Table Of ContentPolicy Implications of Research in Education 3
Helen Proctor
Patrick Brownlee
Peter Freebody E ditors
Controversies
in Education
Orthodoxy and Heresy in Policy and
Practice
Policy Implications of Research in Education
Volume 3
SeriesEditors
ProfessorStephenL.Jacobson,UniversityatBuffalo–StateUniversity
ofNewYork,USA
Dr.GuriSkedsmo,UniversityofOslo,Norway
EditorialBoard
Prof.HelenGunter,UniversityofManchester,England
Prof.StephanHuber,UniversityofTeacherEducationCentralSwitzerland
Prof.JonathanJansen,UniversityoftheFreeState,SouthAfrica
Prof.KarenSeashoreLouis,UniversityofMinnesota,USA
Prof.AllanWalker,HongKongInstituteofEducation
Policy Implications of Research in Education
ScopeoftheSeries
In education, as in other fields, there are often significant gaps between research
knowledge and current policy and practice. While there are many reasons for this
gap, one that stands out is that policy-makers and practitioners may simply not
knowaboutimportantresearchfindingsbecausethesefindingsarenotpublishedin
forumsaimedatthem.
PolicyImplicationsofResearchinEducationaimstoclearlyandcomprehensively
present the implications for education policy and practice drawn from important
lines of current education research in a manner that is accessible and useful for
policy-makers,educationalauthoritiesandpractitioners.
Moreinformationaboutthisseriesathttp://www.springer.com/series/11212
Helen Proctor • Patrick Brownlee • Peter Freebody
Editors
Controversies in Education
Orthodoxy and Heresy in Policy and Practice
123
Editors
HelenProctor
PatrickBrownlee
PeterFreebody
FacultyofEducation
andSocialWork
UniversityofSydney
Sydney,NewSouthWales
Australia
ISBN978-3-319-08758-0 ISBN978-3-319-08759-7(eBook)
DOI10.1007/978-3-319-08759-7
SpringerChamHeidelbergNewYorkDordrechtLondon
LibraryofCongressControlNumber:2014948553
©SpringerInternationalPublishingSwitzerland 2015
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Contents
1 Introduction:HeresyandOrthodoxyinContemporary
Schooling: Australian Educational Policy and Global
NeoliberalReform.......................................................... 1
HelenProctor,PeterFreebody,andPatrickBrownlee
2 SchoolsNotFitforPurpose:NewApproachesfortheTimes ......... 13
JohannaWyn
3 SchoolsandCommunitiesFitforPurpose............................... 27
DorothyBottrell
4 TestingTimes:DataandTheir(Mis-)UseinSchools................... 39
PeterReimann
5 Are These Testing Times, or Is It a Time to Test?
ConsideringthePlaceofTestsinStudents’Academic
Development ................................................................ 55
AndrewJ.Martin
6 Evidence-Based Policy: Epistemologically Specious,
IdeologicallyUnsound...................................................... 63
AnthonyWelch
7 NeglectingtheEvidence:AreWeExpectingTooMuch
fromQualityTeaching?.................................................... 81
MargaretVickers
8 PublicDiversity;PrivateDisadvantage:SchoolingandEthnicity .... 91
CarolReid
9 Building New Social Movements: The
Politics of Responsibility and Accountability
inSchool-CommunityRelationships ..................................... 105
KellyFreebody
v
vi Contents
10 DoestheNewDoxaofIntegrationismMakeMulticultural
EducationaContemporaryHeresy?..................................... 113
GeorginaTsolidis
11 Multicultural Education: Contemporary Heresy
orSimplyAnotherDoxa................................................... 129
MeganWatkins
12 Why Global Policies Fail Disengaged Young People
attheLocalLevel........................................................... 139
SusanGroundwater-SmithandNicoleMockler
13 EducationPolicy‘AtRisk’ ................................................ 149
KittyteRiele
14 ‘MoneyMadeUs’:AShortHistoryofGovernmentFunds
forAustralianSchools...................................................... 157
GeoffreySheringtonandJohnP.Hughes
15 BeyondModernity?ASociologicalEngagementwith‘A
ShortHistoryofGovernmentFundingforAustralianSchools’....... 175
