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In this paper we describe some of the complexities involved in the construction of a sample of 'ordinary' schools. We outline the policy context in England that produces pressures to resist 'ordinariness'. The paper then explores two theoretical tools, fabrication and rhetoric, that are deployed in an analysis of some key artefacts of fabrication from schools in England. Through an examination of artefacts such as school brochures and websites, this paper asks whether there are any 'ordinary' schools in these performative times? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the apparent internal coherence of a programme of agrarian development in India and the distortions and contradictions arising out of its practical implementation. Our object is to examine official policy with regard to tribal residential schools in India, known as ashram shalas. These schools represent an innovation and are different from the general type of day primary schools seen in rural India. In ashram schools, tribal pupils are provided free boarding facilities, together with free school uniforms, text books and other learning materials. These schools are expected to impart elementary education in areas which are remote and sparsely populated and where, on account of the geographic spread of the numerous hamlets, single teacher schools cannot be established. Our study is aimed at understanding official policy in the context of ashram schools, and at providing an arena for bringing to the surface the fundamental contradictions played out in areas of the school situation, specifically relating to: (a) the school organizational structure; (b) the teaching practice; (c) dropout; (d) school-community relations; and (e) area development. The paper is presented in two major parts: (a) the first section will try to relate the functioning of the ashram schools to how the state plans and administers schools with respect to access to them; (b) the second section examines the ashram school as a locus of a wider and general social problem of relating education to social economic and developmental purposes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Global and national agendas to improve the 'quality' of Education For All have brought focus to pedagogic processes in developing country contexts. How can development research pay attention to the social and political significance of pedagogical projects and understand the micro-processes of classroom reform? This paper considers how Basil Bernstein's sociological theories helped develop a nuanced account of pedagogic reform in a study of Indian primary education. I explore how the analysis encouraged by Bernstein's concepts of recontextualisation and educational codes may contribute to current thinking on the role and significance of pedagogy in development research and evaluation activities. The paper also raises caution about the selectiveness and limits of efforts to capture, identify, measure or assess pedagogic processes and change. A Bernsteinian research approach is not immune from producing the kinds of reductionist accounts of pedagogy of which the analysis is wary. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores recent changes in tertiary education policy in New Zealand, which are designed to address legitimation deficits. By offering an analysis of the making, and the subsequent unmaking, of quasi-markets in tertiary education, this paper attempts to describe how the state dealt with legitimation deficits resulting from providers' of tertiary education use of the adult and community education funding category to increase their revenues. In providing this description, the paper helps to provide a way of understanding how the state in New Zealand has responded to legitimation deficits by introducing a new regime of governance. The paper concludes by arguing that, in terms of its treatment of category 5.1 funding, this regime is supportive of neo-conservative goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although not fully established, the National Grid for Learning (NGfL) initiative is already being presented by both government and industry as offering students, teachers and school extensive freedom and autonomy in their day-to-day work. However, this paper argues that the official discursive construction of the NGfL in this way, as a ‘panacea’ to educational problems, obscures vital issues of power and control that may only become apparent once the initiative is fully integrated at the classroom level. Drawing initially on the work of Foucault, and then Poster’s more recent conception of the electronic ‘SuperPanopticon’, this paper re-examines the basis of the NGfL and its role in extending and reinforcing existing power configurations in education. The paper concludes by considering directions for future research into the NGfL, and educational use of the Internet in the light of this analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses sociologically the current form of school-based secondary assessment, in Queensland which is criterion-referenced to Year 10 and a hybrid criterion/norm referenced form at the end of Year 12. Habermas' arguments are used to suggest that this. assessment pattern will give the state potentially greater 'steering capacity' over education by 'rationalising' it-the 'scientisation of schooling'. This form of assessment fits within the accountability discourse of the economically parsimonious 1980 while meeting selection demands. However, the approach does meet some educational demands. The paper also reflects upon the role of the state and expert knowledge in policy formulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sex education is a politically contentious issue in many countries, and there are numerous, competing ideologies relating to the most appropriate methods to teach young people about sexual and reproductive health. This paper examines policy and practice in Uganda in light of two contrasting ideologies, namely morally conservative and comprehensive rights-based approaches to sex education. After a brief description of these approaches, findings from a preliminary qualitative study among teachers working in a non-governmental organisation-run secondary school in Uganda are discussed. Teachers’ responses are analysed against the background of current Ugandan sex education policies. The paper considers the implications of the conservative morality informing both Ugandan government policy and teachers’ implementation of sex education at the focus school. It is argued that, in the light of young Ugandans’ attitudes towards and often varied experiences of sexuality, a comprehensive rights-based approach to sex education may be more appropriate in the described setting. