AERA 2018 – The Dreams, Possibilities, and Necessity of Public Education

Together with the University Alliance Ruhr (UA Ruhr) and the German Center for Research and Innovation (GCRI) ice organized a panel discussion and reception themed "Public Education at the Crossroads" on April 12, 6:30 PM to 8:30 PM, at the GCRI, 871 United Nations Plaza, New York City.

Public Education at the Crossroads

Should free public education be a universal right? Should countries and states guarantee education for all its citizens? How should they make it available?
Challenges to public education in the 21st century are plenty, and they vary from the efficacy of public financing to the capacity of the public systems to adapt to the demands of an increasingly globalized economy or to accommodate to the multiple and often contradictory demands voiced from different ideological, social and cultural perspectives.

International Perspectives on Public School Systems

The second event at the AERA Annual Meeting in New York continued our successful series of German-American Seminars at the AERA Annual Meetings since 2013. We provided a space for North-American, German and international researchers to discuss their research and engage in transatlantic cooperation. By now we are regularly joined by a group of researchers from Finland, Canada, Austria, Cyprus, Switzerland, Great Britain and Australia.

45 experts presented at this year’s session and discussed the interplay of public school systems, societal challenges, administrative contexts and governance structures, educational policies, practices and educational research with regard to various countries and educational settings.
We were having an international session with key speakers Hermann Josef Abs from the University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany and Joel Westheimer, University of Ottawa and seven parallel roundtables. Our roundtables focused on following aspects:

1. School leadership and public school development – Is it about the position or is it about the person?, Chair: Rick Mintrop, University of Berkeley
2. a) Refugees and migrants in public education systems, Chair: Lisa Damaschke-Deitrick, Alexander Wiseman, Lehigh University
   b) Second Table on Refugees and migrants in public education systems.
3. International Large Scale Assessments and their effects on policies, educational quality and research, Chair: Nina Jude, (DIPF, Frankfurt), Janna Teltemann (University of Hildesheim)
4. Digital education policies and practices, Chair: Sieglinde Jornitz (DIPF), Sigrid Hartong (Helmut-Schmidt-University)
5. The economization of education. Towards a Global Education Industry?, Chair: Marcelo Parreira do Amaral (University of Münster), Sabine Hornberg (University of Dortmund)
6. Methodological workshop on translation processes in the field of education, Chair: Norm Friesen (Boise State University)