Complex knowledge and the politics of complexity reduction in 'evidence-based' school improvement in England

Author(s):

Agnieszka Bates(presenting / submitting)

Conference:

ECER 2015

Network:

23. Policy Studies and Politics of Education

Format:

Paper

Session Information

23 SES 10 B, Evidence Based Approaches to Policy Making

Paper Session

Time:

2015-09-10

15:30-17:00

Room:

418.Oktatóterem [C]

Chair:

Ninni Wahlstrom

Contribution

Since the 1990s, evidence-based policy in England has increasingly relied on positivist research methodologies to supply policy-makers and school leaders with a knowledge base of 'what works' in the education system. For example, the scientific research design of the randomised controlled trials (RCT) has been elevated to the 'gold standard' of research-based education policy and school improvement (Cohen et al. 2011; Hammersley 2013). Similar to their application in medical research, educational RCTs are utilised in conjunction with 'systematic reviews' or 'rapid evidence synthesis' involving statistical meta-analyses of all relevant research about a particular 'intervention' (Hammersley 2013; Scott and McNeish 2013). Knowledge of 'what works' is then 'mobilised' for leveraging interventions throughout the system independently of the local context.

Similar positivist methodological approaches have been rolled out internationally, giving rise to new global modes of governance in education. As noted by Sellar and Lingard (2014), the evidence informing the global policy field has increasingly been produced by supranational organisations such as the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). Much of the OECD research relies on quantifying national education systems and using large data samples to increase the explanatory potential of international comparisons, in an exercise of conceptualising the globe as a 'commensurate space of performance measurement' (Sellar and Lingard 2014: 932). Nothing less than a speedy 'transformation' (DCSF 2005; DfE 2010; OECD 2008, 2009) or an education 'revolution' (Barber 1997; Hursh 2005; Lingard 2010) is expected from schools as they transition towards evidence-based school improvement.

There are, however, limitations to these approaches, including the constraints on school leaders, who struggle with the rapidly changing policy demands emanating from the 'what works' approach. By utilising an analytical framework of complexity theory, this paper will illustrate how the claims to the universal validity of normative policy solutions articulated within these approaches engage in a 'complexity reduction' (Biesta 2010) which distorts educational improvement frequently for particular political ends. Because these global policy approaches are bound up with improvement strategies that are myopically focused on student performance data, they also limit the possibilities of alternative educational transition(s). Two questions, therefore, arise:

How else can we conceptualise the complexities of leading educational transition(s) towards complex forms of knowledge?
Whose interests are served by the complexity reduction inherent in evidence-based policy approaches?

This paper will discuss the implications of recent developments within the complexity sciences for researching complex social phenomena such educational improvement.

Method

An analytical framework of 'complex forms of knowledge' is applied in this conceptual paper to evaluate the politics of complexity reduction in English education policy post-1990. As emphasised by a number of complexity scholars researching 'the complex social' (Byrne and Callaghan 2014), developments within the complexity sciences point to a number of important orientations to researching complex social settings and processes. First, researching complexity is premised on an 'open-world ontology' which assumes that the world is dynamic and always in the process of becoming (Tsoukas 2005: 4-5). Second, it calls for an 'enactivist' epistemology based on viewing knowledge as a product of an active knower, who inevitably follows particular 'historically shaped cognitive practices' (ibid.). Third, it is impossible for a complexity researcher to assume an external, 'objective' vantage point as a detached observer and knower of 'truth' (Stacey 2010; 2012). Fourth, a commitment to complexity entails a cautious approach to methodologies which rely on excessive abstraction or categorisation (Stacey 2012) and a recognition that human interactions are 'relatively opaque in [their] consequences but can be modified through reflexive evaluation' (Tsoukas 2005: 5). Last, that applying complexity theory to the social world needs to be mediated through a rigorous attention to issues raised in social theory (Byrne and Callaghan 2014; Stacey 2012). Complex forms of knowledge understand the world as 'being full of possibilities' enacted by purposeful professionals engaging in practice that knows itself from 'within' (Tsoukas 2005). They are aligned with research which values the uniqueness of particular contexts and multiple meanings of the individual and collective endeavours which arise from everyday interactions. The process of knowledge production aims at capturing the 'essence' of the 'human condition or social context of the times' (Simons 2009: 167) and communicating it in ways that may improve educational practice through deeper understandings. Complex knowledge is subjective, rich in descriptive detail and deep meaning, though often at the expense of generalisation.

