Dr. dr. h. c. mult. Erik, Willy, Alberic DE CORTE #

Professor Emeritus
Center for Instructional Psychology and Technology (CIP&T)
University of Leuven, Belgium
Doctor honoris causa, Rand Afrikaans University, Johannesburg, South Africa (2000)
Doctor honoris causa, University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa (2003)
Visiting scholar at the School of Education of Stanford University (1998-1999)
Foreign Member of the National Academy of Education of the United States (2002)
First President of EARLI, the European Association for Research on Learning and Instruction (1985-1989)
President of the International Academy of Education (1998-2006)
Holder of the Francqui Chair 2000-2001 at the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences of the University of Liège (Belgium)
Fellow of the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford (2005-2006)
Fellow of the American Educational Research Association (2009)

CURRICULUM VITAE#

Career and research interests

Erik De Corte was born on June 15, 1941 in Blankenberge, Belgium and is a Belgian citizen. He obtained his certificate as a primary school teacher in 1960, and his master's degree in educational sciences at the University of Leuven in 1964.

Since 1964 (with an interruption for military service in 1965-1966) he has worked at the Department of Educational Sciences, University of Leuven. Until 1971 he was a full-time researcher, having the status of Fellow of the Belgian National Fund for Scientific Research.

In 1970 he obtained his Doctor's degree in educational sciences at the University of Leuven. His doctor's thesis was a report of his main research during the preceding years, namely a theoretical and empirical study on cognitive objectives of mathematics education at the primary school and their evaluation.

In 1971 he was appointed lecturer, in 1972 associate professor, and in 1976 professor of educational psychology at the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences of the University of Leuven. Since 1971 till his retirement in October 2006 he was in charge of the training of students in educational psychology, as well as with students in education and psychology as with student teachers.

During the 1970's his research interest has shifted from the stating and evaluation of cognitive objectives to the study of the cognitive processes and structures underlying cognitive objectives, and to the learning and teaching processes that are necessary to attain those objectives. This new interest led to the foundation in 1980 of the Center of Instructional Psychology, which has been expanded in 1990 to become the Center for Instructional Psychology and Technology (CIP&T); Erik De Corte was the director of this Center till 2005. A major overall aim of the research in the Center is to contribute to the development of theories of learning from instruction as a basis for the design of powerful learning environments.

In that perspective Erik De Corte has worked on different research projects that deal mainly with the following issues: 1. Analysis and improvement of mathematical problem solving in elementary school children; 2. Measurement and analysis of children’s and teachers’ beliefs about mathematics as a subject-matter domain and about the learning and teaching of mathematics; 3. Measurement and analysis of metacognitive, metamotivational and meta-emotional knowledge and skills in upper primary school children; 4. Comparative study of mathematics education in five European countries (England, Finland, Flemish Belgium, Hungary, and Spain). His most recent work focuses on the potential of design-based research for theory building and the improvement of classroom practices, and on the analysis of the social and individual aspects of teachers’ approaches to mathematical problem solving and their impact on student learning.

In 1987 Erik De Corte was awarded a major grant from the Belgian Ministry of Sciences for a six year research project on "Knowledge-driven visual information processing", a joint project of the Laboratory of Experimental Psychology and the Center for Instructional Psychology and Technology (CIP&T) of the University of Leuven. In the CIP&T this grant was used to carry out part of the research on mathematical problem solving applying among others the technique of eye-movement registration. In February 1992 a new grant was awarded to continue the research till the end of 1998. From 1994 on additional grants have been awarded by the Flemish Ministry of Education and the Flemish Fund for Scientific Research to expand the research activities relating to the topics listed above.

From April 1997 till October 2003 he was also coordinator of seven consecutive research projects in the framework of the cooperation between the Republic of South Africa (esp. the University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, but also the University of Pretoria and the University of Stellenbosch) and the Flemish Ministry of Education. These projects related to different aspects of educational innovation (curriculum materials, assessment instruments, teacher training, school leadership) in the new South Africa as developed in the reform project “Curriculum 2005”. A major topic of study in this framework concerns the use of the mother tongue or a foreign language as medium of instruction in a multicultural and multilanguage society.

