Nordtveit, Bjorn

Job Title

Associate Professor, Department of Educational Policy, Research and Administration, College of Education

Last Name

Nordtveit

First Name

Bjorn

Discipline

Educational Assessment, Evaluation, and Research

Introduction

I’m very pleased to take up the position as an Associate Professor at the Center for International Education at UMass. As my name suggests, I’m originally from Norway, but my high school and most of my university studies were done in France. Bjorn NordtveitIn particular, I received my MPhil in history of education, specializing on the Lao PDR, at the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Sorbonne. Subsequently, I started as a volunteer at UNESCO in Paris, after which I became a UN associate expert in Vientiane in 1994, and then a technical adviser monitoring non-formal education projects for UNESCO and UNDP in the Lao PDR.
In 1999, I took up duty as an Education Observer for the UN Security Council’s Oil for Food Program in Iraq. Between 2000 and 2006, I worked in Washington DC as a consultant on non-formal and adult literacy education for the Word Bank, and this work sent me to Burkina Faso, Chad, Guinea, Kenya, Mali, Morocco, Niger, Rwanda, Senegal and The Gambia. In 2005, I also worked in Rome for the World Food Program’s Hunger and Development Report and for UNESCO’s EFA Monitoring Report.
Since 2006, I have been based in Hong Kong, working as a Research Assistant Professor at the University of Hong Kong. During this period, I have been associated with the U.S. Department of Labor, for which I have conducted fieldwork on the topic of child labor and education. This work has enabled me to access new data in the field of teacher training and protection of vulnerable children in Benin, Cambodia, DR Congo, Guinea, Namibia and Swaziland. Also, a competitive grant from Hong Kong’s Research Grants Council enabled me to expand my research and publication in the field of project effectiveness through the study of China’s educational cooperation with Africa, using Egypt and Cameroon as case studies.
I believe my research work, teaching, and occasional fieldwork for international development organizations form a continuity in data gathering, teaching and learning, stimulating discussions with students and colleagues, as well as research and writing. I take a student-centered, constructivist approach to instruction, a methodology informed by both my formal teacher training at the University of Hong Kong and my academic research training. I see myself as a student at the same time as a teacher: I have had the opportunity to take teacher training classes at the University of Hong Kong, as well as specialized courses in topics relevant to my research, such as critical discourse analysis.

