OECD World Forum on Measuring and Fostering the Progress of Societies - Istanbul 27-30 June 2007
Day 3: Friday 29 June 2007 [Afternoon] Parallel sessions
Human Capital: the Largest Share of a Nation's Wealth
Topkapi A
A Variety of Flavors of Human Capital:
Incorporating Humanities and International Exposure into Education
by
Ali DOGRAMACI
Bilkent University
OECD World Forum on Measuring and Fostering the
Progress of Societies Istanbul 27-30 June ’07
• Focus: How can societies better measure their progress or
setbacks?
The question lies at the heart of a long-term OECD project to
explore how the effective use of information can benefit
democracy, empower individual citizens and stimulate a global
debate on what progress means.
• The Istanbul 2007 Forum will aim to improve the development
and dissemination of social, economic and environmental
indicators.….
Title of our session:
Human Capital: the Largest Share of a Nation's
Wealth
To explore what evidence societies need in order to optimise
their investment in - and the return from - their human capital
Human Capital1: The knowledge , skills,
competencies and attributes embodied in
individuals that facilitate the creation of
personal, social and economic well-being.
1T.
Healy, S. Cote, et al. The Well-Being of Nations: The role of human
and social capital, Centre for Educational Research and Innovation,
OECD (2001), p. 18.
Brian Keeley, Human Capital, OECD (2007), p.29.
Whether in the Balkans, or Caucasus
or in the Middle East, or elsewhere;
Educational platforms designed to
improve mutual understanding,
may also enhance the constructive
potential of human capital.
We may train engineers with excellent
technical expertise.
We may train school teachers who know
how to motivate their students and teach
them well in math, science & composition.
These are some of the necessary
components of the Human Capital.
On the other hand, a sufficient bundle
ought to also have certain humane
components providing a potential for fostering
tolerance and understanding across cultures.
Broad-brush indicators of education such as number high school
or university graduates in the country, number of attendees in
professional training programs, or number graduates of specific
disciplines etc. are necessary.
But it also helps to complement such aggregate data
with focused data such as PISA and IALS results.
My talk here is even more limited: Using a single
institution, raw data will be presented in the hope of
instigating efforts to develop some new measures.
In education,how can we attempt to measure the
quantity and quality of inputs, for the development
of a more humane human capital?
Example #1 : Characteristics of required humanity courses
for engineers:
Some measures to consider: Topics covered?
Who teaches them? Class size, contact hours/week?..
Relevance:
Each year in Turkey, more than 1.5 million students
take the state entrance test for universities.
Among them, consider the highest scoring top 100
students. Each year at least 25 of them choose
Bilkent’s Electrical Engineering department. After they
graduate many members of this crème de la crème
group will be leaders in the society, whether in
academia, industry, or government. They will be
involved in matters far more than just engineering.
Electrical and Electronics Engineering Dept.
SECOND YEAR Curriculum
Autumn Semester
MATH 225
Linear Algebra and Differential Equations
EEE 211
Analog Electronics
HUM 111
Cultures Civilizations and Ideas I
TURK 101
Turkish I
Technical Electives (2)
Spring Semester
MATH 206
Complex Calculus and Transform Techniques
EEE 202
Circuit Theory
EEE 212
Microprocessors
HUM 112
Cultures Civilizations and Ideas II
TURK 102
Turkish II
Technical Elective (1)
Class sizes in HUM 111 &HUM 112:
15 to 22 students.
HUM 111 & HUM 112
Main textbooks:
Gilgamesh: A New English Edition , Mitchell(tr.), Free Press, 2006
Sigmund Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents, Strachey (tr.),
Norton, 1961
Homer, the Iliad, Fagles (tr.), Penguin, 1990
Sophocles: Theban Plays, Watling (tr.), Penguin, 1974
Plato, Republic, Grube (tr.), Hackett, 1992
Machiavelli The Prince (Penguin);
Shakespeare, Tempest (Pelican) or Macbeth ( Oxford) or Hamlet
(Oxford);
Descartes, Discourse on Method and Meditations on First
Philosophy (Everyman);
Woolf, A Room Of One’s Own (Harcourt);
Nietzsche, On The Genealogy of Morals. (Vintage).
Faculty Members Teaching HUM 111 and HUM 112
David de Kanter Arndt. B.A. Yale Univ.; Ph.D. in Comparative Literature, U California.
Louise Barry. BA (hons) Trinity College Dublin; DEA, Univ. of Lille III, France; PhD, French Literature, Emory
Univ
Gabriel Noah Brahm Jr. BA in English from UCLA; Teaching Certificate in Rhetoric from San Francisco State
Univ.; MA in American Literature; PhD in Literature and Cultural Studies, U California
Duncan Chesney. B.A. Columbia Univ; M.Phil. Cambridge Univ; Ph.D., Yale.
Julie Chung In Park. B.A.; Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the U California.
Costantino Costantini. Ph.D. Emory Univ. Undergrad degree from Univ. Bari.
Daren Ivan Hodson. Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the Univ of Utah.
Thomas Kelso. B.A in Italian and Anthropology Univ Virgina. M.A.; Univ. Texas; Ph.D. Univ. of Pennsylvania, in
Comparative Literature.
Martina Kolb. Ph.D. & M.Phil. in Comparative Literature Yale Univ; M.A. Univ. of Oregon, also a graduate
degree in Philology and an undergraduate degree, Tübingen Univ.
