The Hazards to Higher Education of Reformist Pragmatism in Cuba: Proposals for an Agenda

A critical study of public policy involving the 2016–2017 reforms of higher education in Cuba points to the hazards of the pragmatic approach to this policy evidenced in numerous educational indicators and official discourse. Although such features are still far from possessing a neoliberal imprint, uncontrolled pragmatism could lead to a neoliberal trend in Cuban educational policy. Various indicators show the slow mutation of educational policy, increasingly measured and understood as an economic policy (in its fiscal aspects) rather than as a social one. Un estudio crítico de las políticas públicas ligadas a las reformas cubanas a la educación superior de (2016–2017) muestra los peligros del enfoque pragmático tomado por este proceso, los cuales se hacen evidente en numerosos indicadores educativos y discursos oficiales. Aunque aún no podemos hablar de una impronta neoliberal, el pragmatismo descontrolado podría conducir a la política educativa cubana en dicha dirección. Diversos indicadores muestran la lenta mutación de la política educativa, la cual se mide y entiende cada vez más como una política económica (en sus aspectos fiscales) que social.

A New Data Mining and Visualization Tool for Brazilian Educational Indicators

The National Institute of Educational Studies and Research Anísio Teixeira provides open data that help to understand Brazilian Education through Educational Indicators. Despite the easy access to the data, it is hard to manipulate and analyze it to understand the educational scenario in different contexts. This work presents a new visualization tool, inspired by the data mining process, which aims to allow the extraction of knowledge through these indicators using selections provided by users in a very simple manner. To show the tool's potential, graphics of several works were recreated and new graphics are presented.

How are the characteristics of national educational systems related to social inequality?

Introduction. A great deal of research concerns the impact of education on the socio-economic performance in different countries, with highlighting the positive impact of education.Aim. The current research is devoted to the relationship between educational indicators and social inequality representing the socio-economic development.Methodology and research methods. By having the use of correlation analysis, the authors examined the relationship between the indicators of national educational systems, including the participation of the population in education, the structure of graduation in educational programmes, the quality of secondary education, the organisation of the educational process, the volume and structure of education funding, on the one hand, and social inequality, on the other. Social inequality was measured using the Gini index, which represents the level of income inequality in the country. The authors also investigated the educational statistics data in the OECD countries, Russia and some other countries participating in the OECD educational research.Results. The results revealed the relationship between many educational indicators and the Gini index, as well as showed several features of these relationships in Russia. In particular, the authors observed a relationship between the social inequality index and such groups of educational indicators as the level of education (the Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient varies from -0,68 for the level of upper-secondary vocational education to 0,51 for the level of upper-secondary general education), participation of the population in education (the correlation coefficient with the integral indicator of participation in education, the average number of years of learning, was -0,64), the quality of education (a positive relationship with the proportion of students, who have not reached the second level of reading literacy in the Programme for International Student Assessment – PISA, reflected in the correlation coefficient equal to 0,56), the organisation of the educational process (positive correlation coefficient with class size equal to 0,61) and the indicators of education financing (negative correlation coefficients for primary and secondary education – -0.48, as well as for tertiary education – -0.57). It is important to note that the indicators related to master’s degree programmes show a greater negative correlation with social inequality than those reflecting the scale of bachelor’s degree programmes and short tertiary programmes.Scientific novelty of the research includes the detailed analysis of the determinants influencing the national educational systems in their relationship with social inequality, as well as the correlation between these parameters in Russia as compared with other countries.Practical significance of the study involves the development of the information and analytical basis for adjusting further policy in the sphere of education with taking into account socio-economic factors.

Application of the Big Data Analysis Model in Higher Education Talent Training Quality Evaluation

With the increasing demand for applied and professional talents, the talent market has been in short supply. Although there are many talents in the talent market, the quality of talents cannot keep up with the development of quantity. Therefore, it is of great practical significance to establish a visual evaluation system of personnel training quality in the field of higher education. In view of the unreasonable evaluation and unclear weight relationship in the evaluation of educational indicators, this paper puts forward a big data analysis model to comprehensively evaluate teaching evaluation indicators, which has more scientific significance. In this paper, different systems in the index system are used as the analysis objects and the first-level weight relationship is normalized, which can distribute the weights more reasonably. Through the big data analysis method, the teaching quality evaluation system is more reasonable and scientific. In this paper, the quality index system for higher education background is designed and constructed and the weight relationship of different educational indicators is analyzed through big data, and four main indicators are obtained; then, the weight relationship of secondary indicators is analyzed, and finally, the weight relationship of all indicators is formed. The results show that the weight relationship of four indexes is 0.3285, 0.1973, 0.2967, and 0.1755, and the evaluation model of education quality is given.

