This August, we held an invited symposium of WERA and the German Educational Research Association at the WERA Focal Meeting in Tokyo, Japan, about Quality in Extended Education: Quality Concepts, Approaches to Measurement and Continuous Quality Improvement.

The symposium was organized by our chairs, Gil Noam and Marianne Schüpbach. The participants, all members of our network, presented this topic from international perspectives, including Japan, Switzerland, the US, Germany and South Korea.

In the symposium, Prof. Fuyuko Kanefuji, Bunkyo University, Japan, presented a paper on the concepts of quality for afterschool programs in Japan. Marianne Schüpbach presented a contribution on socio-emotional development and school achievement in all-day schools in Switzerland of hers and Benjamin von Allmen M.Sc., Lukas Frei M.Sc. and Dr. Wim Nieuwenboom, Freie Universität Berlin, Germany. The third paper, “Improving STEM Quality and Learning,” by Prof. Gil Noam and Dr. Patricia Allen focused on developing systems and state afterschool networks across the United States and was presented by Prof. Gil Noam.

The papers were examined and discussed by Prof. Ludwig Stecher, University of Giessen, Germany, and Prof. Sang Hoon Bae, Sungkyunkwan University, South Korea.

We were glad to have had a very enriching discussion with our audience!

The WERA 2019 Focal Meeting consisted of a program of paper and symposia sessions on topics of worldwide scope. In general, the WERA Focal Meeting seeks to feature research that includes more than one country or is comparative, cross-cultural, international, or transnational in conceptualization, scope, or design.

Read more about the WERA Focal Meeting here.