SIG 23 - Educational Evaluation, Accountability and School Improvement

Educational evaluation and accountability are expected to have a substantial impact on educational quality and school improvement. Evidence shows that such responses can be positive when improvements are made and teachers and principals work harder and/or more effectively. Available research however also points to negative responses when schools and teachers implement quick fix improvements and use strategic behaviour to manipulate the outcomes of external evaluations or narrowly focus on quantifiable and easy to measure elements in the external evaluation framework. Available research in the area of educational evaluation and accountability draws from different theories of change to explain these positive and negative responses.

 

This SIG brings together an array of theoretical and empirical research into external and internal evaluation and accountability of schools and teachers and their impact on teaching, learning and achievement of the students. We are interested in addressing questions on:

• theoretical modelling the relationship between educational evaluation, accountability and school improvement 

• the design of external evaluation and accountability systems of schools and teachers (e.g. concerning reliability and validity), their relation to internal evaluation systems and the impact of such systems on equal opportunities in education, school improvement, teaching and learning in the classroom and achievement of the students.

• empirical methods to study these questions