The overall aim of this study is to evaluate the impact of applying ISO:9001 on the school climate and satisfaction in schools. This was done by using a Likert-type evaluation instrument consisting ...of 21 items with an excellent reliability score for the general scale (Cronbach α = 0.955) and specifically for the school climate dimension (α = 0.969) and school satisfaction (α = 0.927). The instrument was applied to a sample of 2189 subjects (1881 teachers and 308 members of the school management team) at 85 schools in Spain where ISO:9001 has been implemented for at least 3 years. The results show that implementation of this QMS has generally had a medium level impact on school climate and on satisfaction among the teachers, students, and families at the schools in the sample. Moreover, descriptive and differential analyses have been carried out to identify any significant differences in the impact of implementing the QMS on improvements in the two dimensions as a function of the position, gender, seniority at the school, ownership, and size of the school, and length of time with the QMS implemented there. In addition, other analyses were carried out using single-variant general linear models that revealed an effect of interaction between the variables of position and age. Furthermore, cluster analyses were also performed to identify three teacher and management profiles attending to the levels of improvement brought about from implanting the QMS on the dimensions under study.
•The impact of applying ISO:9001 on the school climate and satisfaction is evaluated.•An instrument was applied to 2189 (teachers and management teams) at 85 schools.•Descriptive, differential and cluster analyses were carried out, among others.•The ISO:9001 had a medium level impact on the school climate and satisfaction.
Introduction: interest in evaluating the improvements resulting from external evaluation processes in higher education has revealed that there is a lack of objective instruments available for this ...purpose. Consequently, this study presents the design and validation of an instrument for evaluating the improvement effect of the accreditation system of Spanish university degrees. Methodology: a 108-item questionnaire was prepared and was applied to a sample of 1964 subjects from different university groups (students, teachers, management, etc.). Its reliability and construct validity were analysed using exploratory factor analysis (EFA). Results: analysis of the instrument’s technical characteristics showed high reliability, both overall and at the dimensional level, with Cronbach’s α and McDonald’s ω being greater than .95. The EFA identified eight factors that contained the 105 items finally included, explaining 77.37% of the variance in Discussion and conclusions: these results all indicate that the instrument designed is reliable and valid, with a solid multidimensional structure that makes it possible to evaluate the impact of the accreditation system on various aspects of Spanish university degrees.
PurposeThe objective of this study was to evaluate and compare how school heads and teachers perceived the impact of implementing ISO 9001 Standards on the dimensions management and planning and ...support and recognition.Design/methodology/approachThe study included 2,192 subjects (86.2% teachers and 13.8% heads) belonging to 85 schools in four Spanish autonomous communities (Castilla y León, Community of Madrid, Andalusia and Community of Valencia). We used an instrument made up of 25 items evaluating both dimensions (Cronbach's α = 0.961). We conducted descriptive and differential analyses (applying ANOVA and calculating the effect size) overall and for the assessments by heads and teachers.FindingsResults show a higher impact in small private schools with state subsidies, with 9–11 years of ISO implementation and receiving internal aid or none at all. The impact was medium–high on the management and planning system and medium–low on support and recognition, with heads evaluating at a significantly higher level the impact of ISO 9001 standards on improvement of preparation of classroom timetables, meetings, analysis of staff expectations and recognition of staff achievements.Originality/valueImplementation of quality management systems in education has increased significantly in the last decades, and it is thus necessary to find evidence on how the resulting improvements are generated in schools. This study provides conclusions to the scientific and professional community about how school heads and teachers perceived the impact of implementing ISO 9001 standards on the dimensions management and planning and support and recognition.
•Evaluation of the impact of ISO:9001 Standards and the EFQM model at schools.•Both QMSs have a medium-high impact on the communication system in the schools.•Both QMSs have a moderate impact on ...external relations in the schools.•The schools with EFQM generally show significantly higher levels of impact.
Implementation of Quality Management Systems (QMS) has increased greatly in recent years at a wide variety of institutions. The main purpose of this work is to evaluate and compare the impact of having implemented ISO:9001 standards and the EFQM model on the communication system and external relations at schools. This was done by applying a validated evaluation instrument to 2901 subjects of 116 schools in 4 Spanish Autonomous Communities. The results show that the QMS have a medium-high level of impact on the communication system and a moderate level on the external relations dimension. Furthermore, schools with EFQM feature significantly higher levels of impact on the dimensions studied than schools implementing ISO standards. Significant differences were found in the levels of impact as a function of the number of years of implementation and the type of funding received, among other variables. In addition, an interaction effect was found between the type and size of schools in regard to their external relations.
Computer Algebra Systems (CASs) are extremely powerful and widely used digital tools. Focusing on differentiation, CASs include a command that computes the derivative of functions in one variable ...(and also the partial derivative of functions in several variables). We will focus in this article on real-valued functions of one real variable. Since CASs usually compute the derivative of real-valued functions as a whole, the value of the computed derivative at points where the left derivative and the right derivative are different (that we will call conflicting points) should be something like "undefined", although this isn't always the case: the output could strongly differ depending on the chosen CAS. We have analysed and compared in this article how some well-known CASs behave when addressing differentiation at the conflicting points of five different functions chosen by the authors. Finally, the ability for calculating one-sided limits of CASs allows to directly compute the result in these cumbersome cases using the formal definition of one-sided derivative, which we have also analysed and compared for the selected CASs. Regarding teaching, this is an important issue, as it is a topic of Secondary Education and nowadays the use of CASs as an auxiliary digital tool for teaching mathematics is very common.
