The Economics of Education

It has been argued that high rates of education are essential for countries to be able to achieve high levels of economic growth. Empirical analyses tend to support the theoretical prediction that poor countries should grow faster than rich countries because they can adopt cutting edge technologies already tried and tested by rich countries.

However, technology transfer requires knowledgeable managers and engineers who are able to operate new machines or production practices borrowed from the leader in order to close the gap through imitation. Therefore, a country’s ability to learn from the leader is a function of its stock of “human capital”. Recent study of the determinants of aggregate economic growth have stressed the importance of fundamental economic institutions and the role of cognitive skills.

At the level of the individual, there is a large literature, generally related to the work of Jacob Mincer, on how earnings are related to the schooling and other human capital. This work has motivated a large number of studies, but is also controversial. The chief controversies revolve around how to interpret the impact of schooling. Some students who have indicated a high potential for learning, by testing with a high intelligence quotient, may not achieve their full academic potential, due to financial difficulties.

Economists Samuel Bowles and Herbert Gintis argued in 1976 that there was a fundamental conflict in American schooling between the egalitarian goal of democratic participation and the inequalities implied by the continued profitability of capitalist production.

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Effective Co-Teaching Strategies

Several collaborative teaching approaches have proven to be successful to guide educators who work together in co-teaching partnerships to differentiate instruction. The approaches include:

  1. Supportive Co-teaching – where the one member of the team takes the lead role and the other member rotates among students to provide support
  2. Parallel Co-teaching – where support personnel and the classroom teacher instruct different heterogeneous groups of students
  3. Complementary Co-teaching – where a member of the co-teaching team does something to supplement or complement the instruction provided by the other member of the team (e.g., models note taking on a transparency, paraphrases the other co-teacher’s statements)
  4. Team Teaching – where the members of the team co-teach along side one another and share responsibility for planning, teaching, and assessing the progress of all students in the class.

Some co-teaching approaches (e.g., complementary and team teaching) require greater commitment to, comfort with, and skill in collaborative planning and role release (i.e., transferring one’s specialized instructional responsibilities over to someone else). It is recommended that collaborative teams select among the co-teaching approaches, as needed, based up the curriculum demands of a unit or lesson and student learning characteristics, needs, and interests.

When deciding which approach to use in a given lesson, the goal always is to improve the educational outcomes of students through the selected co-teaching strategies. Many beginning co-teachers start with supportive teaching and parallel teaching because these approaches involve less structured coordination among the co-teaching team members. As co-teaching skills and relationships strengthen, co-teachers then venture into the complementary teaching and team teaching approaches that require more time, coordination, and knowledge of and trust in one another’s skills.

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The 21st Century Learners

The MacArthur Foundation’s grantmaking aims to determine how digital media are changing the way young people learn, play, socialize, and participate in civic life. Answers are critical to education and other social institutions that must meet the needs of this and future generations.

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Survive on Your College Costs

College can be expensive, but it’s possible to both save on costs and make your money go farther once you’re enrolled. Here are 10 big and small ways to cut college costs.

  1. Stay in state—or nearby
    Going to an in-state college can amount to huge savings. The average tuition and fees for in-state students tallied $7,635 in 2011-2012, compared to $17,785 for out-of-state students, according to U.S. News data. If you don’t plan to stay in state, consider regional tuition breaks, which can cut costs, too.
  2. Consider community college
    When money is tight but college is a priority, a community college might be a good option. If you plan to attend a four-year university, consider taking community college courses during high school or the summer before college to start accruing credits early.
  3. Look local
    Scholarships are a great way for all kinds of students to get money for college, and local funding opportunities tend to be less competitive. Don’t overlook small scholarships in your hometown. Odds are, you’ll have a better chance of securing one, and every little bit helps.
  4. Stay on track
    Nothing can cause your college costs to overrun like having to stay in school an extra semester, an extra year, or more. Take full class loads, keep up with your graduation requirements, and focus on earning good grades in every course.
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Why Open Education Matters

Open education encompasses resources, tools and practices that employ a framework of open sharing to improve educational access and effectiveness worldwide.

Open Education combines the traditions of knowledge sharing and creation with 21st century technology to create a vast pool of openly shared educational resources, while harnessing today’s collaborative spirit to develop educational approaches that are more responsive to learner’s needs.

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