Teacher work under data-driven education systems: Enacting autonomy in a Victorian public school (Australia)

• In Event: "Teachers, Schools, and Data: Regulating Quality, Autonomy, and Reform in globalised times"

Proposal

Teachers' work and identity are regularly subject to multiple global and local influences (Day et al. 2006; Robertson, 2016; Voisin & Dumay, 2020). Nowadays, most of the reforms that are impacting the teaching profession are linked to what scholars have referred to as the Global Education Reform Movement, also known as GERM (Sahlberg, 2016). GERM-style reforms are inspired by New Public Management (NPM) principles and include a wide range of policy technologies (Fuller & Stevenson, 2019; Author B, 2019).

The adoption of GERM-style reforms (e.g., national curriculum, standardised testing, and accountability) has generated significant transformations in school governance and the teaching profession worldwide. Premised on a managerial and competitive view of schooling, these reforms have reinforced schools’ internal hierarchies, sometimes creating tensions between principals and teachers, as well as among teachers (Lundström, 2015; Maxcy, 2009). The adoption of new forms of curriculum control, performance metrics and data-intensive policy instruments transform social relations among teachers, creating new balances of power between collective and individual professional autonomy (Mausethagen & Mølstad, 2016), as well as reconfigured roles of teachers and their responsibilities to their colleagues, students and schools (Valli & Buese, 2007).

In doing so, GERM-style reforms have prompted changes in teachers’ identity and practice, which have been largely documented in English-speaking countries (Ball & Youdell, 2008; Author A, 2018). Different investigations suggest that these global managerial education reforms can undermine teachers’ professional autonomy (Assaf, 2008; Lundström, 2015). Even though GERM-style reforms have, at least theoretically, provided schools and teachers with notionally greater autonomy, the narrow accountability measures, curriculum control and ‘performativity’ often result in teachers feeling more constrained and under greater external pressure (i.e., see Keddie et al. 2011). In addition, an extensive body of literature has found that GERM-style reforms promote the de- (or re-) professionalisation of teachers and their work (Author A, 2021; Daliri-Ngametua & Hardy, 2022). These studies usually suggest that performance-based accountability policies (PBA) push teachers to adopt a more technical role with constraints placed on their agency and professional autonomy.

Similar trends have been observed in the Australian context, where, according to Daliri-Ngametua et al. (2023), performance pressures associated with PBA and standardized testing have eroded trust in teachers and have had negative effects on teacher autonomy and creativity (Westcott, 2022). In addition to testing, Australian teachers are also governed by a national curriculum and professional teacher standards (see Gerrard & Farrell, 2014). Like GERM more broadly, the Australian Curriculum and teacher standards are part of a broader suite of reform initiatives aimed at improving academic performance and creating greater consistency across schools and states (Savage, 2020). While the reform package is predicated on a language of autonomy and increased professionalism, scholars have been critical of the hierarchical and restrictive nature of the policies (Mockler & Groundwater-Smith, 2018).

For this paper, we were interested in the shifting nature of teachers’ identities and practice in relation to policy. With a particular focus on expertise and accountability (see Author A, 2023), we were interested in how teachers define and exercise expertise, as well as how the policy environment shapes their role and responsibilities as experts. With these purposes in mind, we report on findings from part of a larger project related to the role of teacher expertise, authority and professionalism in education in Australia, the UK, and the US. Methodologically, the article draws on interviews with eight teachers at a Victorian public primary school, as well as policy documents and artefacts related to the state curriculum policies. Interviews with the teachers were focused on the teachers’ experiences and perceptions of autonomy, professional discretion and data-use in schools. To carry out the analysis, we followed a flexible coding strategy combining predefined and inductive codes (Deterding & Waters, 2021).

The investigation highlights that the multiple dimensions of accountability affect the conditions that produce autonomy in particular ways. In doing so, autonomy takes on a particular character that may or may not enable teachers to exercise the types of autonomy that many say is indicative of authentic or meaningful professionalism. To understand the dynamic relationship between accountability and autonomy, we must first look at the ways the mandated curriculum is working to structure the teachers’ daily practice and decisions. While matters that sit within the ‘curriculum’ domain are not always explicitly associated with ‘accountability’ – which commonly focuses more on the performance- and test-based forms of accountability – we argue that curriculum mandates are very much a part of broader accountability discourses and logics. As mentioned previously, Australia very much sits within the broader GERM discourse. It has prioritised standards-based reform within its approach to accountability, with a national curriculum being centred as one of the key means for achieving this goal (see also, Savage, 2020). In our view, the extent to which teachers can exercise expert judgement about what and when to teach something is critical for professional autonomy. Or, as Gerrard and Farrell (2014) argue: ‘curriculum is developed in order to permit and constrain what happens in the classroom; it is a powerful regulator of teachers’ work’ (p 638).

Authors

• Jessica Holloway, Australian Catholic University

• Lluís Parcerisa, University of Barcelona