MCKINSEY REPORT

The topic of our last session was devoted to the Mckinsey Report. Is this issue familiar in your educational knowledge? 

<<How the world's most improved  school systems keep getting better >>

At the beginning of 2007, the American consultant Mckinsey published this result of a research in which it was analyzed the process followed by the best educative systems in the world to achieve their good results. Its objective was to understand why the world’s top-performing school systems perform so very much better than most others and why some educational reforms succeed so spectacularly, when most others fail.The common and positive features of these systems were deeply studied and contrasted. New and interesting perspectives about educational reality were discovered. There are some well-known sentences like the only form of improving results is by improving teaching. 

The focus of a second study was dedicated to investigate the causes of the progressive improvement is those school systems. The authors are Michael Barber, Mona Mourshed, Chivezi Chijioke and Michael Fullan. The report compiles the experiences of twenty different school systems in Asia, Europe, North America and the Middle East. 

The main aim is to discover the key to achieve positive results as in the case of the improved school systems, and to discern the wrong things in relation to the vain attempsts.One idea is that, instead of the different contexts, the educative systems which are improving share suitable methods for each phase. Another interesting fact is that just educative expense doesn`t mean advance. So, we may deduce that different systems with the same expense obtain dissimilar results. Education reform is top of the agenda of almost every country in the world. Yet despite massive increases in spending and ambitious attempts at reform, the performance of many school systems has barely improved in decades. This is all the more surprising because there are wide variations in the quality of education.

Educative expense by itself is not the determining factor in educational progress. It is not just the level of investment

Changing what happens in the hearts and minds of millions of children – the main charge of any school system – is no simple task.

An optimistic conclusion according to the report is that a considerable improvement can be achieved in just 6 years.

How can we reach it?

So why is it that some school systems consistently perform better and improve faster than others? There are many different ways to improve a school system, and the complexity of this task and the uncertainty about outcomes is rightly reflected in the international debate about how this should best be done. The characteristics of these high-performing school systems have in common and what tools they use to improve student outcomes were examined as it has been mentioned. 

The experiences of these top school systems suggests that three things matter most:

1. getting the right people to become teachers
2. developing them into effective instructors
3. ensuring that the system is able to deliver the best possible instruction for every child

These systems demonstrate that the best practices for achieving these three things work irrespective of the culture in which they are applied. They demonstrate that substantial improvement in outcomes is possible in a short period of time and that applying these best practices universally could have enormous impact in improving failing school systems, wherever they might be located.

In class with Iñaki, one of the main ideas I paid attention to was the focus on teacher's good quality or excellence.  I consider that the bigger is your training and efforts as a teacher, the better are the results you get. I was really surprised about some foreign practices like the screening of candidates, in order to select professionals with the best aptitudes. We remarked upon the famous PISA report, which makes a sort of ranking of countries.

We learned as well the situation in different countries about the educational issue. One example was USA, where education as a profession is undervalued, low paid and underestimated. However, we also dedicated our session to talk about the three top countries: South Korea, Finland and Singapore.

In the last three cases, what struck me most was the great prestige that educational work has gained
over there. In addition to that, it seems to me a good strategy (but harsh!) the  rigid and complex processes of selection, by taking into consideration the best level and capacities. It was really shocking to me the fact that a teacher may be treated like a doctor in Spain. Definitly, conceptions about prestige and priorities are quite subjective.

For further information and in order to see some interesting videos, you can visit the website!

http://mckinseyonsociety.com/how-the-worlds-most-improved-school-systems-keep-getting-better

Finally, I upload two presentations with more information about the topic. Enjoy it! 

Informe mc kinsey from Gabriela Lobo



  

Europa sistema-educativo-inteligente from Gabriela Lobo