Session Information
15 SES 05, Research Methods for Knowledge Creation in Partnerships
Paper Session
Contribution
In the context of decentralization and school autonomy policies, several normative changes have been implemented in education systems worldwide over the last decades. One of the most common transformations has been the development of school networks which lead to a complex system of regulation because it involves different actors in different scales (Barroso, 2005). Those school networks derive from organizations (or from actors within organizations) own will to joint actions that will guide, condition or influence the processes of setting goals, allocating and managing resources and, also, obtained results. School networks, therefore, embody a form of voluntary regulation of a collaborative nature (Justino & Batista, 2013) which can be conceptualized as another type of school administration and organization tool based on horizontal relationships with common goals.
The number of networks or partnerships between schools and other educational actors like university researchers, local actors or civil society organizations has been increasing in Portugal, for a variety of reasons (promoting educational success and deal with issues like school drop-outs, for example). ESCXEL Project - School Network for Excellence is one of those networks created to continuously improve quality and performance in schools. It is based on a partnership between all public school of eight municipalities (in a total of 32 school units which enrol around 59.500 students), their local authorities and a team of researchers of CICS.NOVA, an interdisciplinary centre of research at Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities from Universidade Nova de Lisboa FCSH/NOVA). Schools provide their experience and innovation capacities, local authorities main contribution is the mobilization and coordination of resources and researchers mobilize their scientific knowledge for benchmarking, collaborative learning and local education planning (see Gonçalves, Cunha & Batista, 2011).
The particularity of having a researchers’ team as a partner within this network is an illustration of how knowledge is at the centre of social action in cognitive and reflexive societies (Pons & Van Zanten, 2007). The relation between knowledge and action is used to build regulation tools and becomes in itself a regulation tool (Barroso & Afonso, 2011; Pons & Van Zanten, 2007). Benchmarking, sharing of good practices and the creation of common goals in ESCXEL Project can be considered a knowledge-based regulation tools, as they show what could be done and how (Barroso & Afonso, 2011). However, that process depends on how those tools are received, interpreted and used by local actors, which means that the meaning of knowledge is constructed during the interpretation process of the tools and not inscribed in the tools themselves (Freeman & Sturdy, 2007 in Mangez, 2011).
Regulation and reflexivity in a collaborative environment are always present in ESCXEL project activities, since all knowledge-based tools produced and disseminated within the network can induce self-evaluation and reflexivity processes among local actors on their educational practices and results (Afonso & Costa, 2011; Ozga, 2008). As mentioned above the continuing improvement of quality and performance in schools is the major goal of this project, so self-evaluation and reflexivity processed are crucial.
It has been proved difficult for research to have a real impact in education, mostly due to the fact that both producers and users of knowledge dwell in the same social, cultural and politic contexts and tools provide by producers are not clear as to expected outcomes like what happens in exact sciences (Levin, 2004). Taking those difficulties into account and also the life-long period of the ESCXEL network (it started in 2008), researchers have a set of questions to address: What are the researchers’ major contributions within the school network? How to school deans and ESCXEL network representatives in schools perceive researchers’ contributions? Have those contributions promoted changes within schools?
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
Afonso, N., & Costa, E. (2011). A avaliação externa das escolas: Um instrumento de regulação baseado no conhecimento. In J. Barroso & N. Afonso (Eds.), Políticas educativas: Mobilização de conhecimento e modos de regulação (pp.155-189). Vila Nova de Gaia: Fundação Manuel Leão. Barroso, J. (2005). O Estado, a educação e a regulação das políticas públicas. Educação & Sociedade, 26(92), 725-751. Barroso, J., & Afonso, N. (2011). Introdução. In J. Barroso & N. Afonso (Eds.), Políticas educativas: Mobilização de conhecimento e modos de regulação (pp. 11-25). Vila Nova de Gaia: Fundação Manuel Leão. Batista, S., & Gonçalves, E. (2015, September). School Networks and Knowledge Mobilisation: exploratory study in ESCXEL Project. Paper presented at ECER 2015, Budapest. Abstract retrieved from http://www.eera-ecer.de/ecer-programmes/conference/20/contribution/34798/ Delvaux, B. (2009). Qual é o papel do conhecimento na acção pública? Educação & Sociedade, 30(109), 959-985. http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/S0101-73302009000400003 Gonçalves, E. Cunha, S., & Batista, S. (2011, November). ESCXEL Project – Schools of Excellence Network. A pioneer educational project from Portugal. Proceedings from ICERI2011: 4th International Conference of Education, Research and Innovation. Madrid: IATED. Retrieved from http://library.iated.org/publications/ICERI2011 Justino, D., & Batista, S. (2013). Redes de escolas e modos de regulação do sistema educativo. Educação, Temas e Problemas. [A escola em análise: olhares sociopolíticos e organizacionais], 6(12-13), 41-60. Levin, B. (2004). Making Research Matter More. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 12 (56). Retrivied from http://epaa.asu.edu/epaa/v12n56/. Mangez, É. (2011). Economia, política e regimes do conhecimento. In Barroso, J. & Afonso, N. (Eds.), Políticas educativas: Mobilização de conhecimento e modos de regulação (pp.191-222). Vila Nova de Gaia: Fundação Manuel Leão. Ozga, J. (2009). Governing education through data in England: from regulation to self-evaluation. Journal of Education Policy, 24(2), 149-162. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02680930902733121 Pons, X., & Van Zanten, A. (2007, June). Knowledge circulation, regulation and governance. Research Report Know&Pol. Retrieved from http://knowandpol.eu/IMG/pdf/lr.tr.pons_vanzanten.eng.pdf Veugelers, W., & O’Hair, M. J. (Eds.). (2005). Network Learning for Educational Change. Maidenhead: Open University Press.
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