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Now showing 1 - 10 of 20

Knowledge production in a constructed field: reflections on comparative and international education
(2015-01-01) Nordtveit, Bjorn
Adopting Maria Manzon’s theoretical framework, which draws on Foucault and proposes that comparative education as an academic field is socially constructed, I suggest that the field is neither stable nor well defined. To demonstrate this, I conduct a content analysis of the Comparative Education Review, using Klaus Krippendorff’s methodological framework to study comparative and international education (CIE) researchers’ understanding of the national—and of their related knowledge production in the field. Many comparativists express interests in multiple countries, and their knowledge production takes the form of individual country studies. The countries are habitually studied using a “problem approach” focusing on one specific aspect of the country under investigation and using an associated social science methodology deemed appropriate. Few comparativists are making explicit use of or reference to any methodology that is unique to comparative education. Efforts to catalog and systematize CIE research have demonstrated that the field is becoming so inclusive that it hardly is distinguishable from educational studies as a whole. Hence, I suggest that instead of speaking about unifyingfeatures of the field, it may be more relevant to speak about frequent elements, such as a focus on the national, and a knowledge production characterized by the academic practitioner who desires to improve the education systems studied. A third frequent element may be the focus on educational development, thus justifying the label of “comparative, international, and development education.” One challenge of the field is its dependence on Western social science discourses, which may be marginalizing other voices. © 2015, Education Research Institute, Seoul National University, Seoul, Korea.
An emerging donor in education and development: A case study of China in Cameroon.
(2011-01-01) Nordtveit, Bjorn
This paper analyzes China's new approaches of education aid to Africa through a case study of Cameroon. China's cooperation has been characterized by different discourses and different historic relationships with recipient countries than those of traditional donors. Sino-African policies have gone through different stages, each connected to wider political and economic realities. Currently, a broadening of China's engagement with Africa can be noticed through increasing aid packages and the inclusion of African countries other than those that had traditionally been close to China. Cameroon has been one of the countries that have had a relatively extended cooperation with China. Four types of Chinese education aid to Africa are illustrated by this paper: (i) Confucius Institutes, which are providing language and culture-related training in host countries; (ii) longer term scholarships and short-term training for Africans in China; (iii) school construction; and (iv) stand-alone education projects. By analyzing how these three different types of aid are taking place in Cameroon, various and apparently contradictory strategies and discourses materialize.
Senegal case study
(2005-01-01) Nordtveit, Bjorn
Producing Literacy and Civil Society: The Case of Senegal
(2008-01-17) Nordtveit, Bjorn Harald
Donor and financial institutions, such as the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and others, often promote market-based solutions for the delivery of public services in developing countries. This article examines the use of such market approaches by the World Bank to hire for-profit and nonprofit nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) to implement aWomen’s Literacy Project (WLP) in Senegal. This particular project has been touted as one of the “best” of the large literacy projects in Senegal, and it has been extended as a model by the World Bank in other West African countries, including Benin, Burkina Faso, Chad, Guinea, Niger, and The Gambia. Several recent studies have argued favorably for strong international support to set up local educational policies and economic frameworks (e.g., Resnik 2006). By examining the WLP, I seek to inform the debate on the role of international organizations, as well as for-profit and nonprofit nongovernmental organizations, as producers of women’s literacy and builders of civil society. Prior to presenting the case study, I summarize the discourses related to the neoliberal economic rationale, the role of civil society organizations, and gender and literacy.
Complexity Theory in Development.
(2007-01-01) Nordtveit, Bjorn
Poverty alleviation and integrated service delivery: Literacy, early child development and health
(2008-01-01) Nordtveit, Bjorn
This paper argues that many internationally financed literacy programs do not sufficiently take into consideration important daily life issues of the learners, including nutritional deficiencies that may hinder learning, or of children–parent–society interactions that may improve learning. As a result, many programs have become synonymous with increased supply of a low-quality education. Often, these programs address almost exclusively Education for All (EFA) international policy targets, without sufficiently addressing other poverty alleviation targets, as defined by the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). This paper further contends that approaches that would generate the greatest effects within an EFA-perspective may not be the best way to alleviate poverty within a MDGs-perspective. Based on a case study of a women's literacy program in Senegal, this paper proposes to look at needs within an MDG perspective, and to use multi-pronged and integrated approaches to intervene in sectors where the poverty alleviation impact is the greatest. Current achievements against the MDG indicators show that significant efforts are needed to reduce maternal and child mortality, boost primary school enrollments, and remove obstacles so that a greater number of girls can attend school. One important target group for promoting greater achievements against these indicators would be young adults living in poverty, especially girls and young women. An approach that combines youth and family literacy, early child development (ECD), as well as health and nutrition interventions, could help to break a cycle of poverty that is fundamentally intergenerational in nature. Further, it is argued that integration of these different interventions, which are usually offered as separate services (but addressing essentially the same target group) could be more cost-effective than implementing each component as separate projects. Accordingly, this paper recommends the integration of such services as nutritional training for youth and adults; information and services for family planning; training on STD/HIV prevention and management; access to immunization for children and pregnant women; assistance to obtain antenatal registration and care as well as training and treatment of existing and non-complex conditions; and, if needed, micro-nutrient supplementation.
Review of Maria Manzon’s Comparative Education: The Construction of a Field (CERC Studies of Comparative Education and Springer, Hong Kong 2011)
(2015-01-01) Nordtveit, Bjorn
USE OF PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS TO DELIVER SOCIAL SERVICES: ADVANTAGES AND DRAWBACKS
(2004-01-01) Nordtveit, Bjorn
Development as a complex process of change: Conception and analysis of projects, programs and policies
(2009-01-01) Nordtveit, Bjorn
Development is often understood as a linear process of change towards Western modernity, a vision that is challenged by this paper, arguing that development efforts should rather be connected to the local stakeholders’ sense of their own development. Further, the paper contends that Complexity Theory is more effective than a linear theory of causality to analyze development and education efforts: hence, instead of studying the effects of separate development actions, the integrated factors leading to change should be considered. It is only after such analysis has been conducted, that questions of cost efficiency should be considered, using insights from the field of New Institutional Economics to avoid problems related to the stakeholders’ bounded rationality and asymmetric information leading to moral hazard.
Politics, guanxi and the search for objectivity: the intricacies of conducting educational research in Chinese contexts
(2011-01-01) Nordtveit, Bjorn
This article discusses how history, the cultural setting, and the political–ideological contexts may influence educational research in China. It seeks to demonstrate a dichotomy between official and popular discourses, and argues that there is a need for the researcher to understand and interpret the language style used in various interview settings and research publications in China. Further, it is contended that ideology and cultural influences push towards a ‘virtuous’ or socially acceptable understanding of reality. These ideological and cultural norms may also affect official research data and statistics. Further, the article seeks to demonstrate that for a researcher in China (whether Chinese or not) it is important to cultivate and make use of guanxi (connections), at the same time as understanding the methodological dangers and intricacies of using it.