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Using Evidence-Based Practice to Improve Education in Underdeveloped Regions: Four Empirical Studies from One Longitudinal Project in China

Thu, March 14, 3:15 to 4:45pm, Hyatt Regency Miami, Floor: Third Level, Stanford

Group Submission Type: Formal Panel Session

Proposal

1. Objective
The proposed panel session aims to share the empirical results of and critical reflection on a pioneering longitudinal research project on using evidence-based practice (EBP) to advance educational improvement in an underdeveloped region in China. Using the project as a case, this session will catalyze a comparative and international dialogue on the experiences, challenges, and future of using EBP to improve education in challenging contexts.

2. Background
Education is a pivotal public good that matters to students’ schooling experiences, developmental outcomes, and long-term social well-being (Jamison et al., 2007). However, students in underdeveloped regions, including geographically remote, economically poor, and socio-culturally marginalized regions, generally receive much less adequate and lower-quality education (Hadjar & Gross, 2016). Many countries have taken various measures to address this problem, such as providing financial support, strengthening the educator workforce, and bettering institutional circumstances (e.g., Chudgar et al., 2014; Goodman & Turner, 2010). While some of these measures have proved effective, many others seem not. One reason is the lack of using high-quality research evidence to inform educational practice and reform (Liao et al., 2023; Zhu & Zhu, 2020).

Evidence-based practice (EBP), defined as “both an ideology, of incorporating the best available research evidence into clinical practice, and a process of making informed clinical decisions” (Yates, 2012, p. 1), has emphasized the use of high-quality research evidence in professional practices. Since it originated in medicine in the late 1980s, EBP has been adopted worldwide in a range of professional fields, such as clinical psychology (APA, 2006), social work (McNeece & Thyer, 2004), public administration (Jennings & Hall, 2012), and education (Slavin, 2002). EBP has helped improve the transparency, rigorousness, scientificity, and quality of professional practices in many fields and enhanced their overall professional and social status (e.g., Dekker & Meeter, 2022; Slavin, 2020).

Only recently has the idea of EBP been introduced to the Chinese education system (e.g., Zhu & Zhu, 2020). How do Chinese educational professionals perceive and engage with EBP to improve education? A research team from National Normal University (pseudonym) – a leading teacher education institution in China ­– has been conducting a five-year longitudinal research project (2021-2025) to explore contextually compatible and practically effective strategies for using EBP to improve education in one underdeveloped region of China. The proposed panel session brings the latest empirical research results from this project.

3. The Studies
In particular, the proposed session includes four empirical studies from the abovementioned project. A U-P-G-S partnership among four parties supports the project: National Normal University, Democratic Progressive Party, People’s Government of County Jin in Guizhou Province, and three Experimental Schools in County Jin (all names are pseudonyms). The project’s overarching goal is to enhance the quality of education in the county through systematic evidence-based interventions over a five-year period (2021-2025). County Jin resides in a distant, mountainous, and ethnic-minority-populated region in Guizhou, China. The primary and secondary education quality there has been consistently underperforming compared to adjacent regions. To tackle this problem, the local government initiated this project with a partnership with Democratic Progressive Party and National Normal University.

The authors of the four studies are core research team members of the project. The team used EBP as the guiding theory and systematically capitalized on high-quality research evidence to inform their practice in the project. These included crafting evidence-based interventions, improving educators’ research literacy, and cultivating inquiry-boosting institutional circumstances. To date, the project has been implemented for three years. Based on the research data and the internal and external evaluations, the interventions have produced significantly positive outcomes – students’ performance on standardized tests has improved, teachers’ motivations for and engagement with teaching and research have increased, and the schools’ overall reputation and attractiveness to local residents have grown.

To explore why and how these EBP-informed interventions have worked (or not), the research team has conducted four empirical studies to examine the use of EBP in four crucial domains of schooling, including student development, classroom teaching, teacher education, and institutional infrastructure and culture. The 90-minute session is structured as follows:

Part 1: Project Background and Overview (5 mins)
Part 2: Paper Presentations (60 mins; 15 mins each)
 Study #1: Student Development
Enhancing Students’ Holistic Development Through Evidence-Based Educational Interventions
 Study #2: Classroom Teaching
Integrating Teaching and Research Through Evidence-Based Practice
 Study #3: Teacher Education
University-Based and Non-University-Based Teacher Educators Learning Together Through Collaborative Action Research
 Study #4: Institutional Infrastructure and Culture
Improving Compulsory Education in Under-developed Regions Through Systemic Teaching Research Reform
Part 3: Response from an Invited Discussant (from New York University) (15 mins)
Part 4: Q&A (10 mins)

4. Scholarly Contributions
This panel session makes three scholarly contributions to the CIES community. First, the session enriches the ongoing international discussions on the interplays of research, practice, and reform with the most recent empirical evidence from the Chinese context (e.g., Lenhoff et al., 2022; Slavin, 2020). The four studies empirically testified the effectiveness of using EBP to enhance educational quality in underdeveloped regions, which suggests practical implications for EBP in education in other settings.

Second, the four studies from the same longitudinal project have formed a Chinese model that emphasizes multi-lateral partnerships among relevant parties (e.g., the U-P-G-S partnership) in addressing chronic educational problems (e.g., Zhou, 2014). The Chinese education system has benefited much from international experiences over the past few decades. In return, we hope this Chinese model can provide a conceptual or practical reference for educational reform and improvement in other settings.

Third, this session raises several thorny questions about EBP and educational improvement worth digging deeper into: How much weight should evidence take up in EBP-informed interventions? How can different stakeholders work more equally and collaboratively? How can socio-culturally responsive EBP approaches be constructed to advance educational improvement (Biesta, 2020; Lenhoff et al., 2022)? We hope to work alongside scholars from different countries at CIES 2024 to exchange ideas about these and other emerging questions and strengthen the knowledge base about EBP and educational improvement in underdeveloped contexts around the world.

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Chair

Individual Presentations

Discussant