Education
In 2008, FrameWorks began a multi-year investigation of American thinking about education in general and education reform in specific. Funded by the Nellie Mae Education Foundation and the Lumina Foundation for Education, the goal of this project is to document patterns in public thinking about all levels of the American education system, and to explore the challenges and opportunities that confront those who would reshape the public conversation to support comprehensive reform.
Funders | Recommendations | Research | Related Reports | Products & Tools
Our Funders
Support for FrameWorks' research and message development on Education was provided by the Nellie Mae Education Foundation and the Lumina Foundation for Education. Additional reports from other funders may be posted as they apply to this investigation.
Our Recommendations
**New** The Proper Attitude: Challenges in Framing Higher Education Reform -- A FrameWorks MessageMemo (2010). Can higher education be integrated into an education reform agenda and, if so, what is the best way to do this in order to advance not only higher education policies but also to continue to advance an overall reform agenda? This MessageMemo provides a secondary analysis of FrameWorks’ research on education from the perspective of higher education and presents new quantitative findings and recommendations to answer these questions.
**New** Framing Education Reform: A FrameWorks MessageMemo (2010). This is one of two summary analyses pulling together several years of FrameWorks’ qualitative and quantitative research on how Americans think about the education system in general and education reform in specific. Includes recommendations for using values and simplifying models to frame a wide array of policies from pre-K to higher education.
Our Research
**New** College Bound: The Effects of Values Frames on Attitudes toward Higher Education Reform (2010). This study expands upon a previous survey that examined the impact of values frames in support for progressive education reform. Here, six more detailed values frames were tested to assess their ability to move support for educational reforms, particualrly with regard to higher education.
**New** Preparing America for the 21st Century: Values that Work in Promoting Education Reform Efforts (2010). This report details the results of an experimental survey of more than 1,800 registered voters and explores the extent to which alternative values elevate public support for a wide range of education reforms. The report demonstrates the power of using the value of Future Preparation in communications about education reform, examines the performance of this value across several different types of cognitive tests, and provides guidance to advocates about the wisdom of combining messaging across different levels of the educational system. Our results on the latter suggest that advocates should be careful about combining communications about preschool with those related to education at the K-12 and higher education levels.
**New** Orchestrating Systems and Remodeling Reform: Reframing Education Reform with Simplifying Models (2010)
The research described in this report identifies two simplifying models that, through a multi-method empirical testing and refinement process, have proven effective in extending and shifting patterns of thinking about education reform.
Reform What? Individualist Thinking in Education: American Cultural Models on Schooling (2008) Cognitive interviews conducted by FrameWorks show that involved citizens overwhelmingly think about education at the individual level and have difficulty thinking about schooling and learning as a public good that requires societal investment. This report, based on 49 in-depth interviews, offers a preliminary map of the most relevant cultural models that guide Americans’ thinking about education.
Enough Blame To Go Around: Understanding the Public Discourse on Education Reform (2009) This report shares the results of 18 focus groups conducted in 7 cities with diverse groups of politically engaged people around the United States. This research shows that Americans generally understand the education system as “failing” but lack an organized understanding of the way the system functions or how it may be improved. A key impediment to education reform is the lack of agency that is evident in these discussions.
Put Your Pencils Down Please: Media Coverage of Education Reform 2007-2008 (2009)This study was designed to gain an understanding of how major and select local media cover the ongoing debates over education reform. Relevant stories about reforms aimed at the pre-K through high school years from June 1, 2007, through July 31, 2008 were examined. Researchers found that education reform is typically covered as a local issue where the goal of improved student achievement is juxtaposed against the chronic resource constraints of local school systems.
Don't Give Up On Education!: A Cognitive Analysis of the Media Coverage of Education Reform 2007-2008 (2009) In this second media analysis, FrameWorks researchers analyze how dominant frames in the news coverage of education reform impact public understanding of this issue. Issues in media depictions of education and education reform are examined and suggestions for future framing strategies are suggested.
*NEW* “Her Daughter Was One of Them”: How Personal Narratives Attach to Public Issues in Mississippi News Coverage (2010). This report examines 12 months of newspaper reporting in Mississippi, from January 2009 through January 2010, on five general subject areas: race and racism, education, health and health care, child development, and children’s health and well-being. The majority of coverage across issue areas tended towards individual explanations and solutions to what are fundamentally social and structural problems. The state of coverage of these issues is an important opportunity for advocates and experts in these issue areas to move coverage in more thematic or contextualized directions.
Related Reports
Invisible Structures of Opportunity: How Media Depictions of Race Trivialize Issues of Diversity and Disparity (2009) This analysis was supported by the W. K. Kellogg Foundation to examine the various ways in which race is presented to readers, directly and indirectly, in the nation’s news media. More specifically, it analyzes media coverage of race over the course of one year in four issue areas: health, education, early child development and employment. The report lays out the dominant frames that are applied to race in these areas and demonstrates how these frames constrain public solutions.
Products & Tools
Reform What? American Public Opinions on Education, is a video presentation of the findings from 49 in-depth cognitive interviews, conducted on seven states. The purpose of this work was to identify the common assumptions that Americans have about what education is and how it works. Excerpts from real interviews are included and recommendations for improved communications strategies are provided.
*NEW* The Education Trigger Video is an overview of the simplifying models, or explanatory metaphors, developed and tested to help the public better understand the American education system and how to reform it.
*NEW* The Higher Education Trigger Video is an overview of the simplifying models and values developed and tested to help the public better understand the American higher education system and how to reform it. As you'll see, the higher education system presented its own unique set of reframing challenges.
Education Reform Toolkit - A toolkit containing Talking Points, Frequently Asked Questions, Sample Op-Eds and Letters to the Editor and other tools for communicating about education and education reform. Also includes a video presentation of initial findings from our research, and two briefs that elaborate on core findings related to The Achievement Gap and 21st Century Skills.
Education Nation - This highly visual E-Workshop will take you through the research findings on Education and test your framing IQ in a series of interactive exercises.
