The Comparative and International Education Society (CIES, pronounced "C-I-E-S") is a professional scholarly research organization representing over 4000 education researchers, policymakers, practitioners and students. Based in the United States, and hosting an annual conference as well as issuing several publications, CIES aims to encourage and promote comparative and international education and related areas of inquiry and activity.

Organization and governance

CIES has 37 Special Interest Groups (SIGs) that represent topical and geographic areas. SIGs were introduced by the Society in 2005 and many are now active in organizing events throughout the year, as well as at the Society's annual conference. CIES is governed by a Board of Directors elected by its membership. Its governance structure includes a number of Standing Committees such as a Gender and Education Committee (GEC) established in 1989; an Under-represented Racial, Ethnic, and Ability Groups (UREAG) committee; and, since 1991, a New Scholars Committee (NSC). In 2020 CIES created a Social and Policy Engagement Committee (SPEC).

Early history

CIES evolved out of annual conferences held at

New York University New York University (NYU) is a private university, private research university in New York City, New York, United States. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded in 1832 by Albert Gallatin as a Nondenominational ...

under the leadership of William W. Brickman and was formally chartered in 1956. From the start it drew its membership from the United States and internationally. The first Board of Directors consisted of university professors as well as Bess Goodykoontz, the director of the International Education division of the

United States Office of Education The Office of Education, at times known as the Department of Education and the Bureau of Education, was a small unit in the Federal Government of the United States within the U.S. Department of the Interior from 1867 to 1972. It is now separa ...

. The Society began as the "Comparative Education Society" and was initially a branch of the National Society of College Teachers of Education (NSCTE), which itself was chartered in 1902 as the Society of College Teachers of Education, and has been known since 1969 as the Society of Professors of Education. In its early years, in addition to holding annual meetings, it organized educational study tours, and in 1957 founded a journal, the ''

Comparative Education Review ''Comparative Education Review'' is the official publication of the Comparative and International Education Society. It publishes research that investigates education throughout the world and the social, economic, and political forces that shape ...

''. In 1968 the Society formally changed its name to the "Comparative and International Education Society". After initially meeting jointly with the NSCTE, in 1970 CIES held its first independent annual meeting. CIES was a founding member of the

World Council for Comparative Education Societies The World Council of Comparative Education Societies (WCCES) is an international organization of comparative education societies created in 1970 in Ottawa, Canada. It is organized as an NGO in operational relations with UNESCO. The current presid ...

(WCCES) which held its first conference in Ottawa, Canada in 1970. As the first professional society in the field – and In contrast to the more than 40 WCCES member societies that include a national or regional descriptor as part of their name – CIES has never used a national qualifier to indicate that it is a US-based society.

Publications and awards

In addition to its flagship journal, the ''Comparative Education Review'', CIES has also published a newsletter titled "Prospects" and a monograph book series "Education in Global Perspectives" with

SUNY Press The State University of New York Press (more commonly referred to as the SUNY Press) is a university press affiliated with the State University of New York system. The press, which was founded in 1966, is located in Albany, New York and publishe ...

. From 1959 to 2015 the Society also published an annual bibliography of research in comparative and international education. The Society also has a set of annual awards to honor the achievements of its members. These include an award for the best article published in the ''Comparative Education Review'', which since 1989 has been named in honor of George Z. F. Bereday, the journal's first editor and professor at

Teachers College, Columbia University Teachers College, Columbia University (TC) is the graduate school of education affiliated with Columbia University, a private research university in New York City. Founded in 1887, Teachers College has been a part of Columbia University since ...

; a dissertation award (since 1994) named in honor of Gail P. Kelly, a professor at

University at Buffalo The State University of New York at Buffalo (commonly referred to as UB, University at Buffalo, and sometimes SUNY Buffalo) is a public university, public research university in Buffalo, New York, Buffalo and Amherst, New York, United States. ...

; an Honorary Fellows award; as well as a Joyce L. Cain Award (from 2001) to recognize excellent scholarship on educational themes relating to people of African descent and (since 2011) a Jackie Kirk Memorial Award that recognizes a book related to gender and education and/or education in conflict. Additionally, many CIES SIGs also make annual awards.

Activities

CIES holds an annual conference, typically in February or March, attended by 3000–4000 policymakers, practitioners, students and academics. The location shifts from year to year, moving around major US cities and sometimes taking place in Mexico or Canada. This five-day conference showcases comparative and international research and includes participants from around the globe who engage in knowledge exchange and professional development. Conferences have also included pre-conference workshops and an exhibit hall. During the COVID disruptions of 2020 and 2021 the annual conference shifted to being online-only. During the annual CIES conference the George F. Kneller Lecture is delivered, among various other highlighted panels. CIES also sponsors regional conferences and has organized topical seminars and workshops.

Intellectual influences

CIES has been characterized by many scholars as eclectic and inclusive in the research methodologies, theoretical frameworks, and academic disciplines that compose its work. In alignment with broader social science trends following World War II, much of the work presented at the Society's early annual meetings and published in its journal concerned the relationship between education and national development. While an appreciation of diversity and a concern not to be Eurocentric characterized the work of many of the Society's founders such as Isaac Leon Kandel, the geopolitical context of the

Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...

resulted in a strong commitment to

modernization theory Modernization theory or modernisation theory holds that as societies become more economically modernized, wealthier and more educated, their political institutions become increasingly liberal democratic and rationalist. The "classical" theories ...

