Global Learning Metrics: the relationships between politics, education reforms, and educational quality

• In Event: Poster Session Group 2
  In Poster Session: Global Learning Metrics: the relationships between politics, education reforms, and educational quality

Proposal

This poster will address how education systems are changing their relationships with citizenly, the bureaucracy, and the world system while engaging in the pursuit of global and other standards of educational quality.

Firstly, the poster examines what is already known about the desirability of Global Learning Metrics (GLM) and the dangers associated with its limited focus on basic skills and the emergence of the data-oriented accountability regimes. I look first at why nearly three-quarters of developing countries had participated in at least one national, regional, or international assessment according to the literature (e.g., Kamens and Benavot, 2011), and I detail the interests and motivations of various national actors that have resulted from this work. I note the minimal focus on global politics and the changing relationships between states and various non-state actors including international organizations, regional intergovernmental organizations, and global education industry (GEI) (Verger, Steiner-Khamsi, and Lubienski, 2017) relative to other research on the dangers of GLM stemming from contextual insensitivity and also the limited work which foregrounds the narrow focus on the policy process. It is this gap to which I aim to contribute.

This poster inquires how various actors interact in the structure of governance by negotiating a reflexive network of decisions and actions. Some point to implicit beliefs of GLM proponents who promote the idea that quality-of-outcomes-driven policies are a primary causal factor leading to a successful educational system. It also suggests the pattern of participation in GLM and their network of promoters resemble international regimes as a wide range of policy actors pursuing educational quality support GLM either explicitly or implicitly (Valverde, 2014).

Using Lao PDR as a case, I aim to illuminate the complexities of the relationships between domestic education policy-making and implementation and the forces of global and regional educational advocacy. I chose Laos because the Lao Ministry of Education and Sports conducted three different assessments (one national, one regional, and one international) with the official development assistance from the Australian Government, UNICEF and Southeast Asia Ministers of Education Organization (SEAMEO), and the World Bank in 2017 and 2018. Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER), a not-for-profit organization, provides technical expertise to the former two assessments. To give an example of how promoters frame their strategies, UNICEF espouses that the regional assessment for the South-East Asia Primary Learning Metric (SEA-PLM) - a collaboration between SEAMEO, UNICEF, and ACER - aims to strengthen the capacity of national examination and assessment staff, and support collaboration on the development of learning assessments and standards, across the education systems of member countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) (UNICEF and SEAMEO, 2020).

The presentation will discuss the brief review of existing literature, a qualitative research design triangulating in-depth interviews, observation, and the analysis of key documents, and preliminary results.

Author

• Kana Takahashi, State University of New York at Albany