Barriers for Effective Networking in Competitive Environments: Addressing Distrust and Isolation to Promote Collaboration in the Chilean School System

• In Event: Atlantic Crossings: Research-Practice Partnerships in Europe and North and South America

Abstract

Networking has been advanced as an effective strategy for educational improvement, taking many forms and involving different agents (Author 2006; Brown & Poortman, 2018). Evidence suggests that networking can be beneficial to enhance learning in challenging contexts, when there is a shared purpose, trustful relationships and horizontal structures that allow the development of meaningful collaborative practices and collective decision-making (Author, 2016; Rincón-Gallardo & Fullan, 2016).

In several school systems, networking initiatives have been readily adopted and supported by policy arrangements that provide incentives to collaboration (Authors, 2018). In Chile, the adoption of networking as an improvement strategy has faced some challenges due to the long history of neoliberal policies characterized by hierarchical and market governance that promotes competition over collaboration among schools (González et al., 2020). Nevertheless, there is a clear intention in the education policy landscape to keep pursuing the development of school networks as strategy for educational improvement (Author et al., 2019).

Although the competitive environment of the Chilean school system can be considered a barrier for networking initiatives to become successful, we know it is not the only reason why these fail. Evidence suggests that structures, practices and professional capacities are also important to support collaborative practices among schools (Author et al., 2020). By analysing three experiences of networking in Chile, we aim understanding barriers for networking, and the way in which these networks attempted to overcome them to sustain effective collaboration in the system.

The first experience describes the implementation of the Collaborative Inquiry Networks (CIN) methodology to support collaboration between schools in one municipality, and its results promoting leadership capacities in headteachers and curriculum coordinators. This example reflects on the challenge faced by leaders using a new methodology that disrupts the hierarchical culture of the municipality, breaking schools’ isolation and reframing previous relations to increase trust. The second comes from a professional development programme for systemic leaders, where a group of principals developed focused interventions in their network of urban primary public schools to enhance the exchange of knowledge and practices among network participants. This programme required to develop actions to increase interpersonal trust and attempting to break with isolation before being able to mobilize knowledge for collaborative purposes. The third centres on the development of a model to enhance teacher leadership and professional learning in Initial Teacher Education through collaboration in a university-school partnership. The experience illustrated how the network creates a space for building trust relationships among teacher educators, school teachers and pre-service teachers.

The analysis of these experiences points towards two barriers for successful networking and collaboration: distrust and isolation among network partners. We argue that both barriers emerge from the marketization and hierarchical organization of the Chilean education system. We draw lessons for the current COVID 19 context, where issues of distrust and isolation might either become more disruptive or can be more easily addressed in competitive environments. Conclusions might be of interest to other school systems attempting to introduce a networked approach in similar policy environments.

Authors

• Romina Madrid, Universidad Católica de Valparaíso

• Mauricio Pino-Yancovic, Universidad de Chile, Centro de Investigación Avanzada en Educación (CIAE)

• Álvaro González, Universidad Catolica Silva Henriquez