. Many early leaders in the field embraced an empirical

positivism Positivism is a philosophical school that holds that all genuine knowledge is either true by definition or positivemeaning '' a posteriori'' facts derived by reason and logic from sensory experience.John J. Macionis, Linda M. Gerber, ''Soci ...

and orientation to education rooted in

structural functionalism Structural functionalism, or simply functionalism, is "a framework for building theory that sees society as a complex system whose parts work together to promote solidarity and stability". This approach looks at society through a macro-level o ...

.{{Cite book , last=Coss , first=Jose , title=Crafting a Global Field: Six Decades of the Comparative and International Education Society , publisher=Springer / Comparative Education Research Centre The University of Hong Kong , isbn=978-988-14241-4-3 , editor-last=Epstein , editor-first=Erwin , publication-date=2016 , pages=126–139 , chapter=Shaping the Intellectual Landscape By the 1970s multiple critical and postfoundational perspectives began to appear in the Society. Individuals and groups engaged with Marxist and

Neo-Marxism Neo-Marxism is a collection of Marxist schools of thought originating from 20th-century approaches to amend or extend Marxism and Marxist theory, typically by incorporating elements from other intellectual traditions such as critical theory, psy ...

analyses, represented for example in work dealing with

conflict theories Conflict theories are perspectives in political philosophy and sociology which argue that individuals and groups (social classes) within society interact on the basis of conflict rather than agreement, while also emphasizing social psychology ...

and

dependency theory Dependency theory is the idea that resources flow from a " periphery" of poor and exploited states to a " core" of wealthy states, enriching the latter at the expense of the former. A central contention of dependency theory is that poor states ...

. In recent years, just as the field of comparative education has itself evolved, CIES has become a venue for an extremely wide range of disciplinary and epistemic approaches with research perspectives informed by

postpositivism Postpositivism or postempiricism is a metatheoretical stance that critiques and amends positivism and has impacted theories and practices across philosophy, social sciences, and various models of scientific inquiry. While positivists emphasi ...

postmodernism Postmodernism encompasses a variety of artistic, Culture, cultural, and philosophical movements that claim to mark a break from modernism. They have in common the conviction that it is no longer possible to rely upon previous ways of depicting ...

postcolonialism Postcolonialism (also post-colonial theory) is the critical academic study of the cultural, political and economic consequences of colonialism and imperialism, focusing on the impact of human control and extractivism, exploitation of colonized pe ...

, and

feminist theory Feminist theory is the extension of feminism into theoretical, fictional, or Philosophy, philosophical discourse. It aims to understand the nature of gender inequality. It examines women's and men's Gender role, social roles, experiences, intere ...

commonly appearing alongside economics of education,

development economics Development economics is a branch of economics that deals with economic aspects of the development process in low- and middle- income countries. Its focus is not only on methods of promoting economic development, economic growth and structural c ...

, and more quantitative social research approaches.

References

Selected bibliography

* Epstein, Erwin (ed.). ''Crafting a Global Field: Six Decades of the Comparative and International Education Society''. Springer / Comparative Education Research Centre The University of Hong Kong. ISBN 978-988-14241-4-3. * Jacob, W. James, Huiyuan Ye, Shuo Wang, Xueshuang Wang, Xiufang Ma, Abdullah Bagci, Quan Gu, and Julio Luis Méndez Vergara (2019). "The History of Comparative and International Education in North America." In Wolhuter, Charl Coetzee, and Alexander W. Wiseman, eds. ''Comparative and international education: Survey of an infinite field''. Emerald Publishing Limited. pp. 101-117. ISBN 978-1-78743-392-2 * Manzon, Maria (2011). ''Comparative Education: The Construction of a Field''. Springer / Comparative Education Research Centre The University of Hong Kong. p. 76. ISBN 978-988-17852-6-8. * Sherman Swing, Elizabeth (2006). "A Brief History of the Comparative and International Education Society". ''Current Issues in Comparative Education''. 8 (2). * Sherman Swing, Elizabeth (2007). "The Comparative and International Education Society (CIES)". In Masemann, Vandra; Bray, Mark; Manzon, Maria (eds.). ''Common Interests, Uncommon Goals: Histories of the World Council of Comparative Education Societies and its Members''. Springer / Comparative Education Research Center The University of Hong Kong. pp. 94–115. ISBN 978 962 8093 10 6.

External links

Official website

Comparatively Speaking CIES Presidents Oral History Video
- via www.youtube.com This oral history video, produced in 2007 on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the Comparative and International Education Society (CIES), presents excerpts from oral history interviews conducted with CIES past-Presidents beginning with R. Freeman Butts (1964) and ending with Steven Klees (2007), the videos trace the history and scholarly debates of the Society from its fragile conception to current state of strength and growth.
CIES 60th Anniversary Video
- via www.youtube.com Learned societies of the United States 1956 establishments in the United States Organizations established in 1956 Organizations based in Pittsburgh