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this paper we draw on concepts from policy sociology to analyse the new equity deal for schools in Queensland, Australia. We examine this 'new deal' through an analysis of the language of 'inclusion' and 'educational risk' in key policy documents associated with a major reform of public education in Queensland. In addition, we analyse the interview talk of key policy actors involved in policy framing, carriage and monitoring. We note that globalism has increased rather than reduced social inequity. At the same time, good quality accessible education can play a crucial role in challenging the inequalities produced by global informationalism. In Queensland, Australia, equity is still on the agenda, but in radically new neo-liberal economic ways. The focus is individualistic - each individual needs to be tracked because they are potentially 'at-risk' of 'school failure'. Identification of 'at-risk' students has been devolved to the level of the school and district, and intervention strategies have to be devised at the local level. Stories of success are then to be shared/networked with other schools. We suggest that while 'target group equity' strategies were limited in terms of addressing issues of social exclusion and inequity, the new deal on equity, a market-individualistic approach is an inadequate alternative. In tough times you stick together. ... This was Labor's 'inclusive' society: a social democracy sustained by the wealth-generating power of free markets and economic integration with the world economy, and made strong by a practical ethic of social cooperation and fair distribution. (Watson, 2002, p. 316) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the context of globalisation and hegemonic neoliberalism, the state's ability to legitimate the economic system and its own policies cannot be assumed as a positive automatic effect. The economic and political conditions that once framed state action have changed, and it is reasonable to think that the emergence of a new accumulation regime implies also a shift in the traditional strategies used by the nation-state to legitimate its policy-making. This paper reviews how the neoliberal educational agenda develops a new political rationality that changes the traditional forms in which the state has managed its legitimation crisis. In addition, the paper argues that context-based factors, nationally specific, show that this political rationality may not be uniformly applied among different nation-states. The case of semiperipheral countries provides some evidence on the necessary combination of old and new strategies developed by the state to legitimate a neoliberal agenda. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is about middle schools and the effects of recent policies on the curricula organisation of six of them. We begin by establishing some general links between middle school origins, brief history and development, and wider economic and political forces for change Drawing on four years of research with a group of schools in one local authority, we describe some of the directions of change which followed the Great Debate. We highlight recent changes as these schools came under increasing bureaucratic control, with the emphasis on the organisation of pupil selection and changes from mixed ability grouping, to setting, and back to mixed ability groups. We conclude with some theoretical discussion related to the work of Habermas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines how affirmative action in Brazilian public universities has evolved from the start of the new millennium up to recent years. After an overview of the existing policies in public universities, we explain these patterns based on an analysis of the processes internal and external to the universities. Although these policies were initially thought of as racial quotas, class-based criteria have predominated, while the racial criteria became relatively circumscribed. Within the institutions, affirmative action brought new concerns about how to support and retain low-income students, as well as a discussion about racism, although the latter remains controversial. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper examines the re-articulation of social justice as equity in schooling policy through national and global testing and data infrastructures. It focuses on the Australian National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) and the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). We analyse the discursive reconstitution of social justice as equity in Australian and OECD policy, and analyse NAPLAN and PISA as technologies of governance that re-articulate equity as a measure of performance. These re-articulations are set against the extension of neo-social economistic rationalities to all domains of life and the topological production of new spaces of policy and power. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this paper we examine the factors contributing to gender inequality in secondary schooling in India by critically reviewing the government’s secondary education policy. Drawing on the findings of a study in rural Gujarat, we couple this analysis with an examination of the gendered dynamics that restrict girls’ ability to fully benefit from the education infrastructure and initiatives that do exist, using Connell’s Gender and Power framework. We propose that an extension of the government's current approach to educational reform, focused primarily on expanding infrastructure may aggravate the gender, class and caste asymmetries at secondary level. Fostering an environment that enables vulnerable adolescent girls to benefit from enhanced educational provisions is essential to realizing their rights and the achievement of an equitable system. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper considers the way social partnerships tend to be represented as either horizontal localised networks or neo-liberal policy instruments. Building on two empirical studies of partnerships, we argue that partnerships cannot be understood in either/or ways but are negotiated at the interface between central agencies and local networks. They are mediated by networks operating through the partnership and through government and community, and by the different organisational logics of agencies. These complexities challenge our ways of analysing and representing partnerships, and justify further research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines notions of 'educational time' with particular reference to the work of Basil Bernstein. It focuses closely on the 1967 Plowden report as a particularly appropriate policy case study to demonstrate how different constructions of time can exist within the same document. It then develops educational models originally mapped out by Bernstein, arguing that a full understanding of the areas of consensus and conflict