Dr. Mustafa S. Nakeeb, B.A. Northwestern Univ, Ph.D. in Philosophy, State Univ of New York
Andrea Rehberg BA (Hons) in Humanities from the Univ of North London; MA in Continental Philosophy Univ.
of Essex; PhD in Philosophy from the Univ of Warwick.
Example #2: History Departments with wider horizons
Diversity of faculty backgrounds;
Recognition from scholars of neighboring countries;
Publications in internationally leading publishing houses &
scholarly journals.
Faculty members of Bilkent’s History Department include:
Turkey
Bulgaria
Greece
Britain
USA
M. Kalpakli E. Radushev E. Kermeli C. Leighton T. Roberts
O. Ozel
A. Thornton E.P. Cohn
O. Ergenc
D. Thornton
A. Simin
P. Latimer
G. Buken
Iran
K. Emiroglu
A. Miandji
H. Inalcik (Prof Inalcik is recipient of honorary doctorates
from U. Bucharest, U. Sofia, Athens Univ., Hebrew Univ
of Jerusalem, Ankara University, and more…
Sample Publications:
Inalcik, Halil and D. Quatert. An Economic And Social History of
the Ottoman Empire. Cambridge University Press. 1994
M. Kalpakli and W.G. Andrews, The Age of Beloveds: Love and
The Beloved in Early Modern Ottoman Turkish and European
Literature, Culture, and Society, Duke University Press, 2005.
E. Kermeli, “The Confiscation and Repossession of Monastic
Properties in Mount Athos and Patmos Monasteries, 1568-1570,”
Bulgarian Historical Review vol. 3, p. 39-53 (2000).
P. Latimer, "Estate Management and Inflation: The Honour of
Gloucester, 1183—1263," Albion, 34:2 (2002), 187-212.
E. P. Kohn, This Kindred People: Canadian-American Relations
and the Anglo-Saxon Idea, 1895-1903, McGill-Queen’s
University Press, 2004.
Example #3: Training School teachers
Need general measures on:
Qualifications of faculty: Their teaching experience, diversity of
faculty member backgrounds;
How does the program incorporate student interface with other
cultures, countries, or international programs?
Teacher training programs of Bilkent University
Purpose: To train a new generation of teachers with wide
perspectives
Steps:
1) Established a model PreK-12 school accredited by ECIS &
NEACS; IGCSE & International Baccalaureate
2) Established a novel two year Masters Program for teacher
training. Used intl faculty with teaching expr in good schools
3) Establishing IGCSE & IB Schools in disadvantaged regions
Faculty Members for Step 2
H. NECMİ AKŞİT, Ph.D., Educational Sciences, Middle East Technical University, 1998. Teaching English as
a foreign language, curriculum development, instructional design, assessment and evaluation.
ARMAĞAN ATEŞKAN, M.A., Biology Teacher Education, Bilkent University, 2002. Science and biology
education, environmental issues, curriculum development.
CYNTHIA CRIPPIN, B.A., Math and Education, California State University, 1976. Computer s and
calculations in mathematic education, teacher training, mentoring and partnership
GARY CRIPPIN, B.A. Dartmouth, Ph.D.,History, UCLA 1975, Experience includes Directorship of Intl Schools
in Europe, Asia & South America (14 years), Teacher/Director of Studies- The Buckley School, Sherman Oaks,
CA, USA: (6 years)
LIVINGSTON T. MERCHANT, Ph.D., International Relations, Harvard University, 1969. Ph.D., Asian History,
Brown University, 1983. Curriculum studies, social studies education, teacher education, professional
development, school partnerships, technology in the curriculum, special education.
RASİM ÖZYÜREK, Ph.D., Turkish Language Teaching, Baku State University, 1998. Turkish language
teaching methods.
MARGARET SANDS, Ph.D., Science Education, Nottingham University, 1983. Science education, teacher
training, school partnerships, examination and assessment, curriculum development and evaluation, project
management, quality assurance and standards.
ENGİN SEZER, Ph.D., Linguistics, Harvard University, 1991. Turkish and Turkic linguistics, old Turkish
literature.
ERIC WILLIAMS, Senior Lecturer. Ph.D., University of Illinois, 1996. Curriculum and assessment, quality
assurance and evaluation, e-learning.
Instructional method of Step 2 includes:
Students spend one or more days a week in partner schools
(including the model school), gaining practical experience of upto-date approaches to teaching
International approach to teacher education: All students spend
two months in US schools, working alongside American
teachers in their classrooms. The US visit is made possible by
the generous support of the Fulbright Program of USA.
=====================
Step 3
Establishing IGCSE-IB schools in Eastern Anatolia: More than
75% of students on full Bilkent Scholarship.
Teachers in these schools encouraged to enroll in Bilkent’s parttime Doctoral Program in Education. In 6 years when they get
their Ph.D.s some will join faculties of education and serve as a
new breed of professors with good teaching experience
Student Exchange programs: Especially Erasmus of EU
Need to focus on pre-university: Erzurum; later pre-school
Intl accreditation: AACSB, ABET, ECIS, NEACS
Intl Curricula, standards: IB; IGCSE, syllabi & External exams
Need both ways.
If one country does it, while the other does not: Not so good!
Until now: Input based measures;
Also need Output Based measures
Conclusion
In usual aggregate national statistics, existence of
couple of pioneering education programs will be hard
to observe. But, it would help to know their presence.
Why not also keep statistics to track
different flavors of human capital formation?
Number of universities providing “a specified level” of
humanities for engineering students;
Number of History Departments with specified levels
of internationalization;
Number of universities offering teacher training
programs with specific attributes; …
….. etc.