At Odds: School Choice Research and Arizona's Increasingly Neoliberal Policies and Values

• In Event: The Sociopolitical Context of Neoliberal Education Policy and Implications for Black Girls and Novice Principals

Abstract

Purpose & Theoretical Framework
Families in Arizona are faced with deciding among public schools with open enrollment, Arizona online instruction, charter schools, home schooling, or private schooling funded by them, tax credit scholarships or empowerment scholarship accounts (Arizona school choice). School choice literature is vast and illustrates socio-political evidence of cream skimming or selectiveness of students (Cowen, Fleming, Witte, & Wolf, 2012; Fleming, Cowen, Witte, & Wolf, 2015; Jabbar, 2016a; Jabbar, 2016b; Lubienski, Gulosino, & Weitzel, 2009), race and negative selection or shift of minority students to choice schools (Fleming et al., 2015; Scott & Holme, 2016; Waitoller & Super, 2017), stakeholder impact (Potterton, 2018a; Potterton 2018b), and isomorphism (Burke, 2016; Davies and Quirke, 2007; Henry & Dixson, 2017; Oplatka, 2004). Still, proponents of education markets continue to promote school choice policies citing the goals of education markets (Davies and Quirke, 2007; Oplatka, 2004), market theory (Cheng & Peterson, 2017; Chubb & Moe, 1990; Friedman, 1997; Smith, 1976) and neoliberal values. Thus, the purpose of this paper is to explore and interrogate school choice literature and Arizona school choice policies over the years. In this piece, I address the questions:
What is the relationship between scholarly research and Arizona’s market-based education policies?
Which types of epistemological frameworks and methods influence policy?
In analyzing the existing scholarly empirical research and Arizona’s school choice policies, I employ a post-modern framework influenced by Thomas Popkewitz’s (2000) notion of systems of ideas, which states that “power is exercised less through brute force and more through the ways in which knowledge (the rules of reason) constructs the “objects” by which we organize and act on the issues, problems, and practices of daily life.”
Methods and Data
The methods of this paper include a systematic literature review and critical discourse analysis of empirical school choice literature emphasizing methods and epistemology, critical policy analysis of Arizona’s school choice policies, and a descriptive data analysis of AZmerit (Arizona’s standardized test) scores for varying school types in Arizona.
Conclusions and Significance
In Arizona’s school choice policies, mandated state assessments, such as AZMerit, appear to outweigh scholarly empirical research of all types, regardless of the methods used. The state’s neoliberal education assessment policies provide evidence for the expansion of the state’s neoliberal school choice policies, though they fail to contextualize and situate them in the environments in which they exist. In other words, test score data do not account for social barriers and experience relating to race, socioeconomic status, and other identifying factors outlined in much of the scholarly research. This reaffirms Popkewitz’ (2000) claim that those in power determine what counts as knowledge and what to do with that knowledge. Whether intentional or not, in choosing to move forward and expand on education markets, Arizona policy-makers are refusing to acknowledge the truths and knowledge of key stakeholders, such as students, teachers, administrators, and communities. Thus, this paper seeks to contextualize the politics of “data-driven” policy-making in Arizona in order to inform future education policy research and research methods.

Author

• Stephanie Celaya Serventi, The University of Arizona