Feature

Upcoming conference pushes for a scientific basis in education

APA and the Mid-Atlantic Regional Educational Laboratory's lab on student success, one of 10 federally funded Regional Education Laboratories, are teaming up to recommend ways that science can help K-12 schools address such challenges as accountability and student achievement.

By M. DITTMANN

April 2004, Vol 35, No. 4

Print version: page 35

Psychologists and educators will gather May 13-14 at a conference to develop the recommendations--also the basis for a book, "The Scientific Basis of Educational Productivity." The book will explore how education research can contribute to education reform and the improvement of student achievement.

Conference-goers will include teachers, principals, school board members, officials from state education departments, superintendents, members of national parent organizations and psychologists.

Book chapters by psychologists will highlight scientific methods they use and provide examples for educators and researchers unfamiliar with the methods. Other topics include new federal education research initiatives, experimentally controlled research, the scientific basis of teacher licensing and school psychology, blending experimental and descriptive research, and the application of the science of teaching and learning to work, family and school.

The book will be published by Information Age, most likely by this fall.

--M. DITTMANN