The Impact of Science and Mathematics Education on National Economic Development: Cross-National and Longitudinal Analyses

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9254958 Meyer The central issue of this proposed research is to try to measure change in Gross National (or Domestic) Product in a number of "developed" nations in the post-World-War-III period in relation to changes in emphasis in national education systems with regard to science and mathematics. The nature of change on the independent variable side -- SEM education -- is largely at the level and "density" of the intended curriculum: i.e., alterations in the number of science and math courses and specifics content coverage (e.g., related to technology or new fields of science). Measures of pedagogy, broad attitude toward school science, nature of testing, and other possible significant changes are not involved. The methodology involved consists, on the independent variable side, of close analysis of educational documents and policies (course descriptions, curriculum frameworks, teaching materials, and the like) nation by nation, together with scaling or clustering of this material. On the dependent variable side, the measures are largely those of macroeconomic estimates of GNP growth over particular periods of time, using a kind of segmented or interrupted time series approach,, which amounts to a sort of pseudo-panel approach. That is, relatively brief periods of half a decade or a decade are looked at over the entire span of 30 or more years, with each nation's data forming its own series but with comparisons possible across nations during particular periods.