From 1999 till 2005 he has supervised and coordinated two research projects relating to the innovation of mathematics education in Chilean primary schools, in cooperation with the Departemento de Didactica de la Matematica of the Facultad de Educación of the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile (Santiago).

From 2002 till 2006 he was co-promotor of a Scientific Network on “Design, development, and evaluation of powerful learning environments”, funded by the Fund for Scientific Research – Flanders. Besides the Leuven Center for Instructional Psychology and Technology, the network involved three research teams from other Belgian universities, five Dutch partners and five teams from other European countries (Finland, Germany, Greece, Switzerland, United Kingdom.) From 2003 till 2008 he was the Flemish project leader of a research project on “Addressing the direct and indirect impact of HIV/AIDS on pre-and school-going children in South Africa”, which was part of a comprehensive, joint cooperative research program of the Flemish Interuniversity Council (VLIR) and the University of the Western Cape, South Africa.

Since 2010 he is member of the team of the research project “Educational innovation in undergraduate and graduate programs with emphasis on the sustainable management of agro-ecosystems and rural development” which is part of a comprehensive, joint cooperative research program of the Flemish Interuniversity Council (VLIR) and the Universidad Nacional Agraria La Molina (UNALM), Lima, Peru.

Awards and Honours

• First laureate of the Belgian University Contest in 1965.
• Award of the Belgian Ministry of Education for the Best Publication on Education 1973.
• Research Award of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics in the U.S.A. for a research article on young children's mathematics problem solving, published in the November 1987 issue of the Journal for Research on Mathematics Education, and entitled: "The effect of semantic structure on first graders' strategies for solving addition and subtraction word problems".
• Foreign member of the Royal Norwegian Society of Sciences and Letters, Class of the Humanities (since October 1991).
• Member of the Academia Europaea (since April 1995).
• Member of the International Academy of Education (IAE) since January 1997; President of the Academy from June 1998 till September 2006.
• Recipient of the 1997 “Oeuvre Award for Outstanding Contributions to the Science of Learning and Instruction” of the European Association for Research on Learning and Instruction (EARLI)”
• Doctor honoris causa of the Rand Afrikaans University, Johannesburg, South Africa (2000)
• Holder of the Francqui Chair 2000-2001 at the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences of the University of Liége (Belgium) focused on “Educational psychology and mathematics instruction”
• Foreign member of the National Academy of Education of the United States (2002)
• Doctor honoris causa of the University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa (2003)
• Fellow of the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford (2005-2006)
• Fellow of the American Educational Research Association (2009)

Professional activities

June 1985: organization in Leuven of the First European Conference for Research on Learning and Instruction. During this conference the European Association for Research on Learning and Instruction (EARLI) was founded; E. De Corte was elected as its first president (June 1985 - September 1989).

October 1986 - September 1996: coordinator of an bilateral agreement for cooperation between the Catholic University of Uruguay in Montevideo and the University of Leuven. Major projects that were carried out in the framework of this agreement are the development and implementation of a Master's degree program in Education ("Maestria in Educacion"), and the development of a Center for Science Education.

September 1989 - December 1993: First Editor-in-Chief of the journal Learning and Instruction. The Journal of the European Association for Research on Learning and Instruction (EARLI).

January 1986 - December 1989: member of the Governing Council of the Institute for Educational Research (SVO) in The Netherlands.

January 1987 - December 1990: chairman of a Departmental Committee of the Flemish Ministry of Education on the use of information technology in primary education.

October 1987 - January 1993: Director of the Institute for Language Teaching and Leuven Language Learning of the University of Leuven. (Member of the Institute's Administration Board from 1972 till 2006).

Member of the International Program Committee of the 2nd European Conference for Research on Learning and Instruction (EARLI) held in Tübingen, Germany, September 1987.

From 1987 till 2006: Chairman of the Editorial Board of "Studia Paedagogica", book series of the Leuven Department of Educational Sciences, published by Leuven University Press.

April-June 1989: Member of the panel of experts in the Operation 1992 Planning Exercise for the Commission of the European Community, Directorate General XIII (Telecommunications, Information Industries and Innovation), in the area of the application of technology and emerging R&D in learning).

