M. Danish Shakeel

Bio: M. Danish Shakeel is an academic researcher from Harvard University. The author has contributed to research in topics: School choice & Voucher. The author has an hindex of 8, co-authored 27 publications receiving 234 citations. Previous affiliations of M. Danish Shakeel include University of Buckingham & University of Arkansas.

The Participant Effects of Private School Vouchers Across the Globe: A Meta-Analytic and Systematic Review

Abstract: School voucher programs (a.k.a. opportunity scholarships) are scholarship programs - frequently government funded - that pay for students to attend private schools of their choice. Many private school vouchers programs have been initiated around the world with the goal of increasing the academic performance of students. Voucher programs are often viewed as a way to increase achievement and satisfaction for individual students and families, while at the same time creating competitive pressures that encourage other schools in the area to improve. Countries like Chile and India have developed extensive school voucher programs. While many studies have been conducted on school vouchers, a meta-analysis of the international randomized controlled trials (RCTs) evaluating the achievement effects of vouchers has never been conducted. This study is a meta-analytic consolidation of the evidence from all RCTs evaluating the participant test score effects of school vouchers internationally. Our search process turned up 9,443 potential studies, 19 of which ultimately were included. These 19 studies represent 11 different voucher programs. A total of 262 effect sizes are included, with a two-stage consolidation of those estimates yielding a total of 44 drawn from the last year of the studies. We have included only math and reading outcomes as other subjects are rarely reported and are difficult to compare across countries. We also differentiate between English and reading outcomes and present English results as a subcomponent of the reading effects to account for the effect of local language in the international context. Our meta-analysis indicates overall positive and statistically significant achievement effects of school vouchers that vary by subject (math or reading), location (US v. non-US), and funding type (public or private). Generally, the impacts are larger (1) for reading than for math, (2) for programs outside the US relative to those within the US, and (3) for publicly-funded programs relative to privately-funded programs.

Who is More Free? A Comparison of the Decision-Making of Private and Public School Principals

Abstract: While substantial school choice research focuses on student achievement outcomes, little has explored the mechanisms involved in producing such outcomes. We present a comparative analysis of private and public school principals using data from the School and Staffing Survey (SASS) 2011–2012. We add to the literature by examining the differences in private and public school principals’ abilities to influence important decisions at their schools from a nationally representative sample of 9,230 school principals. Results indicate that private school leadership exhibits more autonomy in influencing school level policies, perhaps explaining private school advantages.

Can private schools improve school climate? Evidence from a nationally representative sample

Abstract: A safe school environment is essential for effective learning and the inculcation of civic values. The article presents a comparative analysis of school climate and safety in private and public sch...

Does Private Islamic Schooling Promote Terrorism? An Analysis of the Educational Background of Successful American Homegrown Terrorists

Abstract: Some commentators argue that private religious schools are less likely to inculcate the attributes of good citizenship than traditional public schools, specifically proposing that private Islamic schools are relatively more likely to produce individuals sympathetic to terrorism. This study offers a preliminary examination of the question by studying the educational backgrounds of Western educated terrorists. While data are limited, in accord with prior work findings indicate the vast majority of both Islamic and reactionary terrorists attended traditional public schools and had no religious education; hence findings suggest that early religious training and identification may actually encourage prosocial behavior.

此处“personality”译法探析

Abstract: 在翟象俊主编的《大学英语》第2册第5单元中，有这样一个句子：“As a boy and then as an adult, I never lost my wonder at the personality that was Einstein.”教参中指出“the personality that was Einstein”应理解为“the personality which was the most striking characteristic of Einstein”，该句译为“作为一个孩子，到后来作为一个成人，我一直对爱因斯坦的个性惊叹不已”。很明显，在这里译者把“personality”理解为“个性，人格”，但本人认为应译为“人物，名人”更妥。“personality”可作“个性，人格”讲，但它还有另外一个重要意思。在陆谷孙主编的《英汉大词典》（1993年版）中，“personality”第3条释义为：“个人，人物，名人”：“appoint a personality to lead a campaign，派一个人去领导一场运动”。“a personality in the news，新闻人物”。在...

Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other

Abstract: Nationality: American Education: Ph.D. in Sociology and Personality... Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology … https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8694125-alone-together Start by marking “Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other†as Want to Read: ... Unfortunately I am no closer to telling you why we expect more from technology & less from each other than I was before I read this book. One of the main things that bothered me about this book was that, even though I was really interested in these …

Dying To Win: The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism

Abstract: Robert Pape thoroughly examines the misperceptions about and motivations behind suicide terrorism in his book, Dying to Win: The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism. He uses empirical data and a multidisciplinary approach to support his argument that suicide terrorism is used to meet the secular and strategic goal of compelling the withdrawal of military forces.

Reign of Error: The Hoax of the Privatization Movement and the Danger to America's Public Schools

Abstract: Reign of Error: The Hoax of the Privatization Movement and the Danger to America's Public Schools Diane Ravirch New York: Knopf, 2013. 416 pages. $14-34 USD/Paperbac Diane Ravitch spent decades advocating metrics and alternatives for elementary and secondary public school reform, including some years in government implementing the current assessment-as-accountability regime, but, by 2006, she doubted her own prescription for public school ills. This itch in her mind turned into two books, The Life and Death of the Great American School System, a careful mea culpa regarding testing and a data-driven attack on data-fixation, and, most recently, Reign of Error. As a New York University research professor of education, she also founded an organization, the Network for Public Education (NPE). All of these efforts are aimed fundamentally at the primary and secondary educational systems in the U.S., but the arguments are relevant to community colleges, particularly in the Obama administration. Community colleges today face such questions of "reform"--Ravitch often puts this word in doubtful quotes--and the community college may fall for the same hoax. Ravitch outlines the view of "reformers" in chapters 3-8 of Life and Death and chapters 2-4 and 14-20 of Reign of Error as seeing schools preparing children to become participants in the society's economy. This vision, argues Ravitch, emphasizes two elements: standardized tests and social engineering. Standardized tests are the first social modality by which academic competition is exercised. At this level, a child is getting practice and developing skills that suit one for a competitive economy: self-control, the efficient use of instrumental reason, calculations of utility, innovation, initiative-taking, and so on; but more specifically, job-relevant skills come along eventually, and by assessing disaggregated skills instead of the aggregated judgment that grades make, the system can more precisely sort its future workers. Educational services deliverers get their own grade, from their output--from the scores that their students make, assessed over time. The other element comparative testing emphasizes is a social engineering aspect: that people of differential abilities and aptitudes will be sorted by testing into those career and academic pathways in which they will be comparatively advantaged--on the Adam Smith and David Ricardo model, more or less. Market utility is the appropriate standard of judgment for an individual, according to the reformers' view, because it is the standard of judgment for a collectivity. The strength of corporations (the "bottom line") and countries (military, GDP) is similarly assessed quantitatively. In advanced societies, the citizen labor force is stratified according to performance, which is measured by one "earning what one deserves"--by differential monetary life outcomes. A well-formed education system thus prepares each person for the slot in the economy in which she is most apt to attain her greatest comparative advantage--that which will, among the measurable outcomes, result in her maximum lifetime income-earning potential. Privatization melds public and private interest, in this view, because it allows maximum room for competitive pressures to sort out to any desired level of detail the most efficient producers of society-specific, needed workforce skills. Assessing student learning disaggregated by skill performance facilitates tracking students into the most contributory pathways and prepares them for competitive job-hunting and job-keeping. Similarly, assessing instruction drives teachers and teaching institutions into the most efficient delivery of the most demanded knowledge and skills. Anything that gets in the way of this quantized, data-driven approach is a market inefficiency--as well as, on the reformers' view, a social anachronism and a political albatross. …