among these models is vital if we are to understand how teaching professionals think about the future. The paper addresses the following questions: How does time affects education? What influence does this have on educational outcomes? How does this relate to public policy initiatives? Assuming a tacit, collective understanding of time and the future can undermine the very policy intentions a government might be seeking to promulgate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the most pervasive educational issues confronting Australia, and other countries, at the moment is the declining completion rates in high schools. While a period of success was experienced after the Second World War, there is now a pressing need to reform high schools in the ways they connect with young lives. In this paper, we present a 'sociology of the high school' as a way of encapsulating the high school as an institution that: is still largely stuck in a 'continuity of practice' (Elmore, 1987); has an 'attachment to familiar pedagogical routines' (Eisner, 1992); fails to listen to students; is hierarchically structured; treats students in immature ways; is hung up with passing on content; and seems more concerned with insulating itself from, rather connecting with or appropriating, young lives into the curriculum. As an alternative, we examine the notion of middle schooling that requires a version of whole school reform that engages with structures, cultures and changing pedagogy in ways more resonant with, and respectful of, young lives. We examine the tensions and dilemmas experienced at Investigator [1] High School in Australia, and conclude that the centerpiece has to be breaking the mold of the 'scripted' teacher and its replacement by the 'teacher-as-improviser'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues that theorizations of the state which are sensitive to both its durability and its permeability, and theorizations which can account for the massive interconnections between local and global forces as well as different material and discursive sites are missing from contemporary work in the sociology of education. Drawing on Foucault’s notion of ‘governmentality’ as a key resource for addressing this impasse, the authors highlight the constant fabrication of racial identity through the production of the pure space of racial origins or ‘resentment’—the process of defining one’s identity through the negation of the other. This dynamic, the article maintains, now informs key discourses both in popular culture and education. The authors conclude that these processes operate in tandem in the prosecution of the politics of racial exclusion in our times, informing key policy debates, including those around affirmative action and bilingual education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper critically assesses Chris Shilling's claims that structuration theory provides a new and important direction for sociology of education. That assessment is conducted with particular reference to the long-standing research programme in the sociology of education, known as the differentiation-polarisation theory (d-p). The plausibility of the claim that d-p is positivist is examined, and the extent to which d-p meets the supposed inadequacies of sociology of education allegedly exposed by structuration theory is investigated. It is concluded that the novelty and importance of structuration theory for sociology of education and a fortiori education policy remains unproven. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the relationship between the Conservative 'educational reforms' in the 1980s, which purported to give parents more democratic rights as consumers and participants in education, and changes in family life in Britain. It focuses on those demographic, familial changes, in particular in gender relationships, towards mothers having more public and private responsibilities for children and their education. It looks at whether these changes in family life have, in fact, been taken account of in 'educational reforms'. It asks the question about whether 'education reforms' which give more democratic rights to parents in general allow for more democratic rights for women as mothers, in the contexts of lone motherhood, maternal participation in paid employment and adult/higher education. On the other hand, are the implications of such education changes to increase the private responsibilities, rather than democratic rights, of motherhood? Although family is on the education policy agenda, it is not clear that gender is on the agenda. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Throughout most of the 1960s there was considerable optimism among education policy makers that schools could foster equality of opportunity could mitigate social class disparities in educational achievements. During the 1980s a growing number of local education authorities have produced policy documents which are designed to remedy racism, 'racial' inequalities and 'racial' disparities in achievements. This article argues that these more recent initiatives mirror very clearly the earlier, class based, definitions of problems, explanatory paradigms and policy recommendations. It suggests that the racialisation of structural inequalities, the politicisation of 'race' issues locally and the contradictions generated by four particular crises of legitimacy within education provide the context within which antiracist policies can be understood. It asks what lessons can be learned from the demise and failure of earlier class-based education policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reflects on the issue of social policy and education. Political debate about education has moved away from an apparent concern with inequality and the links between education and poverty or strategies to modify these problems, to discussion of education's role in the economic recession. At the same time, many social scientists have eschewed political participation in government as an arena for their research. Many have resorted to different political arenas for the implementation of their research-based strategies. Others have resisted political action and resorted to policy analysis. Many interested in educational policy have moved away from explicit lobbying tactics and focus less directly on the organization of compulsory education, especially secondary schools. Interest centers more on issues traditionally seen as marginal to compulsory schooling, although there is no consensus of what that interest should consist. Much recent work on education takes the state as central, as do other political economies of social policy, in attempts to understand the characteristics of the relationship between education and the economy. This approach cannot be separated from the current concerns of much of the contemporary sociology of education.