Member of the International Program Committee of the 3rd European Conference for Research on Learning and Instruction (EARLI) held in Madrid, Spain, September 1989).

September 1990: appointed Editor of the Section on Instructional Psychology of The International Encyclopedia of Education, Second Edition (published in April 1994).

September 1990: organizer and chairman of a NATO Advanced Research Workshop on "Computer-based learning environments and problem solving", organized at the University of Leuven, Belgium (September 25-29, 1990).

October 1991-October 1997: member as senior scientist of the programme “Learning in Humans and Machines” of the European Science Foundation (Task Force IV: Situated learning and transfer).

July 1992: Co-organizer of the NATO Advanced Study Institute on "Psychological and educational foundations of technology-based learning environments" held in Crete, Greece (July 26 - August 3, 1992).

February 1994: Member of the External Committee of the Finnish Ministry of Education (Helsinki, Finland) for the Evaluation of Faculties of Educational Sciences.

July 1994 - August 1998: President of the Division on Educational, Instructional, and School Psychology of the International Association of Applied Psychology.

August 1994 - July 1998: Chairman of the Department of Educational Sciences of the University of Leuven. October 1994: nominated for President-elect of the American Educational Research Association (AERA).

October 1994 – January 2002: Coordinator of a Doctoral Program in Educational Management, as a joint venture of Assumption University, Bangkok, Thailand, and the University of Leuven, Belgium.

Member of the International Program Committee of the 6th European Conference for Research on Learning and Instruction (EARLI) held in Nijmegen, The Netherlands in August 1995.

Member of the International Program Committee of the 7th European Conference for Research on Learning and Instruction (EARLI) held in Athens, Greece in August 1997.

Member of the Programming Council for Educational Research of the Dutch Organization for Scientific Research (1996-2001). Chairman of the Organizing Committee of the Flemish-Dutch Educational Research Conference held in Leuven, Belgium, May 21-23, 1997.

October 1996 – September 1998: Participant in a project on “Constructivismo y educación” in the framework of the ALFA program of the European Union (the ALFA program aims at stimulating cooperation in research and training between European and Latin-American universities). The project involved 3 European and 7 Latin-American universities.

In connection with the project: visiting scholar at FLACSO (Facultad Latinoamericano de Ciencias Sociales) in Buenos Aires in the Diploma de Postgrado “Constructivismo y educación”.

January 1997 – May 1997: Member of the Panel on New Standards for Primary Education of the Flemish Council of Education (of the Ministry of Education).

Member of the International Program Committee of the 9th European Conference for Research on Learning and Instruction (EARLI) held in Fribourg, Switzerland in August 2001.

2000: Chairman of the Review Committee for Research in Pedagogics and Education in the Netherlands in charge of evaluating 35 research programs from seven Dutch universities in the period 1995-1999.

Member of the Organizing Committee of the Conference on “Excellence in Higher Education”, jointly organized by the Academia Europaea and the International Academy of Education in Stockholm, Sweden on May 30-June 1, 2002 (E. De Corte acted also as chair of the conference and is editor of the volume published about the conference).

Member of the Evaluation Panel in Education and Teacher Education at the University of Helsinki, Finland (March 2002). 2002 – 2006: Co-promotor of the Scientific Network on “Design, development and implementation of powerful learning environments” funded by the Fund for Scientific Research – Flanders for the period 2002-2006. The network involves 14 European research teams.

Member of the Committee for the Evaluation of Research and Training Programs in Educational Sciences and Teacher Training at the Universities and Teacher Training Colleges in Baden-Württemberg, Germany (October 2003 – April 2004).

Member of the International Program Committee of the 11th European Conference for Research on Learning and Instruction (EARLI) held in Nicosia, Cyprus in August 2005.

Chairman of the Review Committee of the training programs in Pedagogical Sciences in the Universities in the Netherlands (2005).

Member of the Evaluation Committee of the teaching programmes in electronics and electromechanics “dans les Hautes Ecoles et la Promotion Sociale de la Communauté Francaise , Belgique” (November 2007; February 2008).

Member of the Evaluation Panel of Management and Leadership of Education at the University of Helsinki, Finland (November 2008).

