I’m waiting for my flight to Stavanger here in the beautiful and extremely expensive Oslo airport (Bottle of water: $3.17, Strawberry Yoghurt $2.70, Small Cheese and Ham Roll $7.77, etc.) and reading today’s Dagbladet (I think it is usually considered a somewhat leftist Labor party supporting and populist paper). In a series of articles entitled “Norwegian Schools in Crisis” there was one piece listing the results so far from a series of studies on Norwegian education and comparisons with several other European countries and the US. Below are a few of the conclusions so far according to two professors Anne Welle-Strand and Arild Tjeldvoll:
–Too many bad teachers Apparently there a lot of under-qualified and not sufficiently trained teachers in Norway, including some recruited straight out of secondary school (C: can this be true? Am I not understanding this correctly: “I flere år er det blitt rekruttert svake kandidater fra videregående skole.”)
–Not enough specialization While teachers in other countries focus on one topic or one grade level, Norwegian teachers often follow their class from one year to the next. This has resulted in many Norwegian primary school teachers lacking in specialized knowledge. C: I remember this when I spend a brief time in Norwegian elementary school (Sunde Skole). I have often wondered what the pros and cons of this system must be.
–Strong opposition to evaluations and student testing The researches sees this as the biggest problem with trying to raise quality. C: I agree to a point that this can be a problem but I would want to guard against the opposite problem which arises in places which go way too far in trying to quantify progress and knowledge with elaborate testing and evaluation schemes.
–An ‘Anti-Knowledge View” («anti-kunnskaps-syn») These researchers claim that over-emphasis on the socialization aspects of education has gotten in the way of knowledge and hurt Norwegian’s ability to compete internationally.
-The results of a study of OECD countries. last year showed that only 47% of Norwegians surveyed believed that “education was important.” which was 20% below the average responses in other countries.