At different points in time, different objectives have been set for what students should know and be able to do after attending school. By studying study regulations and curricula, one gains insight into how certain forms of knowledge are perceived as prerequisite to live and act under given social conditions or into experiences or expectations of what must be handled in the future.  

In the Danish upper secondary school, 2005 marks a historical turning point. From 1903 until 2005, it did not undergo any significant reform-initiated modernisations (Raae 2011: 127) but since 2005, no less than five reforms have been passed with major shifts in objectives and an increasing attention to interdisciplinarity and interdisciplinary teaching. The number of reforms within a short period of time can be seen as an indication that our globalised, rapidly changing world is increasingly perceived as risky and unstable. This is not a purely Danish phenomenon. Winter (2017) and Erikson (2017) suggest that educational reforms have come to be cornerstones of educational governance, and Lindberg & Vanyushyn (2013) describe how it leads to repeated shifts between periods of major changes and periods of minor adjustment. According to Ramirez & Boli (1987), the rationale is that a continuously process of strengthening and renewing the educational system is essential to national progress.

Previous studies show that such processes reach into schools’ work and understandings of teacher professionalism (Alvunger, 2015; Biesta, Priestley, Philippou, & Robinson, 2015; März & Kelchtermans, 2013; Schmidt & Datnow, 2005). Luttenberg and colleagues (2013) express concern that the “pressure for change can lead to perceptions of reduced autonomy and teacher discontentment” (p. 290). Also Erlandson & Karlsson (2018) are nervous about teachers. Teachers who find “their ideologies are non-consistent with a particular reform tend to reject it and emote negatively toward the change” (p. 26). In a Danish context, such concerns are well-placed. Studies in the Danish upper secondary schools show that the focus on interdisciplinarity, interdisciplinary teaching and formalised collaboration between disciplines greatly challenges teachers and teaching (Hobel 2017). In that sense, one can say that the attempt to address risks creates new forms of risk. 

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the rationale behind the shift in objectives and the increasing attention to interdisciplinarity and interdisciplinary teaching from different perspectives: In study regulations and curricula, among managers, teachers and students. Why and how are these forms of knowledge perceived as prerequisite to live and act under given social conditions? Furthermore, the purpose is to identify possible explanations for the challenges and risks that seem to be caused by the shifts. The assumption is that such explanations may be found in different and varying understandings of disciplines, disciplinarity and interdisciplinarity across managers, teachers and students and within different groups of these. Furthermore the assumption is that such variations are reasoned in more fundamental perceptions of knowledge forms.

Based on this, the paper’s research question is: 

Whichunderstandings disciplines, disciplinarity and interdisciplinarity exist in study regulations and curricula and among school managers, teachers and students, and how do these understandings relate to various more fundamental perceptions of knowledge forms?

The theoretical basis for the paper is found in sociological systems theory as it is developed by Niklas Luhmann. According to Luhmann (1998), transition grows from within. The transition processes are observed as features of the present, but as linked to past and future through experience and expectation. With reference to Koselleck’s meta theory on history, Luhmann argues that ”what moves in time is past/present/future together, in other words, the present along with its past and future horizons” (Luhmann 2000: 307).

Our methodological approach is framed as a phenomenological analysis to understand our research question as it is understood by the actors. This is achieved by combining qualitative and quantitative data collected from students, teachers and managers in 37 Danish gymnasiums (upper secondary school level) in the spring of 2018 and the autumn of 2017, respectively. The data was collected as part of the extensive, longitudenal research study ‘Reform 2017’-project carried out by the Southern University of Denmark. The metodological design has point of departure in the conceptual frame made by analysing study regulations and curricula. This frame is then applied firstly on the quatitative dataset with variable-oriented analyses (Onwuegbuzie, Slate, Leech & Collins 2009) of perceptions of knowledge forms within and across disciplines as percieved by students, teachers and managers. Secondly these results are “complemented” and “initated” in the sense of Greene et al’s taxonomy for mixed-methods designs (Greene; Valerie; Caracelli and Wendy 1989) with case-oriented analyses of the knowledge forms based on the qualitative interviews of 4 case-schools in the Reform 2017 project. The resulting conclusions on the combined and initiated mixed-method study design elaborates, enhances and creates empirical findings on the phenomenon of knowledge forms within and across disciplines. From the quantitative dataset variables describing experiences and expectations of knowledge forms are analysed through exploratory factor analysis, and simple and multiple regression analysis in the SPSS software packet (Field 2013). The data analyses are carried out for each group of students, teachers and managers seperately. There are 6226 students responses, 877 teacher responses and 126 responses from school managers from 37 physical schools and more than 40 separate gymnasium educations located at these schools in the danish gymnasium programme. The qualitative analysis unfolds the variable analysis by comitting it to the schooling context of the selected case-schools in the case-analysis, one school from each educational form in the overall gymnasium programme. This analysis will combine the perspectives of students, teachers and managers in each case focusing on interview-topics such as: how do you percieve knowledge forms in and across disciplines, how did you experience periods and/or sessions of knowledge forms across disciplines, with what and how can knowledge forms across disciplines contribute to the students’ and teachers’ learning and professional development? Each case contains 2-3 focus-group interviews with students, 3-4 personal interviews with teachers and 1-2 management interviews, all semi-structured interviews.

The aim of the paper is to understand, whether and how the challenges of interdisciplinarity can be justified in different and possibly incompatible views of knowledge in schools which is a matter of research into how the educational system responds to changes in society and what kind of transition is taking place in the educational system seen from the perspective of different actors. Based on the empirical analysis related to reforming of upper secondary education, we will describe the current phenomenon of knowledge forms within and across disciplines as percieved by students, teachers and managers in the Danish Gymnasium. This actual empirical description will be compared to the historical development of knowledge forms based on analysis of study regulations and curricula within and across disciplines. The results of the analyses will create a relevant framework for discussing the exploratory hypothesis that the educational system is trying to cope with the risks in society by focusing on tecahing the students how to learn competences, which at the same time may induce new risks for the teachers in the schools. The risks that the teachers may experience, are related to their perception of the more and more porous borders of the knowledge forms within and across disciplines as they are working to create an learning environment for teaching and training student’s competencies. Or put in short: will risk redcution for the students’ ability to cope with the risk society on one hand make teachers more unsecure on the other hand? On a lager scale, one might also ask: what are the consequences of this development in the fundamental perceptions of knowlegde forms for students, teachers and managers in the context of the this paper as a case of how the educational system responds to the rising risk in the surrounding society?

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