In 2017 CIES will convene its Annual Meeting for the fourth time in Atlanta, Georgia. For the first decade and a half of its existence the Society met exclusively in Chicago and Boston — and broke from that pattern in 1970 with a meeting in Atlanta. Since then CIES returned to Atlanta in 1983, 1988 and will now again in 2017. While the size of the conference and our organization was considerably different in those earlier years, we see an interesting consistency in some of the issues and concerns being discussed.
The 1970 CIES program book consisted of a single, double-sided page. There were four sessions in total, each taking up a three hour time-slot. Susanne Shafer and Ursula Springer led a discussion on studies of teachers; a symposium on “Recent Developments in Comparative Education” featured Philip Foster, Harold J. Noah, Max A. Eckstein and Andreas Kazamias. By 1983 the CIES program book had expanded to 18 pages and the conference included 3 plenary sessions and a total of 28 panels. We can note N’Dri T. Asie-Lumumba, current CIES Past-President, speaking on “Social Inequality and Access to Schooling in the Third World”, as well as Erwin Epstein the 2016 CIES Kneller lecturer even then speaking on “Competing Epistemologies in Comparative Education.” By 1988 the CIES program book ran to 38 pages and featured familiar names such as Ruth Hayhoe, Maria Teresa Tatto, Vandra Masemann – also the late Heidi Ross who discussed her research on Shanghai Number Three Girls Middle School. Then Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young, a great civil rights leader and former US ambassador to the United Nations, addressed the Society. The conference included sessions on “Internationalizing Teacher Education”, “Social Unrest and Peace Education” as well as a session on “Leaders in the Field” featuring the familiar names of Eckstein, Noah, Kelly, Kazamias.
As CIES has grown, broadened and diversified so have the leaders in our field. In March 2017 over 3000 academic researchers, practitioners, and policymakers active in the field of comparative and international education will gather in Atlanta for the 61st CIES Annual Meeting. While it is heartening to consider the advances in our field and the tremendous improvements in educational access that have been made in the 30 years since CIES last met in Atlanta, it is also clear that inequality remains a pressing problem around the globe.
Please read the CIES 2017 Call for Papers and join us in Atlanta March 5-9, 2017 as our Society continues to unfold the promise of comparative and international education.