MartinForsey
16 MarketsAllAround:DefendingEducationinaNeoliberalTime .... 181
RaewynConnell
17 Markets Made Out of Love: Parents, Schools
andCommunitiesBeforeNeoliberalism ................................. 199
HelenProctor
18 WhoAretheHeretics?..................................................... 207
PatrickBrownleeandPeterFreebody
AuthorBios ....................................................................... 217
Chapter 1
Introduction: Heresy and Orthodoxy
in Contemporary Schooling: Australian
Educational Policy and Global
Neoliberal Reform
HelenProctor,PeterFreebody,andPatrickBrownlee
Abstract This book grew out of a colloquium series, hosted by the University
of Sydney, in which leading scholars and researchers were invited to name what
they took to be the deep, potentially lethal flaws at the heart of contemporary
schoolingpracticeandpolicy.Theywereinvitedtoidentifyandchallengeprevailing
orthodoxies and to voice their potentially ‘heretical’ views about education in the
twenty-firstcentury.ThechaptersinthisvolumearisefromanAustralianschooling
andpolicycontextthathasinternationalresonance.Australiaprovides,weargue,a
good case study of the kinds of globally popular reform strategies that have been
describedbythecelebrityFinnisheducator,PasiSahlbergas‘GERM’—theGlobal
EducationReformMovement:standardisation;afocusoncorecurriculumsubjects
attheexpenseofareassuchascreativearts;risk-avoidance;corporatemanagement
models, and test-based accountancy policies. In this chapter we introduce key
elements of our authors’ critiques of contemporary education policy and practice
and consider the purpose of critique (or ‘heresy’), and the practical impact, or
otherwise, of this kind of academic work at a time of uncertainty and change for
universityresearchandteachinginthefieldofeducation.
Thisbookgrewoutofacolloquiumseries,hostedbytheFacultyofEducationand
SocialWorkattheUniversityofSydney,inwhichleadingscholarsandresearchers
were invited to name what they took to be the deep, potentially lethal flaws at the
heartofcontemporaryeducationalpracticeandpolicy.Theywereinvitedtoidentify
andchallengeprevailingorthodoxiesandtovoicetheirpotentially‘heretical’views
abouteducationinthetwenty-firstcentury.The‘Heresies’colloquiaweredesigned
asoccasionsfordebateandcontestationnotonlyviaexchangeswiththeaudience
H.Proctor((cid:2))•P.Freebody•P.Brownlee
FacultyofEducationandSocialWork,UniversityofSydney,Sydney,NewSouthWales,Australia
e-mail:[email protected]
©SpringerInternationalPublishingSwitzerland2015 1
H.Proctoretal.(eds.),ControversiesinEducation,PolicyImplications
ofResearchinEducation3,DOI10.1007/978-3-319-08759-7__1
2 H.Proctoretal.
butalsoviatheinclusionofcriticalresponsesthatcounteredorbuiltoneachleading
address. This collection, which also includes some additional contributions, is the
outcomeofthatsetofexchanges,organisedintochapterpairs,aleadchapteranda
shorterresponse.
Heresiesnamedbyourauthorsincluded:
• The traditional age-graded school, operating on a narrowly-theorised model of
childandadolescentdevelopmentisnolonger“fitforpurpose”(Wyn).
• “Testing,formativeassessment,andevenmorerecentapproachestoperformance-
based and real-time diagnosis of learning” are informed by inadequate
understandingsofhowpeoplelearn(Reimann).
• “Evidence-based policy” is not as neutral an idea as it sounds (Welch). Neither
is“qualityteaching”(Vickers).
• Staying longer at school does not necessarily benefit “at risk” students (Reid;
Groundwater-SmithandMockler).
• “Multiculturalism”isnowahereticalproposition(Tsolidis).
• Educationitself—“thesocialprocessinwhichwenurtureanddevelopcapacities
forpractice”—iscurrentlyatrisk(Connell).
• Neoliberalsaretherealheretics(BrownleeandFreebody).
The book is predicated on the conviction that informed critique is a necessary
accompaniment to developing and sustaining good school systems. Just how
‘heretical’theassertionsaboveare,andforwhom,areissuesdiscussedbelow.