Theoretical aspects of the concept of "quality of education" in rural schools

В российском обществе сформировалось определенное представление о сельских школах как о группе ущербности образовательных учреждений, в силу особенностей организации их жизнедеятельности. Тем не менее сравнительный анализ результатов ГИА (ЕГЭ/ОГЭ), ВПР, НИКО, которые демонстрируют обучающиеся городских и сельских школ, показывает, что 30-ки лучших школ из разных регионов составляют более 50% ОУ сельской местности. Чаще всего около трети школ сельской местности завершают рейтинговые списки качества образования. Сельские ОУ при равных условиях существенно отличаются по уровню образовательных показателей обучающихся. В данной статье рассмотрено понятие «качество образования», которое является емким и многоаспектным. Рассматривая качеств образования сельских школ, необходимо учитывать их особенности. Основной особенностью сельской школы является видовое и типовое многообразие, и оценивать их качество образования необходимо с точки зрения подходов, принципиально отличающихся, от городских школ. Поэтому особенно остро встает вопрос о теоретическом изучении качества образования сельских школ. In Russian society, a certain idea has been formed about rural schools as a group of deficient educational institutions, due to the peculiarities of the organization of their life. Nevertheless, a comparative analysis of the results of the GIA (USE / OGE), VPR, NICO, which are demonstrated by students of urban and rural schools shows that the top 30 schools from different regions make up more than 50% of the OU of rural areas. Most often, about a third of rural schools complete the educational quality rating lists. Rural educational institutions, under equal conditions, differ significantly in the level of educational indicators of students. This article discusses the concept of "quality of education", which is capacious and multidimensional. Considering the quality of education of rural schools, it is necessary to take into account their features. The main feature of rural schools is the diversity of species and types, and it is necessary to evaluate their quality of education from the point of view of approaches that are fundamentally different from urban schools. Therefore, the question of the theoretical study of the quality of education in rural schools is particularly acute.

Referências locais de qualidade educacional: Estudo comparado das trajetórias de Sobral/CE e Oeiras/PI

This article is the result of a comparative education research on the educational reforms trajectories carried out in the last two decades by the municipalities of Sobral/CE and Oeiras/PI. Based on the last PISA results, the text discusses the different concepts of “quality” in education and then contextualizes the units of analysis and presents its main educational indicators results. The two trajectories comparison highlights the similarities and specificities of each process, indicating strategies action that can be replicated in other places, but also recognizing the importance of developing local solutions appropriate to each reality. In the final analysis, it shows that in different periods of time and conditions, Sobral and Oeiras have been able to advance significantly in the enforcement of the right to learning and that intranational comparisons are a promising source for new investigations and educational reform policies aimed at quality.

Shifting Paradigm in the Higher Education Sector of Pakistan during COVID-19: An Empirical Analysis of the Online Teaching Experience

The world is undergoing a dramatic COVID-19 induced transformation in almost every sector of the economy including education. The virus has drastically changed the dynamics of teaching and learning across the globe. This paper is an attempt to examine how COVID-19 has affected the higher education sector of Pakistan. An empirical analysis of the online teaching experience of both the public and private sector university faculty was conducted for this purpose. The current study aims to highlight the need for developing tools for effective teaching that have wide ranging applications in Pakistan, an exercise that requires concerted research effort. Education sector is among the worst hit sectors due to the spread of the coronavirus in Pakistan. Indeed, educational indicators for Pakistan and the current state of the education sector indicate a gloomy scenario. Instructors and students across universities, colleges and schools were ill-prepared for a situation where they had to rely on online teaching and other web-based instructional tools. In this scenario, certain areas in the education sector require extensive research, training and application, such as digital education, assessment tools and applications, project-based learning (PBL), and mobile based strategies for developing self-regulated learners (SLRs) as well as the introduction of various other tools meant to enhance student engagement during the process of learning. The study found that the faculty in the public and private sector universities was not inclined towards online teaching. The results also revealed that the private sector institutions were more facilitating than the public sector institutes. However, the role of HEC during the pandemic was proactive. There is a need to take effective measures at the local and national level to facilitate the student body as well as the instructors lest there is a severe decline in educational indicators or rise in the dropout rate.

Assessing the educational performance of different Brazilian school cycles using data science methods

Educational indicators are metrics that assist in assessing the quality of the educational system. They are often associated with economic and social factors suggested to contribute to good school performance, however there is no consensus on the impact of these factors. The main objective of this work was to evaluate the factors related to school performance. Using a data set composed by Brazilian schools’ performance (IDEB), socioeconomic and school structure variables, we generated different models. The non-linear model predicted the best performance, measured by the error and determination coefficient metrics. The heterogeneity of the importance of the variable between school cycles and regions of the country was detected, this effect may contribute to the development of public educational policies.

GERANDO INTELIGÊNCIA ATRAVÉS DE MICRODADOS: UMA PROPOSTA DE BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE PARA A ÁREA DE ENSINO DO INSTITUTO FEDERAL DA BAHIA (IFBA)

Educational indicators are instruments of significant importance for assessing the outcomes and quality of educational institutions. In order to provide information for strategic decisions, Business Intelligence systems are gaining more and more space in the Information Technology market. This article intends to identify the main educational indicators and their various approaches, in order to evaluate their contributions and/or inadequacies to the pedagogical management of the Instituto Federal da Bahia, besides addressing the Business Intelligence theme, identifying their origin, concepts and applicability. In conclusion, it was presented a proposal to develop a BI system to generate intelligence through microdata extracted from IFBA's academic and administrative systems and, finally, to produce strategic indicators to support decision making regarding students' academic life.