中大下载的英文名著THE PUBLIC INTERESTWord格式文档下载.docx

1、exclusively on ideological and personal beliefs, the public integrity ofdemocratic institutions can easily be lost. The educated publicvoters andtaxpayers who ponder the future of education and societyshould alsoponder whether public policies are being based on unsubstantiatedrationales. Policy deve

2、lopment should be informed by research thatexamines whether the policy pathways chosen by public officials haveeffects consistent with the public goals and the claims made by politicalinterest groups. To assess the impact of changes in public policies oneducation and public finance on preparation fo

3、r college, access to college,and success in college, it is necessary to start with an objective framework,one that represents the public interest in education.This book focuses on the integrity of policy research with respect to thepositions taken in relation to the research findings. In the U.S., p

4、olicymakers are critical of the quality of schools. I am concerned with research onthe correlates of test scorese.g., math courses in high school or readinginstruction approaches in elementary schoolsthat has been used torationalize policy. The previous chapter discussed research used by state andfe

5、deral policy makers to criticize colleges for their inefficiencies when pricesrise but seldom to acknowledge the ways policies influence prices to rise. Acounterview is that prices rise largely as a consequence of policy （Heller,evident that government policy did have a substantial influence in publ

6、iccolleges （i.e., colleges were compensating for the loss of government needbasedgrants and state subsidies）, but it was also evident that educationexpenditures have risen in public and private college in the U.S. （St. John,2006）. When competing explanations for rising prices were examined, it was26

7、 Chapter 22003）. My argument is that policy researchers have an obligation to considerthe multiple vantage points on critical issues. The easy path is to useresearch to argue a particular position or point of view, but integrity requiresunderstanding competing arguments and constructing research to

8、test them.Integrity in educational policy research requires balanced approaches thattest competing arguments about educational outcomes and that evaluate theeffects of policies based on research-informed rationales. Findingtheoretically sound designs to examine competing arguments is crucial topolic

9、y researchers and an integral aspect of integrity in research. Thisrequires stepping beyond ones own position on policy to consider it alongwith others in analyses and interpretations of research. Research of this typecould lead to arguments that favor one policy position over another or topolicy ar

10、guments that balance aspects of multiple rationales. For example, inresearch on college access there is little reason to doubt that preparation,information, and finances are all important, so it is reasonable to expectpolicy rationales to balance these elements.The concept of integrity in public pol

11、icy making implies using researchin balanced ways to craft and refine policies to achieve outcomes related togenerally accepted goals. While this sounds simple, most policy argumentsabout education lack this type of integrity, a point emphasized in the priorchapter. As a university-based policy rese

12、archer, I am not directly engagedin the formation of policy. Instead, I hope my efforts to conduct balancedpolicy research can be informative for people who are engaged in policymaking. However, to maintain my integrity as a researcher I try to use thebest available data and methods in research that

13、 assesses competingrationales.This chapter starts with a brief summary of the framework used in thisstudya way of viewing policy on access developed in Refinancing theCollege Dream （St. John, 2003）. This framework provides a way ofexamining competing arguments about preparation, college transitions,

14、 andpublic finance. Then, I reexamine John Rawlss theory of justice, whichprovides the core assumptions for the framework. Next, I reexamine theideological arguments and competing economic and educational rationalesfor reform. Then, I introduce the balanced access model as a means ofassessing ration

15、ales for education reform, an issue that has become a focusof my more recent research on education policy （St. John, 2004）. Finally, Idiscuss my approach to measuring the effects of policy in relation togenerally accepted statistical methods.2. The Public Interest 271. FRAMING THIS STUDYEducation and public finance policies have become imbalanced as aconsequence of the over