ABSTRACT
Some of the criticism of the evidence-based education (EBE) movement is well founded, and partly due to the clear weaknesses of the ways in which it has been operationalised and reported. These weaknesses range from the kind of evidence being evaluated, practical problems in conducting trials, how the results are being analysed, and how they are being aggregated and used. This chapter presents a discussion of some of the main weaknesses. Even where trials have been conducted – and the work of Institute of Education Sciences (IES), Educational Endowment Foundation (EEF), International Initiative for Impact Evaluation (3ie) and others has led to considerable progress – they can be problematic. They often do not address key issues, and are frequently so small or have so many treatment groups that they have no practical value. They may test complex or vaguely defined approaches so that even when a trial shows that an approach is successful it is unclear what that means.