ThechaptersinthisvolumearisefromanAustralianschoolingandpolicycontext
that has international resonance. Australia provides, we argue, a good case study
of the kinds of globally popular reform strategies that have been described by the
celebrityFinnisheducator,PasiSahlberg(2011)as‘GERM’—theGlobalEducation
Reform Movement. Sahlberg lists five reform strategies that have ‘infected’ such
Anglophone countries as Australia, the US and England but which some other
more successful educational nations such as Finland, have managed thus far to
eschew. These are standardisation; a focus on core curriculum subjects at the
expense of areas such as creative arts; risk-avoidance; corporate management
models, and test-based accountancy policies. The enactment of these strategies is
framedbygovernmentsasanational—oftenindeedanationalistic—matter;theyare
encouragedandfacilitatedbyglobalcompetitionandinternationalagenciesnotably
theOECD.
This volume offers a collection of varied case studies and critiques of the
application of what is otherwise known as neoliberal education reform. Australia
isaworldleaderinsomeelementsofGERM,notablyinitswell-developedschool
choice regime (Jensen et al. 2013; Musset 2012; Campbell et al. 2009). The Aus-
traliancaseisalsocharacterisedbygrowingsocio-economicdisparities,increasing
concentration of advantage and disadvantage in its schools, and a complex set of
legislativeentanglementsaroundschooling,involvingmultiplelevelsofjurisdiction
(e.g.,seeGonski2011;SheringtonandHughes,Chap.14,thisvolume).Inthenext
sectionweintroducesomekeyelementsofourauthors’critiquesofcontemporary
educationpolicyandpractice.Wethenconsiderthepurposeofcritique(or‘heresy’),
1 Introduction:HeresyandOrthodoxyinContemporarySchooling... 3
and the practical impact, or otherwise, of this kind of academic work at a time of
uncertaintyandchangeforuniversityresearchandteachinginthefieldofeducation.
Thefinalpartofthechapteroffersaguidetothechapterpairs.
AustralianSchoolingasaCaseStudy ofNeoliberalReform
Itispossiblethattheterm,‘neoliberalism’,isbecomingoverusedincontemporary
critical discourse (see Brownlee and P. Freebody, Chap. 18, this volume on
“neoliberalfatigue”).Itiscertainlyachargeddescriptor,widelyusedbythe(many)
critics and opponents of the set of arrangements it describes, but rarely if ever
by ‘neoliberals’ themselves. Practitioners and supporters of neoliberal, or market-
orientedreformtendtodescribewhattheydoinlanguagethatassumesmoraland
ideologicalneutrality,therebyofferingfewspacesforprofessionalorpublicdebate
other than around the procedural details. In this book we nevertheless argue that
naming and explaining some of the detail of neoliberal arrangements continues
to be important, precisely in order to create spaces for thorough-going discussion
andcritique,ratherthanjusttinkeringwithdetails.WementionedaboveSahlberg’s
list of the key features of ‘GERM’, all of which are addressed in this collection.
The most detailed account of neoliberalism in this book is Raewyn Connell’s.
Contributing to an already rich critical literature (for example, Marginson 1997;
Davies and Bansel 2007; Lingard 2010; Meagher and Goodwin 2014), Connell
examines the history of Australian education policy from the 1970s to the early
2010s and locates the Australian story in a global context, reaching back to the
MonetaristexperimentsofChileinthe1970s.Shefocusesonhowaparticularset
ofpolicyandinstitutionalarrangementshascomeabout(managerialism,marketised
accountability,newhierarchiesofschooling)andhowandwhythesearrangements
seem poised to continue to dominate the provision of mass education for some
time to come. Connell argues that it is crucial to recognise the significance
of international financial markets in the shaping of national social policy and
infrastructureandalsothatmarket-orientededucationpolicyisbroughtaboutwithin
abroadbipartisanconsensusinAustralianstateandfederalgovernments.Infactthis
effectivebipartisanshippointstooneoftheissuesraisedbythisbookandelaborated
onbelow:theapparentepistemologicalschismbetweenpolicy-makersalignedwith
bothsidesofthemainpartypoliticaldivideandthekindsofcriticalsocialscientists
whohavecontributedtothisvolume.
The two main questions asked by our authors of contemporary Australian
education policy and practice are “is it fair?” and “does it work”? Of course this
is not the first and will not be the last time these questions are put, but they are
important. Concern that marketised systems of schooling exacerbate social and
educational inequality is a pervasive argument in this volume (for example, Reid;
Vickers).Aconclusiontobedrawnfromanumberofthechaptersisthatneoliberal
or market-oriented policy frameworks, despite claims about the flexibility and
responsivenesstheyafford,frequentlyfailtofostergenuineschoolengagementand
