Quality of Education and cost

It is an easy to understand relationship: under given circumstances, the quality of education correlates with investment.
Furthermore, comparing theUK with Kazakhstan, it seems that productivity and investment also follows a similar relationships.
As Kazakhstan has the challenge of the transformation from a still Soviet-style dominated VET system to a more market-oriented one, it can be expected, that some front-up investment seems necessary. As a strategic paper of the Ministry of Education of education points out,(page 19), Kazakhstan currently invests 3.6 % of GDP on education, while twice the figure might be more appropriate for its ambitous plans.

Knowledge worker productiviy 2.0: dream or nightmare

Andrea Back asks this questions, Jochen Robes provides his views: fast access to information, possibility to create networks, search for experience and answers. But at the end of the day, problem solving has not changed.
Challenges are to cope with the fast change, setting priorities, switching between different networks and avoiding a "mental overload".
Old habites die hard, so it is a individual experience to adopt permanently the personal style to new circumstances. One can not circumvent to make an evaluation of new technology for use: every situation is different.

Analyzing this blog

The website: http://www.typealyzer.com/ provides an online analyze of the writing style of blogs. I got the following answer: The long-range thinking and individualistic type. They are especially good at looking at almost anything and figuring out a way of improving it - often with a highly creative and imaginative touch. They are intellectually curious and daring, but might be physically hesitant to try new things.

The Scientists enjoy theoretical work that allows them to use their strong minds and bold creativity. Since they tend to be so abstract and theoretical in their communication they often have a problem communicating their visions to other people and need to learn patience and use concrete examples. Since they are extremely good at concentrating they often have no trouble working alone.

Of course, such a short analyze can not be taken too serious. However, it would be interesting to get feedback from readers: Do you agree this kind of evaluation? is it meaningful? If yes, to which extent?

New York Department of Education provides e-mail adressess

Contributing to better education is very often now more a question of imagination than financial ressources. The New York Department of Education set to give kida and parents e-mail addresses. The objective: parent engagement, keeping in contact, creating communities, avoiding the gap between haves and have-nots.
If one consider the funcitonality of Gmail (and other free E-mail accounts), a lot of problems and information deficiencies can be adresses. It does not need a lot. There is more communication, more problem solving, more involvement. A small solution with a potential big impact, even if considering that the change in daily routines is extremely hard work.

Flat World Knowledge

We had the bestseller "The World is flat: A brief History of the Twenty-first century" from Nobel price winner Thomas L. Friedman. Now we have Flat World Knowledge: webpage where extremely high-quality open educational resources can be produced and disseminated in a way that is sustainable over a long term. It combines free access and publishing on demand, so you might have the best of both worlds.  

First books are already online for free, and there is a catalog and a publishing list. 

Economic efficiency of open content

JISC, a committee, funded by Higher Education bodies to support "to provide world-class leadership in the innovative use of of ICT to support education and research" has evaluated different publishing models, focusing, particularly, on the traditional subsrciption or toll access publishing, which involves reader charges and use restrictions, and an open access self-archiving where academic authors post their work in online repositories, making it free available to all Internet users. 

The outcome comes is that significant savings can be achieved, up to 172 million pound or 3 % from overall publishing activities. 

This is not a surprise and it is already significant. More saving is expected. We are at the beginning of a long way. Penetration of the ICT model makes the old model more and more redundant. 

I have no doubts than strategic decision-making for Kazakhstan on favor of open publishing will have a lot of benefits, even considering, that the outcomes of these decision might be appreciated only in 5 - 10 years. As usually, there is no opposition, but lack of knowledge between decision-makers. 

Competitiveness and VET

The Lisbon Strategy of the European Union aims to make the EU "the most dynamic and competitive knowledge-based economy in the world". It was set out by the European Council in March 2000. 

In 2005, Kazakhstan announced the objective to become one of 50 most competitive economies in the World. 

9 years after setting the Lisbon agenda and 4 years after the declaration of the Kazakh government the prelimary results are disappointing. Europa has lost competitiveness and is, nevertheless, fully involved in the current global financial and economic crisis. Kazakhstan has also lost on a wide range of factors, as a current issue of "Expert Kazakhstan" points out.  Accidentially or not, does this raises question whether official announced policies are able to do the job or whether they get used as covers for second agendas? I do not know. 

One success factor is clear: investment in the work force. Regarding VET, Kazakhstan is moving in the right direction. The sector was starving for ressources and attention since independence. We are now in the beginning of the modernization process. From this point of view, the results are no surprise. Unfortunately.