Member of the International Program Committee of the 13th European Conference for Research on Learning and Instruction (EARLI) held in Amsterdam in August 2009.

Chairman and Editor of the Proceedings of the Conference on “From information to knowledge; from knowledge to wisdom. Challenges and changes facing higher education in the digital age”, organized by the Academia Europaea (to be held in Stockholm, Sweden, November 2009)

Membership of professional organizations

• European Association for Research on Learning and Instruction (EARLI) (President 1985- 1989)
• International Association of Applied Psychology (President of the Division on Educational, Instructional, and School Psychology, 1994-1998)
• Vlaams Forum voor Onderwijsonderzoek (Flemisch Association for Educational Research; member of the Founding Committee in 1995, and of the Executive Committee from 1995 till 2005)
• Nederlandse Vereniging voor Onderwijsresearch (Dutch Association for Educational Research)
• American Educational Research Association (member since 1972; Nominated in October 1994 as Candidate for President-elect of AERA; member of the Committee on International Relations of AERA 1996-1999; Fellow since 2007)
• American Psychological Association (member since 1981)

Membership of Editorial boards

• International Journal of Educational Research (Associate editor 1987 - 2002)
• Chairman of the Editorial Board of the book series “Studia Paedagogica” of the Department of Educational Sciences of the University of Leuven (1987 - 2005)
• Learning and Instruction. The Journal of the European Association for Research on Learning and Instruction (EARLI) (1989-1993, Founding editor)
• European Journal of Psychology of Education (since 1985)
• The Spanish Journal of Psychology (since 1998)
• Pedagogische Studiën (Educational Studies) (1975-1983; chairman of the Editorial Board 1979-1983)
• Tijdschrift voor Hoger Onderwijs (Journal of Higher Education) (since 1989)
• Section Editor of the Section “Instructional Psychology” of the International encyclopedia of education (Second edition). (1994). Oxford, U.K.: Elsevier Science Ltd.
• Co-editor (with F.E. Weinert) of the International encyclopedia of developmental and instructional psychology. (1996) Oxford, UK: Elsevier Science Ltd.
• Associate editor of the EARLI Series “Advances in Learning and Instruction” (published by Elsevier Science Ltd) (1998 – 2005)
• Theory into Practice (since 2003)

• Educational Research Review (since 2006)
• Learning Inquiry (since 2006)
• Metacognition and Learning (since 2006)
• Cambridge Journal of Education (since 2007)
• Forum on Public Policy (since 2009)

Study visits, Scholarly invitations and Congress participation

With the financial support of the Belgian National Fund for Scientific Research Erik De Corte made a first study trip to the U.S.A. in July and August 1975. He visited the following institutes: Graduate School of Education, University of California at Los Angeles; School of Education of Stanford University and the Stanford Center for Research on Teaching; Far West Laboratory for Educational Research and Development at San Francisco; College of Education, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Wisconsin Research and Development Center for Cognitive Learning, Madison; Educational Testing Service, Princeton.

He was awarded a study visits grant by NATO to make a trip to the U.S.A. in March and April 1979. He visited the following institutes: Learning Research and Development Center at the University of Pittsburgh; Department of Psychology of Carnegie-Mellon University at Pittsburgh; Center for Human Information Processing, University of California at San Diego; School of Education at Stanford University.

In 1983 he was awarded a study visits grant by IBM to visit advanced centers in the U.S.A. in the field of research on the impact of computer experience on children's thinking and problem-solving skills. In March and April 1983 he visited the following centers: School of Education and Department of Psychology of Stanford University; Xerox Palo Alto Research Center; Lawrence Hall of Science, University of California at Berkeley; Laboratory of Comparative Human Cognition, University of California at San Diego; Educational Computing Group of the MIT Laboratory for Computer Science; Bolt, Beranek & Newman, Cambridge, Mass.; Learning Research and Development Center, University of Pittsburgh; Department of Psychology, Carnegie-Mellon University of Pittsburgh.

He has been invited to give lectures and seminars at many universities, research centers and conferences in different parts of the world (see also the following section “Guest professorships”).

