This thesis explicates how an international literacy testing (ILT) initiative, overseen by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), is put to use to coordinate teaching and learning in adult literacy education programs in Canada, and in Ontario in particular. The testing initiative was conceived to manage and monitor global literacy resources, and promote their development for economic productivity and competitive advantage. Guided by institutional ethnography, the analysis reveals how certain operational and support devices of the testing initiative have been transposed into the context of adult education and training, carrying with them the ideological concerns of the economistic testing project and some of its methodological procedures. Various devices and technologies of the ILT are reformulated as individual assessments for adult learners, and are also incorporated— as is and with extensions— into a national occupational skills framework, a provincial curriculum reform, and a series of policy persuasion projects. Educators, program coordinators and curriculum developers, concerned with the development of literacy that is responsive to learners and their aspirations, recognize the limitations of the curricular frameworks and assessments. They devote inordinate amounts of time and effort reformulating, translating, force-fitting, and supplementing them. At the same time, a narrowly conceived locating information pedagogy—distinct from both academic literacy needed to access formal education systems and a responsive and situated literacy needed to actively participate in social practices—is developed and widely promoted. Policy entrepreneurs have incorporated the devices into their policy persuasion projects, including a project that profiles adults according to their literacy proficiency, their value in the labour market and whether or not they are ‘economically efficient’ to educate. Persuasion tactics are aimed at policy-makers and adult educators in order to convince them to shift educational support away from those who already experience limited access to educational opportunities (adults with secondary education or less) to those closest to reaching what is deemed to be an acceptable literacy level (adults with post-secondary education). Attempts to limit and privilege the purpose of adult education and training, in combination with the development of curricula and assessments that do the same, obstruct and contradict efforts to support equitable literacy learning opportunities for Canadian adults.

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Questa tesi esplora i meccanismi che possono portare una società a cadere in trappole di disuguaglianza. Essa si focalizza sull’istruzione, il capitale umano e la redistribuzione. Il Capitolo 1 studia la recente letteratura sull’istruzione gerarchica, l'ineguaglianza e la mobilità sociale. Il Capitolo 2 propone una analisi positiva delle decisioni di voto maggioritario sulla quantità di risorse assegnate alla pubblica istruzione e la loro allocazione per l'istruzione di base e quella avanzata. L’analisi mostra che l'esito del voto maggioritario sulle aliquote fiscali e tipi di istruzione possono incrementare la disparità di reddito e la scarsa mobilità sociale. Se l'istruzione terziaria non può essere fornita per tutti dal sistema pubblico, e se i bambini provenienti da famiglie benestanti hanno più possibilità di entrare in una università statale, ne consegue che l'equilibrio di voto corrobora una trappola disuguaglianza. Il Capitolo 3 si concentra su una prospettiva normativa. Si dimostra che, diminuendo gli standard economici in materia di istruzione avanzata si aumenta l’equità nell'economia, ma si possono anche ridurre il capitale umano prodotto presso le università e la crescita economica. I migliori risultati economici in termini di equità ed efficienza si ottengono sia dalla fornitura pubblica sia privata dell’istruzione. Il Capitolo 4 analizza come le trappole di disuguaglianza possano emergere a causa dei diversi livelli di capitale umano nella società e di trasmissione intergenerazionale. Si ipotizza che la disuguaglianza nella distribuzione del capitale umano colpisca sia i prezzi dei beni "di partecipazione" sia le preferenze degli agenti. Se ne deduce che, per evitare le trappole di disuguaglianza non è sufficiente investire in istruzione, ma è anche importante compensare gli ingiusti vantaggi. / This thesis explores the mechanisms that can lead society to be caught in inequality traps. It focuses on education, human capital and redistribution. Chapter 1 surveys recent literature on hierarchical education, inequality and social mobility. Chapter 2 proposes a positive analysis of majority voting decisions on the amount of resources assigned to public education and their allocation to basic and advanced education. It shows that the outcome of majority voting on tax rates and types of education can aggravate income inequality and low social mobility. If tertiary education cannot be publicly provided for all, and if children from wealthy families have more chance to enter state university, then voting equilibrium supports an inequality trap. Chapter 3 focuses on a normative perspective. It is shown that decreasing economic standards in advanced education increases equity in the economy, but can also reduce the human capital produced at universities and economic growth. The best economic outcomes in terms of equity and efficiency are obtained by both the public and private provision of education. Chapter 4 analyzes how inequality traps may emerge due to the different levels of human capital in society and intergenerational transmission. We assume that inequality in human capital distribution affects both the prices of the “participation goods” and agents' preferences. We deduce that to avoid inequality traps it is not enough to invest in education, but it is also important to offset unfair advantages.

