The Privatization of Spanish Education: Implications for Curriculum

• In Event: The Reemergence of Curriculum Theory

Abstract

This paper characterizes, analyzes and evaluates the impact of the implementation of privatization processes in Spanish education, focusing on the cases of the Autonomous Communities of Madrid and Andalusia. The first section deals with the endogenous privatization measures of the educational system. It refers to the participation of the private sector in the development of public education, promoting an area of collaboration and allowing the introduction of the business sphere in the management of public schools. In this sense, the externalization of educational services, the franchise contracts with private companies to manage public schools, the expansion of private schools that offer non-compulsory education levels financed with public funds, and the creation and development of standardized tests and exams, are examples.

The second section focuses on the analysis of endogenous privatization dynamics. These are referred to the translation and implementation of ideas, methods, and practices taken from the private sector into the public sphere, so as the later starts functioning in an entrepreneurial way as proper businesses. Here, the paper analyzes the impact that all these processes could be exerting in the roles of different educational actors and in the formation of new purposes, obligations, and dispositions.

The third section deals with the implications of this transition for curriculum. In order to guarantee diversity among educational providers, the regional government of Madrid has recently announced that all schools will have direct control over a 35% of their curricular programs with the aim of contributing to a differentiation of the educational offer that both public and subsidized-private schools are able to provide. According to the market advocates, the existence of central and unified tests and measures will avoid potential ‘disruptions’ and problems of ‘information asymmetry’. League tables are a powerful tool to provide information but also generate an internal hierarchy among the schools in the locality and the region. They also represent another example of the adoption of these ideas not only by conservative groups but also by the agendas of supposedly more left-wing oriented organizations. As an example, El País, a national newspaper traditionally aligned with social democratic positions within the political spectrum, is the only newspaper that has been periodically publishing the results of the so-called ‘diagnose examinations’ in Madrid during the last six years. Alongside, these national evaluations have been used as the base to implement other principles promoted by the market advocates, as, for instance, the introduction of scales in the salary of the teachers according to the results of their pupils. In this direction, the Andalusian regional government created in 2008 the “Program for the Improvement of Quality and Academic Results in Public Schools”, but including also the subsidized-private schools, which regulates a raise in the salary of the teachers mainly in terms of the improvement of their students’ performance.

Finally, the paper analyzes the effects of that those privatization dynamics on the inclusion/exclusion processes of the educational system, both in Spain and, more concretely, in the two autonomous communities that take part in the research.

Author

• Antonio Olmedo, Institute of Education - University of London