Accountability and Improvement: Finding a Balance Through School Evaluation

• In Event: Roundtable Session 100
  In Roundtable Session: Accountability as More Than Testing and Sanctions: Alternative Instruments to Improve Schools From Around the World

Abstract

How to balance the tension between accountability and improvement in schooling systems is a problem that vexes governments, policy makers, schools, educational researchers and theorists. This paper outlines how the government agency in New Zealand responsible for school evaluation, the Education Review Office, sought to achieve an appropriate balance. Through iterations of the Building Capacity in Evaluation (BCiE) project, the agency came to develop a conceptual model of “complementary evaluation” to underpin their future directions.

Author

• Carol Anne Mutch, University of Auckland