Research Funding in the U.S.: Implications for Teacher Education Research

Overview & Synopsis

Discussions about appropriate methods for education research have escalated in the wake of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act of 2001 and related changes to federal policies for educational research and its funding. This legislation highlights the importance of "scientifically-based research" and in particular foregrounds the use of randomized controlled trials in which educational treatments are tested by comparing an experimental group that received a particular treatment to a control group that did not. It is argued that this approach lessens the potential for researcher bias and allows findings to be generalized more readily. The U.S. Department of Education's research arm, the Institute of Education Sciences (IES), supports projects that employ randomized-trial designs, while the What Works Clearinghouse provides an online database of research findings that the Department of Education has decided meet their guidelines for methodological rigor. This article examines this context and explores implications for education research in universities, particularly teacher education research. An examination of teacher education research--its histories and contexts, the teacher education enterprise, the purposes for which the findings of teacher education research are used, how the research is valued, and who is making the judgment--provides a basis for considering the future of teacher education research and how teacher educators might respond to critics of teacher education and teacher education research.