This article draws on the case of academic work produced by Colombian scholars, to address the debate on the persistent failure of policy efforts to improve school effectiveness. Realist meta-theory plays a significant role in this research, because it provides a general framework to identify ontological problems and inconsistencies in empirical and theoretical positions informing policy debates in the country. The analysis focuses on the contributions and weaknesses of empiricism, structuralism and post-structuralism in the work of Colombian scholars, and concludes by arguing for the need to deploy research methodologies that study stratified emergent social processes behind observable educational outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The professionalisation of teaching in Australia is a policy shift that transpires within broader policy dynamics which are increasingly influenced by neoliberal logics. In this article we examine teacher responsibility through analysis of a new measure introduced in Victoria. This requires teachers to prove professional development hours in the area of teaching students with special needs in order to maintain their professional registration. Through our analysis of this policy move we draw out some tensions that emerge in relation to teacher responsibility, accountability and autonomy to reveal that (often hidden) neoliberal governing logics can operate to shift teachers’ focus from care of the student towards care of the (professional) self. With the theoretical support of Nel Noddings’ ‘ethic of care’, we argue that teacher responsibility to care can be torn between market-based regulations and the care of the student, paradoxically de-professionalising teachers’ work in the act of attempting to professionalise. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

When Piketty’s bookCapital in the Twenty-first Centurywas released in 2014, it became an overnight success. Piketty focused on the concentration of wealth in a tiny social elite, and showed that their wealth had increased following the financial crisis in 2008. Yet the value of Piketty’s book offers something more than this for social scientists concerned with social inequalities. His work on a large data-set of long-run income and wealth statistics illustrates that the assumptions and models which have guided the work of neoclassical economists are flawed, but that societal arrangements matter. Yet despite this insight, Piketty’s solution to the problem of inequality is to argue that ‘… the best way to reduce inequalities with respect to labor … is to invest in education’. In this article I argue that there are major problems with this proposed solution and outline three lacunae that need to be addressed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is concerned with teachers’ negotiation of global transitions premised on improving educational opportunity with implications for professionalism. The study blends sociology of gender, work, and organisations and gender policy analysis to theorise teachers’ policy negotiations. I explore how 20 Argentine teachers mediate 3 programmes’ demands for care work. Policy as practice and street-level bureaucracy are applied to data to interrogate for gendered boundary work. I propose the addition of care work, gender, and a street-level view to Maguire’s global teacher. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Employing a Weberian understanding of the centrality of a strong bureaucracy in the modern nation-state, this article examines the relationship between the state and elite education in France. Through a historical analysis and an examination of two current issues facing education – widening participation and pressures to internationalise – we illustrate how the legitimacy of the administrative and political establishments, as well as the status granted to elite education tracks, has been largely preserved. Furthermore, dominant social classes have actively played a role in this alliance, thereby limiting the circle of eligible individuals who can aspire to future elite positions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Educational under-achievement by a section of the Maori population is a persistent problem for New Zealand. This article is a theoretical examination of the practice and consequences of a culture-based curriculum that is promoted as the solution. We develop the argument that not only is the ‘cultural solution’ at odds with the complex social reality in New Zealand, but it is itself a contributor to educational under-achievement. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article examines the effects of social capital on the likelihood of dropping out from the compulsory education system (Grades One through Eight) in Turkey. It focuses on the question of whether school-related social capital can provide the means to stay in school in the presence of risk factors such as socioeconomic status, race, or gender that cannot be easily modified. Despite major progress in enrollment rates due to policies enacted in recent years, the overall drop-out rate in compulsory education is close to 15% in Turkey. Data collected from 764 student–mother pairs show that drop-outs are exposed to higher number of social risk factors. We further illustrate that school-related social capital, as measured by quality of in-school teacher–student interactions as well as parental involvement in school, significantly and positively contributes to adolescents’ likelihood of staying in school even in the presence of severe social inequalities. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The integration of care and education across pre-school sectors of several European countries is currently a key policy priority. In England this necessitates reform aimed at re-modelling a traditionally hierarchical and divided workforce. Drawing on research with early years professionals, this article explores the micro-politics of reform with a focus on the extent to which workers in pre-school settings are engaging in new collaborative ways of working. In particular, the transformative potential of the communities of practice model in shaping changes to the early years workforce is discussed. Findings reveal the intersection of social class as labour-market position with several cross-cutting issues and their importance in perpetuating continuing inequalities of process. These present a challenge to the emergence of any new form of collaborative inter-professional working arrangements within the English early years context. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

An essay is presented on further education (FE) in England and related issues such as socioeconomic factors in educational policy, the state's interest in preparing skilled employees for business needs, and social justice in the FE sector. Policy rhetoric concerning competitiveness in a global economy, the development of a vocational education and training system that is based on market demand, and the failure of a supply-led model for the development of human capital are discussed.

