Neoliberal discourses defining and measuring "student achievement" and "teacher success" through myopic high-stakes testing-driven criteria for "accountability," can perpetuate the very inequities these reforms purport to address. Nested within a five-year inquiry using grounded theory to investigate experiences of…

In this article, we experiment with the idea of combining path dependency, convergence and contingency in explaining Finnish distinctiveness in education policy and politics since the early 1990s. The focus of this article is on quality assurance and evaluation (QAE) in comprehensive schooling. We elaborate on and contextualise the Finnish QAE…

This paper provides a critical analysis of the Australian government's education revolution policy as promulgated in the media release document, "Quality Education: The Case for an Education Revolution in our Schools". It seeks to problematize the government's claim to marry quality and equity, via an analysis of the discursive…

In this article, a deconstructive "survol" of the term "standards" suggests that the concept contributes to an "outside-in" professionalism masquerading as "inside-out" professionalism. In examining a case of "standards" in action, the authors point out the inadequacy of "standards" as…

This article examines education accountability as a mechanism of coercive neoliberal urban governance in the USA. Drawing on Gramscian theory of the "integral state" as the dialectical synthesis of coercion, consent, and resistance, the author argues that as the crisis gives the state less room to win consent, it intensifies coercion as…

This paper examines the global policy convergence toward high-stakes testing in schools and the use of test results to "steer at a distance", particularly as it applies to policy-makers' promise to improve teacher quality. Using Deleuze's three syntheses of time in the context of the Australian policy blueprint Quality Education, this…

This paper examines teacher accountability and authority in early childhood policy. It reports on data from a study that investigated the influences affecting early childhood teacher decision-making at the preschool level in Victoria, Australia. Using a question raised by Ball "Where are the teachers in all this [policy]?" provided a…

In this paper, we undertake a particular policy critique and analysis of the gender achievement gap discourse in Ontario and Canada, and situate it within the context of what has been termed "the governance turn" in educational policy with its focus on policy as numbers and its multi-scalar manifestations. We show how this "gap…

People witness today in the US what might be considered a "generous hijacking" of educational policy. Policy debates on charters, vouchers, for profit schools, testing and evaluation companies, and "education reform" reveal a triple privatization of educational policy. Varied enactments of educational privatization dot the…

The meaning, measurement, and implications of "public opinion" have long been a source of debate. In this paper, we examine the extent to which the educational priorities of elites in the US reflect the educational priorities of the American public. To do so, we focus on one particular segment of the education policy-making elite --…

The predominant focus in this paper is on issues of school context and, in particular, on the dimensions of context at a large English comprehensive school that enable it to thrive within the current demands of the contemporary audit culture. Featuring interview data gathered from a number of senior educators, the paper draws on Braun et al's…

Italy is well known for its difficulty in introducing any educational evaluation system. This paper explores the dynamics which occurred in Italy in 2010-2011, within the context of the umpteenth national pilot of school and staff evaluation. Our research object is an unfinished project, observed in its development. We get close to the struggles…

The article focuses on the policy rhetoric of the Masters in Teaching and Learning (MTL). This is a new degree being launched in the summer of 2010 aimed, initially, at teachers who have just joined the profession. The degree presages the aspiration for a Master's level teaching profession in England. Professional development as conceived in the…

Through the example of a Danish reform of educational plans in early childhood education, this paper analyses the emergence of a new pedagogical desire related to administrative educational reforms promoting accountability, visibility and documentation. Two arguments are made: first, it is argued that the changes in administrative practices during…

This paper examines the perverse effects of the new accountability regime central to the Labor government's national reform agenda in schooling. The focus is on National Assessment Program -- Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) results that now act as "catalyst data" and are pivotal to school and system accountability. We offer a case study,…