Session Information
Session 10C, Contested Terrains of Education Policy
Papers
Time:
2005-09-10
09:00-10:30
Room:
ENG
Chair:
Evie Zambeta
Contribution
Background. Lithuania has been engaged in a decade of educational reform as laid out in 'The Concept of Education', 1992. The Ministry of Education and Science (MES), together with the representatives from the President Office and the Government, had prepared a new strategy for the next decade. The Ministry of Education and Science had reformed the document of Education Law and Policy for 2002- 2012: this document had been prepared in order to reflect the reforms of the past decade and planned changes. During the last 12 years a variety of educational reforms had been designed and implemented mostly at secondary school level: the legal framework for the educational reform was established; a new content of a secondary school was formed; the system of state maturity examinations was reorganized; preparation for schools audit and monitoring of educational status been started; school libraries were modernized; a strategy of computerization in education was formed. The policy implementation into practice assumes that administrators at various levels have to interpret the expectations of policy makers by generating rules and regulations. Apart from the contradictions caused by competing bureaucratic functions, and if education is not seen as being organized intentionally by the ruling class to reproduce the existing social order (McGinn, Street, 1982), teachers eventually have to translate the rules and regulation into actual classroom practice on a day-to-day basis. In the context of this notion Fitz, Halpin, and Power (1994) discuss various strains of implementation research and distinguish a variety of forces that have an impact on the possibility to realize policy. Forces such as the historic antecedents to the development of the policy, management styles and micro politics, organizational features and legitimate authority structures within a given system, and views of the public can be regarded as influencing the transformation of policy into practice (Berkhout, Wielemans, 1999; Welsh, McGinn, 1999).Research problem. The analysis of attitudes of education stakeholders is the significant problem of educational policy. The research emphasizes on issues that include this research question: What are the significant differences in attitudes of education stakeholders (principals, head teachers, teachers, pupils, parents and students) to education policy implementation issues that exist in the 'real' (in-use) level of education policy?Aim. To illuminate the significant differences among the attitudes of education stakeholders to education policy implementation issues.Methods. Data collection: The systemic scientific literature and document analysis; questioning survey. Statistical data analysis. Data analysis: statistical procedures of Mann-Whitney and Kruskal Wallis tests; the conceptual background for empirical data analysis is based on the general principles of conflict (Collins, 1974; Dahrendorf, 1996) theory. Sample. Total sample: 1030 respondents (192 students of higher educational institutions, 246 pupils of secondary school, 180 parents, 255 teachers of secondary schools, 93 head teachers and 64 principles of secondary schools). Results. Statistical analysis indicated the differences in stakeholders' attitudes towards education policy implementation issues. The hypothesis were raised in the research that the status of the respondents influences the evaluation of the education policy implementation issues had been supported. The main statistically significant differences were uncovered between education users (students, parents etc) and providers (teachers, head - teachers etc.). Such differences could be interpreted no even statistically, but from the standpoint of the conflict theory too: between the interests' groups that have and have not the power for making decisions always exists the tension that stipulates conflicts (open and hidden). The results that are presented in this research study include the variety of aspects that are substantiated by the significant statistical differences, for example, in evaluation of existing equal opportunities to acquire the education for all the significant differences exists between head - teachers and students; teachers are well - disposed (relating to parents' attitudes) to evaluation of the existing adults' learning opportunities; the school principles are more conductive to evaluation of the opportunities to inclusion of 'problematic' children than pupils; pupils are more benevolent to opinion that learning environment is problematic than the teachers.
Search the ECER Programme
- Search for keywords and phrases in "Text Search"
- Restrict in which part of the abstracts to search in "Where to search"
- Search for authors and in the respective field.
- For planning your conference attendance you may want to use the conference app, which will be issued some weeks before the conference
- If you are a session chair, best look up your chairing duties in the conference system (Conftool) or the app.