After World War II, Chinese residents of Singapore demanded the establishment of local Chinese universities. The ruling regime, however, which was under the shadow of the neighboring Malay-dominated Malay Peninsula, was forced to suppress the development of such schools. In Hong Kong, the British needed to install a Chinese university to counter Beijing's and Taiwan's campaigns for recruiting students from the colony. As Hong Kong was a monoracial Chinese society, the government, not having to worry about the reaction of other indigenous groups, met this challenge by founding a fully recognized Chinese university. This research demonstrates that under diverse backgrounds of racial politics, state authorities have unequal latitudes to accommodate the educational institutions of subordinated racial groups. It also reveals that state education policies in small and dependent settings, unlike those in big and sovereign nations, are more susceptible to pressures from external powers and influences from the metropolis. These findings urge scholars to pay more attention to the factor of race and use comparative methods when employing the theories of state and hegemony to investigate education and power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Higher education (as learning and teaching) is increasingly regulated by the state yet is simultaneously being opened up to market forces. Is the system being nationalised or 'marketised'? Opinion is divided, but the debate is often confused by a lack of theoretical explicitness so that inconsistencies, contradictions and dubious elisions are allowed to persist unremarked. Through a critical engagement with the literatures on quasi-markets, the free economy and the strong state, neo-liberalism, and 'steering at a distance', this article identifies three models implicit in discussion of the 'modernisation' of higher education. The first treats marketisation and state intervention as incompatible strategies for reform, the second argues that state intervention may contribute to the success of a higher educational market economy (thus subordinating the state to the market), while the third proposes that market relations are mobilised in the cause of centralised policy objectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses issues on the sociology of education in the Netherlands as of 1982. Like in most European countries and in the U.S., sociologists in the Netherlands have only recently shown a systematic and empirical concern with matters of education and socialization in general. In fact it was only after 1950 that the first few research projects were done and it was 1964 before the Dutch sociologists officially began to show interest in the subject when the Netherlands Sociological Society held a conference devoted to the basic problems of the sociology of education. Most of the teaching and research work in the sociology of education has taken place in the university departments of sociology and definitely not in institutes and colleges of education. More and more, the academic study of education is being built upon a few basic disciplines. In the country, there is a movement towards more or less interdisciplinary departments of education in which sociologists of education participate from their own sociological departments. In the Netherlands, a considerable part of the sociological research in the field of education is carried out in institutes which were specifically founded for that purpose. Dutch sociologists of education have organized themselves quite firmly to create favorable conditions for the development of their discipline. Four fields or subjects which cover most of the Dutch activities in the field of sociology of education, both in terms of theory and research. These are: social inequality in education, education and economy labor market and qualification, the school as an institution and educational policy.

The article presents a reply to Harold Silver's review of Unpopular Education. Silver's review calls for a sustained re-examination and reappraisal of educational policy experience and for debate how to do it. Instead of debating our findings and arguments, Silver delivers a little inaugural lecture on the subject of real History. Indeed, he seems to be pretty sure what real sociology and real political science are too. The main charge against Unpopular Education is that it does not conform to any of these reputable academic practices. He casts it instead into a limbo of its own, along with some other restless characters. The first page of the review contains a number of formulations about the nature of history. Description entails selection and emphasis. All historical work is influenced, informed or governed by some kind of theory. Historical descriptions are often conducted as, or amount to case studies in the relevant theory whether or not it is explicit. The confusions in Silver's own stance allow him to hold simultaneously that Unpopular Education is a work of history and not history at all. As history it is faulty it omits themes central to any form of analysis of the period. As theory it is ideological because, so the argument seems to run, it is too explicit. Yet the foils against which these judgements are made remain extremely evasive. The logic of analysis seems indeed Platonic.