The authors present a theoretical proposal for the organization of mathematical contents, more precisely to curricula development formalization and formal verification, inspired by knowledge ...engineering techniques. The situation addressed is the following: the starting point is a mathematical “official curriculum” (or part of it), not necessarily completely detailed. In our proposal, a group of experts would have to first build a detailed formulation of this curriculum (including the “prerequisite” relation between contents), which we will denominate “preprocessed official curriculum.” We detail how any “official curriculum development” could then be rigorously formalized and formally verified in a way inspired by rule-based expert system formal verification. We have defined the following terms: “contents soundness,” “contents completeness,” “relation soundness,” “relation completeness,” and “absence of cycles.” We believe that this is a completely new formalization within mathematics teaching theory that, once computer is implemented, would be very helpful. That would be the case, for instance, in countries where government sets the “official curricula” for Primary and Secondary Education and textbook contents have to be manually checked and approved by academic authorities: evaluators would “only” have to extract the textbook contents and set the “prerequisite” relation among them and let the computer do the rest.
INTRODUCCIÓN. En Educación Infantil resulta de especial importancia el modo en que se trabaja la adquisición de conocimientos y el desarrollo de competencias, pudiendo ser determinante la metodología ...utilizada en el aula. El objetivo de este estudio es evaluar y comparar el nivel de competencia matemática en el ámbito numérico, en alumnos de 3º de Educación Infantil en función de tres metodologías (Centros de Interés, Juegos y Narraciones y Aprendizaje Cooperativo). MÉTODO. Se ha aplicado la Prueba Evolutivo-Curricular de Matemáticas (PRECUMAT) a una muestra de 181 niños de 9 centros educativos de la Comunidad Autónoma de Madrid. Se han realizado, por un lado, análisis descriptivos y diferenciales sobre la adquisición de conocimientos y el desarrollo de la competencia matemática en el ámbito numérico, en función de la metodología utilizada en el aula y, por otro, un análisis clúster para la identificación de perfiles de alumnos en base a su nivel de competencia matemática en el ámbito de estudio. RESULTADOS. Los resultados muestran que los alumnos de la metodología Cooperativa presentan niveles significativamente más altos en Numeración verbal, Numeración visual, Sentido numérico, Cálculo mental y Resolución de problemas (p < 0,01). Se han identificado tres perfiles de alumnos en función de su nivel de competencia matemática, resultando ser el conglomerado formado por los alumnos que han seguido una metodología basada en el Aprendizaje Cooperativo los que poseen un nivel más alto de desarrollo de la competencia. DISCUSIÓN. Los resultados del estudio permiten afirmar que el uso de metodologías basadas en el aprendizaje cooperativo en la etapa de Educación Infantil favorece la adquisición y el desarrollo de competencias matemáticas en el ámbito numérico.
Background: Sequencing contents is of great importance for instructional design within the teaching planning processes. We believe that it is key for a meaningful learning. Material and methods: ...Therefore, we propose to formally establish a partial order relation among the contents: the relation: “to be a prerequisite”. We have applied this approach to the mathematical contents of the compulsory Secondary Education of the Spanish educational system. This information has been modeled as a graph. The amount of contents considered (814) and the number of ordered pairs in the order relation considered (17,782) has produced a big graph. In order to work effectively with that amount of data, we have used software specialized in network analysis. More precisely, we have used the software packages Pajek and Gephi. Results: This software, together with the use of techniques borrowed from graph theory, has allowed providing a tool for debugging curriculum developments (similar to rule based expert systems verification). Conclusions: This is a contribution to the processes of sequencing contents and, therefore, to the processes of planning teaching and instructional design.
PISA and TALIS, congruence or discrepancy? Fernández-Díaz, Mª José; Jesús Miguel Rodríguez-Mantilla; Martínez-Zarzuelo, Angélica
Revista electrónica de investigación y evaluación educativa,
01/2016, Letnik:
22, Številka:
1
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
International educational evaluations on a grand scale provide information of great interest to the educational, scientific and political community. Many studies have derived from them, both ...nationally and internationally. On the other hand, it is well known from the beginning of these macro-assessments the diversity of opinions they have generated. In this context, the aim of the study presented here is to analyse and go deeply into the relationships between the results from PISA 2012 and those relating to teaching practice of secondary TALIS 2013, trying to find out the consistencies and discrepancies between the results of both, considering that these two evaluations should show certain coherence between the results obtained by students and teacher ratings. The descriptive analysis carried out taking the overall scores on both evaluations show obvious discrepancies, as countries occupying the top positions in the results of students in PISA are located in the last places in teaching practice of teachers. To go deeper into this aim data from TALIS-PISA link have been used, where it is assumed that more intense relationships should be produced as there is a direct link between students and teachers evaluated. The analysis also show the lack of the expected coherence. These results lead to reflect on the possible underlying causes and so it is proposed the need for a coordinated design of both evaluation processes.
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