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Submitted by Guido Couto Penido Guimarães (guido.guimaraes@fgvmail.br) on 2015-05-15T19:21:28Z No. of bitstreams: 1 20150516035825408.pdf: 2427180 bytes, checksum: 7d04b8fe0a5b09cdefb5e1395b3e7dbd (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by BRUNA BARROS (bruna.barros@fgv.br) on 2015-05-20T14:02:22Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 20150516035825408.pdf: 2427180 bytes, checksum: 7d04b8fe0a5b09cdefb5e1395b3e7dbd (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Marcia Bacha (marcia.bacha@fgv.br) on 2015-06-12T20:07:15Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 20150516035825408.pdf: 2427180 bytes, checksum: 7d04b8fe0a5b09cdefb5e1395b3e7dbd (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2015-06-12T20:07:40Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 20150516035825408.pdf: 2427180 bytes, checksum: 7d04b8fe0a5b09cdefb5e1395b3e7dbd (MD5) Previous issue date: 2015-04-13 / In this paper we investiga te the impact of initial wealth anel impatience heterogeneities, as wcll as differential access to financia! markets on povcrty anel inequality, anel cvaluate some mechanisms that could be used to alleviate situations in which these two issues are alarming. To address our qucstion we develop a dynamic stochastic general cquilibrium modo! of educational anel savings choicc with heterogeneous agents, where individuais differ in their initial wealth anel in their discount factor. We find that, in the long run, more patient households tend to be wealthier anel more educated. However, our baseline model is not able to give as much skewness to our income distribution as it is rcquircd. We then propose a novel returns structure based on empírica! observation of heterogeneous returns to different portfolios. This modification solves our previous problem, evidencing the importance of the changes made in explaining the existing levels of inequality. Finally, we introducc two kinds of cash transfers programs- one in which receiving thc benefit is conditional on educating the household's youngster (CCTS) anel one frec of conditionalities (CTS) - in order to evaluate the impact of these programs on the variables of concern1 Wc fine! that both policies have similar qualitativo rcsults. Quantitatively, howcvcr, the CCTS outperforms its unconclitional version in all fielcls analyzecl, revealing itself to be a preferable policy.

For the analysis of changes in educational inequality, several quantitative methods have been developed in educational research. One of them is the school transition model (also known as the Mare model). The school transition model has been criticised on many grounds in recent years. In the following, I introduce the advantages of this model, its analytic conception, its critique and explain why this critique is not such a big problem in empirical analyses as is generally assumed. Finally, I give a summary.:1. Introduction 2. Advantages of the Mare model 3. Statistical conception of the Mare model 4. Critique of the Mare model 5. Summary

This thesis is a report on the study of the educational opportunities, problems, and handicaps which are peculiar to the environment of the Mexican child in Wichita Falls, Texas. The purpose of this study: It is a known a fact that the educational opportunities afforded the Mexican children in Wichita Falls, Texas are inferior to those afforded the white children or Negro children. The reason for this is the unsuccessful attempt to intersperse the Mexican child with the white children after they have completed the third grade. Naturally, because of racial, differences, aptitudes, and inherent characteristics, the Mexican children are at a distinct disadvantage in attempting to compete in an educational manner with their white brother. Much has been done toward curriculum revision and in the study of needed changes in the public school program for the white children, but very little has been done to find the needs or to meet the needs of the Mexican children, although he, too, is an American citizen in most cases and is subject to the same rights, privileges, and educational advantages as the white children.

This study is made to determine the educational inequalities that exist in the schools of Wheeler County and to set up a plan that will help to equalize the educational opportunities for all the children in the county, on a basis well within its financial ability. The study consists of three phases of the problem of equalizing educational opportunities in the schools of Wheeler County. The first will consist of a study of the educational conditions of the schools, based upon the general population trends, scholastic trends, the per pupil load of each elementary classroom, the subject-pupil load of each high school teacher, and the qualification of the teachers according to college work. The second will consist of a financial survey of the schools based upon assessed valuations, tax rates, cost per scholastic, and outstanding bonded indebtedness. The third will be the formulating of a plan for the equalization of educational opportunities based upon the findings of the educational and financial surveys.

The purpose of this study is to determine the status of the educational opportunities of the white and the colored child in the State of Texas during the year of 1935-36 and to locate the inequalities with reference to: building equipment, transportation, library facilities, teachers, average daily attendance of pupils, teacher-pupil ratio, per pupil cost of instruction, age-grade distribution, and age of pupils when graduated. The study found the following conclusions: The building value per pupil enrolled in the white schools was over three times as much as the building value per pupil enrolled in the colored schools. Nearly twice as much was spent to transport a white child to school as was spent to transport a colored child to school. The libraries in the white schools had five times as many volumes per pupil enrolled as did the libraries in the colored schools. The value of libraries, per pupil enrolled, was about five times as much in the white schools as in the colored schools, along with several more.

A History of Unequal Opportunity in the U.S. Segregation of Latino School Children Half a century has passed since the U.S. Supreme Court famously stated that separate educational facilities are inherently unequal. After all this time, separate facilities are still the reality and they are still unequal. This thesis examines the educational experience of Latino children in the United States from the twentieth century up to the present, with the main focus on the area of the American Southwest. The history of Latino school segregation is examined from the legal perspective, focusing on the significant court cases in which Latinos fought against segregation and for equal educational opportunities. A special attention is paid to Mendez v. Westminster federal court case, which has ended de jure segregation of Latinos after the World War II. While the topic of school segregation in relation to Latinos is often overlooked by professional literature and little known to the public, it is very important as Latinos represent one fourth of all public school children in the United States today. This paper concludes that, because of school segregation, the educational history of Latinos in the United States is one of unequal opportunity. Moreover, the educational opportunities of Latino children remain...