Erik De Corte participated actively in many national and international meetings, among others: the annual meetings of the American Educational Research Association (yearly since 1979); all biennial conferences of the European Association for Research on Learning and Instruction (EARLI) since 1985; meetings of the International Society for the Study of Behavioural Development; congresses of the International Association of Applied Psychology; conventions of the American Psychological Association; conferences of the International Group for the Psychology of Mathematics Education (member of the National Advisory Committee of the 1982 conference held in Belgium in July 1982); the annual meetings of the Dutch Association for Educational Research, and of the Flemish Forum for Educational Research.

Guest professorships and Guest lectures

• October 1979: Faculty of Education of the Randse Afrikaanse Universiteit, Johannesburg, Republic of South Africa.
• September-October 1981: Faculty of Education, University of Pretoria, Republic of South Africa.
• November 1981 and February 1983: Teacher Training College of the University Mohammed V, Rabat, Morocco.
• October 1982: Ministry of Education, Bujumbura, Burundi.
• March 1984: University of Kinshasa, Zaïre
• February 1985: University of Lubumbashi, Zaïre
• September 1986, February 1988, October 1988, February 1989, October 1989, August 1990, March 1992, March 1994, November 1995 : Catholic University of Uruguay, Montevideo
• August 1990: Universidad de Belgrano, Buenos Aires, Argentina
• October 1991: Erziehungswissenschaftliche Fakultät, Universität zu Köln, Germany.
• March 1994, November 1995, October 1996 : Facultad de Educación, Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile, Santiago, Chile
• June 1996 :Institut de Pédagogie,Université de Fribourg,Switzerland.
• October 1996: FLACSO (Facultad Latinoamericano de Ciencias Sociales), Buenos Aires, Argentina.
• March 1998: Institut de Pédagogie, Université de Fribourg, Switzerland.
• July 1998: Faculdade de Psicologia e de Ciencias da Educaçao, Universidade de Porto, Portugal.
• September 2001: Pädagogisches Institut, University of Fribourg, Switzerland.
• November 2001: Pädagogisches Institut, University of Zürich, Switzerland.
• July 2002: School of Education, Murdoch University and Science and Mathematics Education Center, Curtin University of Technology, Perth, Australia.
• October 2002: Faculty of Education, University of Cyprus, Nicosia, Cyprus.
• June 2003; March 2005: Pädagogisches Institut, University of Fribourg, Switzerland.
• June 2004: Invited lecture in an Expert meeting on “Empirische Bildungsforschung”, organized by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, Niederkassel bei Bonn.
• August 2004: Invited lecture at the Shaanxi School Improvement Project, Pucheng, Shaanxi Province, China, August 19, 2004.
• November 2004: Invited lecture at the Facultad de Educación of the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile.
• November 2004: Invited lecture at the Faculty of Education of the University of the Western Cape, Cape Town, South Africa.
• March 2005: Pädagogisches Institut, University of Fribourg, Switzerland
• March 2005: Invited lecture presented at the Provincial Teaching Training College, Siem Reap, Cambodja.
• March 2006: Invited lecture at the Graduate School of Education, University of California – Berkeley, CA
• March 2006: Invited lecture at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, Stanford, CA.
• May 2006: Invited lecture at CRESMET (Center for Research on Education in Science, Mathematics, Engineering and Technology), Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ.
• May 2006: Invited lecture in the framework of Stanford’s “Methods of Analysis Program in the Social Sciences (MAPSS)”, Stanford University, CA.
• March 2007: Invited lecture in a Pre-conference of the 2007 Biennial Meeting of the Society for Research in Child Development on “Developmental science and early schooling: Translating basic research into practice”, Boston MA.
• October 2007: Invited lecture at the Science and Mathematics Education Centre, Curtin University of Technology, Perth, Australia.
• November 2007: Conferencia invitada en el IX Congreso Nacional de Investigación Educativa, Mérida de Yucatán, México.
• December 2007: Invited lecture at the Faculty of Education of the University of Cyprus.
• January 2008: Invited keynote lecture presented at University of Oldenburg, Germany.
• July 2008: Invited lecture presented at the Oxford Round Table, St. Anne’s College, Oxford, England.
• October 2008: Invited lecture at the Graduate School of Teaching Processes, University of Koblenz-Landau, Campus Landau.