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Research Project Summary

Can a one-week workshop help teachers in the former Soviet Union prepare their students for the transition to a market economy? Yes, based on an international research project conducted by the Council for Economic Education last year in Lithuania, Latvia, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, and Poland.

In the study, which was part of the International Education Exchange Program, high school students of teachers taking part in the Council for Economic Education teacher training programs consistently demonstrated higher levels of economic understanding than did students of teachers who did not participate in the Council for Economic Education’s workshops. Data were collected from over 3,000 students and 114 teachers over a five-month period in 1996-97.

Reinforcing research conducted in the U.S., training combined with instructional materials was found to have a greater impact on student economic understanding than either training alone (without materials) or the materials alone (without training). In other words, the Council for Economic Education training was most valuable when combined with frequent use of the Council for Economic Education instructional materials.

The study also examined attitudes toward a market economy among students in the five countries. Student attitudes grew increasingly positive when trained teachers used the Council for Economic Education materials often with their students. Due to time constraints, the reliability of the instrument used, and the fact that attitudinal changes generally lag behind gains in knowledge, the attitude findings were less conclusive than the results on student understanding.

This research study was conducted for the Council for Economic Education by the National Center for Research in Economic Education, in cooperation with Education Development Center, Inc. The International Education Exchange Program is funded by the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Educational Research and Improvement.