Expected Outcomes

There are clear tensions between complex forms of knowledge and the evidence-based approaches prevalent in the policy approaches to school improvement in England. Epistemologies oriented towards complexity reduction focus on 'outcomes', reduce objects of study to numerical values and disparate phenomena to abstract categories that can be compared. They seek prediction and generalisation. Based on claims to universal applicability, positivist knowledge is deployed to engineer educational transition(s) and reduce education to a 'perfectly controllable and perfectly predictable technology' (Biesta and Osberg 2010: 1). The shortcomings of these epistemologies include inflated claims to knowledge and an anti-professional bias which undermines the value of local knowledge (Hammersley 2013). Accordingly, evidence-based leadership is increasingly constructed as efficient implementation of policy, compliance and 'thoughtlessness' in the application of knowledge (Gunter 2014: 97). In Government-funded research, it is frequently private consultants who are commissioned rather than educational researchers and academics, which can push independent (and critical) research conducted at universities to the margins. This enables government interventions into research design, on the basis of 'quality delivery' and 'relevant findings' (Gunter et al. 2014: 5). For example, a recent UK government-funded research project on evidence-based school improvement recommends that researchers avoid 'jargon' and make explicit their 'implications for practice, what the pitfalls may be, and which elements should (and should not) be adapted' (Scott and McNeish 2013: 25). Innovation in educational leadership development is also increasingly linked to knowledge produced in the private for-profit sector and 'delivered' to schools in the form of 'pre-packaged', simplistic solutions (Gunter et al. 2014). In this context, complex knowledge can counter the politics of complexity reduction and open up debates about genuine 'innovation' in educational transition(s).

References

Barber, M. 1997. The Learning Game: Arguments for an education revolution. London: Indigo. Biesta, G. 2010. 'Five theses on complexity reduction and its politics'. In 'Complexity, consciousness and curriculum'. In D. Osberg and G. Biesta (Eds.) Complexity Theory and the Politics of Education. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers, 5-14. Biesta, G. and Osberg, D. 2010. 'Complexity, education and politics for the inside-out and the outside-in: An introduction.' In 'Complexity, consciousness and curriculum'. In D. Osberg and G. Biesta (Eds.) Complexity Theory and the Politics of Education. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers, 1-4. Byrne, D. and Callaghan, G. 2014. Complexity Theory and the Social Sciences: The state of the art. Oxon: Routledge. Cohen, L., Manion, L. and K. Morrison. 2011. Research Methods in Education (7th ed.). Oxon: Routledge. DCSF (Department for Children Schools and Families). 2006. Primary National Strategy. http://nationalstrategies.standards.dcsf.gov.uk/primary/primaryframework. DfE (Department for Education). 2010. The importance of teaching: The schools White Paper 2010. www.ictliteracy. info/rf.pdf/Schools-White-Paper2010.pdf. Gunter, H.M. 2014. Educational Leadership and Hannah Arendt. London: Routledge. Gunter, H.M., Hall, D. and C. Mills (Eds.) 2014. Education Policy Research: Design and Practice at a Time of Rapid Reform. London: Bloomsbury Publishing Plc. Hammersley, M. 2013. The Myth of Research-based Policy & Practice. London: Sage Publications Ltd. Hursh, D. 2008. High-Stakes Testing and the Decline of Teaching and Learning: The Real Crisis in Education. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield. Lingard. B. 2010. Policy borrowing, policy learning: testing times in Australian schooling, Critical Studies in Education (51)2: 129-147. OECD. 2008. Improving School Leadership VOLUME 2: CASE STUDIES ON SYSTEM LEADERSHIP. www.sourceoecd.org/education/9789264044678. OECD. 2009. Creating Effective Teaching and Learning Environments. First Results from TALIS: Teaching and Learning International Survey. http://www.oecd.org/education/school/43023606.pdf. Scott, S. and McNeish, D. 2013. School leadership evidence review: using research evidence to support school improvement. www.nationalcollege.org.uk/publications. Sellar, S. and Lingard, B. 2014.The OECD and the expansion of PISA: new global modes of governance in education, British Educational Research Journal, (40)6: 917-936. Simons, H. 2009. Case Study Research in Practice. London: Sage Publications Ltd. Stacey, R.D. 2010. Complexity and Organisational Reality: Uncertainty and the need to rethink management after the collapse of investment capitalism. London: Routledge. Stacey, R.D. 2012. Tools and Techniques of Leadership and Management: Meeting the challenge of complexity. London and New York: Routledge. Tsoukas, H. 2005. Complex Knowledge: Studies in Organizational Epistemology. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Author Information

Agnieszka Bates (presenting / submitting)

University of East Anglia

Education

Norwich

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