1. Innovation in Education: CEP research Sandra McNally

2. Inside the ‘black box’ Role of ICT Teaching practices Management and organisational survey Importance of governance

3. Literature on the Role of ICT Several educational studies showing a positive link between computer use and exam achievement Positive relationship may be driven by factors other than computer use (or software), i.e. other inputs important for educational performance. Many studies that deal with endogeneity problem in some way find no evidence of a positive relationship Possibly computers are replacing more effective teaching methods.

4. Our research (Machin, McNally, Silva) Does a change in information communication technology (ICT) investment in schools have any impact on changes in educational outcomes in English schools? Quasi-experimental setting: change in the rules governing ICT investment in different regions of England. This change produced ‘winners’ and ‘losers’ in terms of ICT investment. Our approach identifies whether this had an effect on educational outcomes (find positive effect in primary schools)

6. Evaluation of teaching strategies: “the Literacy Hour”; “the Numeracy Hour” (Machin and McNally) Highly structured hour of literacy teaching introduced to some schools through National Literacy Project in in 400 schools in England in September 1996 and September 1997. Constituted a discrete, well-defined and systematic change in how literacy is taught within primary schools (and where teaching standards were perceived to be low before).

8. Management and Organisational Survey (John Van Reenen, Rafaella Sadun and colleagues) Survey that collects information on 3 key areas: -Monitoring. What information is collected? How is it being used? -Targets. Do schools have them and how do they use them? -Incentives. Do teachers get rewarded for good performance?

9. Governance Survey (for the future…) Steve Gibbons, Steve Machin, Olmo Silva In the UK, the governing body has a key role in making decisions. Aim is to find out how features of the governing body relate to how the school performance. Issues are: -Composition. How are governors chosen? -Involvement. What does this consist of? -Incentives. What role does the governing body have here in relation to teacher and head-teachers?