The British Association for International and Comparative Education (BAICE) is a professional association for the promotion of research, teaching, and policy development in different modes of international and comparative education. It holds a conference every two years.
This year’s conference was held at the University of Sussex, Falmer – Brighton from 3-5th September 2024, under the theme “Transgression and transformation: (re)bordering education in times of conflict and crises”. Bringing together scholars, researchers, students, and educators, the goal was to stimulate an intellectual dialogue on global crisis in the sector of education.
The BAICE Team, from the Centre of International Education (CIE), University of Sussex, led by Jo Westbrook, Linda Morrice, and Sarah Jeffrey, mobilized about 290 delegates from 38 countries around the globe to exchange on the urgency of research and the need for collaboration beyond borders in sharpening education beyond times of global crises.
Scortia Quansah, Muna Kalati’s Research and Engagement Officer and an affiliate of the Department of Communication Studies of the University of Cape Coast – Ghana was present. Scortia’s team, including Dr. Lieke Stoffelsma, Radboud University and Dr. Isaac N. Mwinlaaru (UCC), presented on Bilingual Education in Ghana’s Post Colonial Context. Central to their presentation was investigating L1 and L2 literacy skills for quality learning.
The study explored the L1-L2 literacy development of 220 of Akan-English bilingual learners in Grade 4,5 and 6 from three primary-schools in Ghana’s Central region. It employed quantitative and qualitative analyses to investigate learners’ L1 and L2 literacy development. The top 30 and bottom 30 scorers of the group-based assessment were chosen for a qualitative analysis to examine their ability to construct words from morphemes.
Learners’ reading comprehension, oral reading fluency, vocabulary knowledge, morphological awareness, and word-building skills were evaluated in individual-based and group-based assessments. Results from the study indicated that morphological awareness is a strong predictor of reading comprehension.
The findings revealed that top scorers demonstrated proficiency in forming accurate words by combining a wide variation of L1/L2 roots and affixes, indicating a high knowledge of morphology and vocabulary. This competence positively impacted their reading comprehension. This finding has implications on the books produced for learners. Thus, bilingual books are highly recommended to enable learners to become proficient in morphology, a strong predator of reading comprehension.
Partaking in this year’s BAICE Conference has exposed me to the different strategies and efforts individuals and organisations are making to enhance global education. It was a heartwarming moment to dialogue with experts, scholars, and researchers for feedback on improving studies conducted. There was the opportunity to have engagement and further collaboration with organisations such as British Council, Education for Sub Sahara Africa (ESSA), Read to Play, Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO) among others.