Annual Report 2007, Ghent
The network had two sessions during ECER in Ghent: a paper session and a workshop.
The paper session dealt with various developments in educational research policy as well as in technological innovations.
There are a few institutions in the world which are able to review the research done in a certain subject and which can tell us what really works, i. e. which research is relevant and which is not. These centres are getting more and more important for educational policy makers mainly in the English speaking part of the world. But it is only a question of time when this evidence-based policy will also be appreciated in other European countries.
More and more, the Internet and especially the so called Web 2.0 bring us many new features and tools to handle the flood of information and to communicate with each other. Keywords are here: Blogs, Wiki, Podcasting, Social Software, etc. Some of these developments could also be useful for the community of educational researchers and for information specialists.
The workshop held in Ghent was entitled "The Provision of Information about Educational Research in Selected European Countries: an Annual Review". Recent developments in this subject in Germany, Italy, in the UK as well as in Austria were shown and discussed.
During ECER in Ghent the Network 12 had its annual meeting, which is by the way open to everyone interested. We discussed the very rough outlines of a new project which could succeed our PERINE project which is unfortunately no longer funded by the EC. A common project could help the Network to be more stable and to attract new members.