
Participants:
Adam Gamoran
Daniel Greenstein
Michael S. McPherson
Jeannie Oakes
|
Despite the contraction of federal funds and the current involvement of very large foundations, private dollars comprise a relatively modest share of all funds spent on education research. How do foundation leaders view their opportunities to promote high-quality research? What do they see as their responsibilities to pursue a focused agenda, versus allowing research topics to emerge from the field? How have foundation activities changed in response to the shifting landscape of education research? This panel discussion will foster a dialogue between foundation leaders and education researchers. Four speakers will respond to guiding questions from the moderator, and audience members will be invited to comment and pose further questions.
Link to session
Learning Analytics: Capturing, Analyzing, and Visualizing Experiences of Lifelong Learning
Monday, April 7, 12:25 p.m. to 1:55 p.m.
Convention Center, Terrace Level - Terrace I
Session will also be live-streamed |
Chair:
Taylor Martin
Discussant:
Edward Dieterle
Participants:
John T. Behrens
Ryan Baker
Marie Bienkowski
Bob Wise
|
To enable personalized, lifelong learning, we need education researchers capable of unlocking insights contained in the growing tsunami of student- and teacher- generated data associated with digital tools and environments. Creating a talent base of education researchers with deep analytical talent won’t happen overnight. It will require prioritizing resources, developing and sustaining a professional infrastructure, and creating new research tools capable of capturing, analyzing, and visualizing experiences continuing all through life. It will necessitate changes in teaching and learning practices and new policies that strike an appropriate balance between protecting privacy and drawing on large volumes of learning data to advance education outcomes. And it will require strengthening collaboration among the sectors of the education enterprise. In this session, experts from academy, industry, government, practice, and philanthropy will draw from their professional experiences to discuss the opportunities and challenges associated with learning analytics, providing worked examples and strategic priorities.
Link to session