She finds Support Systems to Bring Equity to Education Worldwide
By John LeMay
Locally and globally, Frances Kemmerer, an associate professor in the
School of Education’s Department of Educational Administration and Policy
Studies (EAPS), has become a major voice in the financing and development
of education systems.
“She is one of the three or four most outstanding people working today in
the economics and international financing of education,” said Douglas
Windham, a professor in the department and a close associate of Kemmerer’s.
Kemmerer has travelled throughout the developing world, to places as
diverse as Haiti, Somalia, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Uzbekistan, to mention
a few, as an advisor on the financing and administering of schools,
colleges and universities. She works under contract to a variety of
institutions, including branches of the UN like the World Bank and UNICEF;
agencies like the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID); and
the Asian Development Bank, based in Manila.
She has also studied the financing of education here in New York State.
During the mid-eighties, she undertook a project with Fred Dembowski, now
chair of EAPS, to study tax-base and funding allocation schemes in New
York. This work was done on behalf of the New York State Senate’s Education
Finance Committee.
A first glance at Kemmerer’s resume, however, may yield a puzzled response:
before she earned her doctorate in the economics and financing of education
(at the University of Chicago in 1981), her undergraduate background was in
philosophy, and her masters degree was in world religions.
Windham has an explanation: “Her interest in equity and fairness permeates
everything she does. She takes her values and applies them in the economic
sphere — promoting fairness, whether the issues are those of gender,
ethnicity or language.”
And Kemmerer herself said, “My concerns are primarily equity concerns.
Economics is about the allocation of resources. Who gets what and why?
Educational finance involves a set of philosophical as well as practical
issues.”
As she spoke, her computer screen glowed in the background, displaying a
paper-in-progress which she is writing with Windham and World Bank
personnel. The paper will help guide World Bank policy in future
interventions in developing nations. Maps, photos, and artifacts from
around the world quietly punctuate her office space.
Kemmerer is quick to point out that much of her work is undertaken with
colleagues, and that most members of the department are accomplished in the
area of international education. “That’s what’s so interesting about our
department,” she said.
Still, the work listed under “supplemental activities” on her vita could
easily make a career in themselves.
This past summer, Kemmerer worked on two separate projects in developing
countries — Cambodia and Mongolia — and a comparison of the two projects
gives some idea of the range of circumstances in which she works.
In Cambodia, working for USAID, Kemmerer and Anthony Cresswell, another
EAPS faculty member, gave a three-week planning workshop to ministry of
education officials in Phnom Penh, providing training in planning and
research skills. This was Kemmerer’s first visit to Cambodia.
Although the workshop itself went well, Kemmerer described Cambodia as a
“post-conflict nation” in which Pol Pot’s killing of two million people has
left the education system with enormous handicaps and relatively few
trained personnel. Of the ministry personnel she met with in Cambodia, some
had masters degrees and some had only primary educations.
“This is the first year since the `holocaust’ in which their university has
been able to offer freshman through senior courses,” she said. “Cambodia
has an extraordinary need for external support that hopefully will be gone
after a few generations.”
Mongolia, which Kemmerer visited with Windham, is experiencing different
problems.
Kemmerer had been there before. “It was like a homecoming,” she said. In
contrast to Cambodia’s status as “post-conflict,” she described Mongolia, a
former ally of the Soviet Union which now stands as a buffer between Russia
and China, as “post-command,” a reference to the controlled, centralized
economies of the Soviet era.
Mongolia’s education had been heavily subsidized by the Soviets; since the
break-up of the USSR, that funding has dried up, with the result that
Mongolia’s education system “looks good on the surface — it’s
infrastructure is intact and it has a well-educated population and highly
trained educators — but it is drawing down on its capital stocks. Nothing
is coming in and it is downsizing severely. Mongolia will need external
support to get them through this transition.”
Asked if any of her work has been particularly gratifying, Kemmerer said,
“I’ve loved all of it. In all of this work you get so much more than you
give, just because you learn so much about culture and issues.”
Kemmerer described her contribution to developing nations in
characteristically modest terms: “Our recommendations often serve to give
outside support to those people within the developing countries who are
already working toward similar goals.
“In our sector work, we always strive to be fully collaborative, involving
all the stakeholders in the process. An outside team of six to eight
members is paired with a team of local consultants, heads of ministries,
representatives of teachers, and where possible in the subsectors, groups
of teachers and parents.”
Kemmerer’s international work has had a striking effect on the student
population at the University: “We’ve gotten a lot of students this way.
I’ve had students from every country I’ve worked in. They eventually find
their way here.”
She teaches a full courseload, and department chair Fred Dembowski called
her a “mainstay” of the doctoral dissertation seminar, which she teaches
nearly every year. This means that most doctoral students work with her
immediately before writing their dissertation proposals. Dembowski said
that as a result, she currently serves on over twenty dissertation
committees, and chairs many of them.
Windham had a further explanation of Kemmerer’s presence on so many
dissertation committees: “She is one of the very best teachers the
University has — students quickly figure out who has the expertise and who
will devote the time and patience to their dissertation work.”
Windham calls Kemmerer an “ideal of what a University professional should
be, in terms of teaching, research and service to the community.”
Despite Kemmerer’s extensive international work, there is one aspect of it
where she feels she hasn’t done enough. Though she has done a lot of sector
assessment — analyzing the needs and capacities of education systems, and
she’s done a lot in the area of teacher incentives — finding the right mix
of financial and nonfinancial rewards for teachers, Kemmerer said that her
work in community support — working with the families of students and other
community members — has been mostly theoretical.
To be directly involved with community support, she said, would require a
commitment to long-term fieldwork which she hasn’t yet been able to make.
But when asked whether her future will include any change in that
situation, Kemmerer responded, “Yes, I am definitely going to do it.”
Link with BU Creates New Degree in Biology/Dentistry
By Carol Olechowski
University students can now earn a Bachelor of Science degree in Biology
and a Doctor of Medical Dentistry (DMD) degree at Boston University’s
Goldman School of Dental Medicine in seven years.
Under a new agreement between the two institutions, which is effective
immediately and shortens the course of study by one year, the University at
Albany will recommend up to five students annually for early admission to
BU. Those accepted will begin their studies at Boston University after
completing their junior year at Albany.
Students seeking admission to the program must have completed a minimum of
90 degree credits with a cumulative grade point average of 3.2 in both
science and overall courses; the University’s General Education and Writing
Intensive requirements; and all requirements for the major in the Biology
Bachelor of Science program. In turn, Albany will waive its senior
residence requirement for those students upon enrollment at Boston
University Goldman School of Dental Medicine. The waiver must be approved
by the Committee on Academic Standing and reported to the Undergraduate
Academic Council.
Students entering the Goldman School usually are required to have
bachelor’s degrees. Participants in this program, however, will receive
their bachelor of science degrees in biology from Albany after successfully
completing their first year at BU. The DMD degree is awarded by Boston
University after the successful completion of four years of required study
at its Medical Center campus.
Students must apply for admission to the Goldman School of Dental Medicine
during their sophomore year by submitting an application to Albany’s
pre-health adviser, Donna Platner. Applicants recommended to Boston
University and meeting that institution’s admissions standards are notified
of their acceptance during the summer between their sophomore and junior
years.
Financial aid, awarded by BU on a competitive basis for the four years of
study on its campus, will be available for students who qualify. The
University also has early assurance admission programs with SUNY College of
Optometry and Albany Medical College.
