Building Consensus: Idea Brokerage in Teacher Policy Networks

Abstract

We show how policy makers converged to support similar reforms on a major educational issue: teacher effectiveness. Our study demonstrates the importance of idea brokers—actors that facilitate connections between preferences in policy networks and promote consensus around new policy ideas. Our study is based on analysis of testimony from 200 Congressional hearings from 2001 to 2015. We use discourse network analysis to examine network ties based on policy preferences expressed in hearings. We visualize policy networks, identify brokers, and estimate exponential random graph models to examine policy changes between the Bush and Obama administrations. We show how idea brokerage is associated with a convergence of policy preferences around teacher effectiveness among a coalition of political actors.

Foundation-sponsored networks: Brokerage roles of higher education intermediary organizations

“…Educational foundations are influential advocates in the policy implementation process (Bushhouse & Mosely, 2018;Hess & Henig, 2015;Galey-Horn et al, 2019;Reckhow & Tomkins-Stange, 2015. Major foundations function as linkage actors across several educational contexts, advocating for specific policy ideas within a network of entities.…”

“…Indeed, a growing body of literature examining the policy engagements of K-12 philanthropists demonstrated that funders are building strategic relationships between educational leaders and decision-makers, investing in boundary-spanning intermediaries that can champion shared goals (Bushhouse & Mosley, 2018;Galey-Horn, Reckhow, Ferrare, & Jasny, 2019;Reckhow, 2013;Reckhow & Tomkins-Stange, 2015Quinn, Tompkins-Stange & Meyerson, 2014). In higher education, research demonstrates that intermediaries are influential knowledge brokers, interpreting and spreading information and goals across several postsecondary contexts (Gándara et al, 2017;Hammond, Adams, Rubin & Ness, 2020;Miller & Morphew, 2017;Ness, 2010;).…”

Using policy network analysis to understand ideological convergence and change in educational subsystems

“…Thanks to this work, we now have a robust research base to guide more advanced statistical analyses of policy networks in educational domains. Initial attempts have already begun to advance this agenda using techniques such as exponential random growth models (e.g., Galey-Horn et al, 2020), but substantial work remains. Readers are free to copy, display, distribute, and adapt this article, as long as the work is attributed to the author(s) and Education Policy Analysis Archives, the changes are identified, and the same license applies to the derivative work.…”

“…During periods of dynamic policy change, like Kingdon's (1984) policy windows, policy brokers may bridge institutional arrangements by facilitating informational processes through diffuse issue networks. Meanwhile, within coalitions, these actors serve as "idea brokers" that facilitate the symbolic and practical links between policy preferences in different discourse coalitions (Galey-Horn et al, 2020). Although discourse coalitions focus on one issue area at a time, there may be multiple justifications for supporting a policy (Leifeld, 2017).…”

“…According to DNA, coalitions can be represented as a two-mode discourse network using actors' public statements about policy (from media appearances, legislative testimony, organizational websites, etc.). To operationalized coalitions, discourse networks can be analyzed directly as two-mode networks (e.g., Galey-Horn et al, 2020) or converted into normalized one-mode actor networks connected by shared belief ties (e.g., Leifeld, 2016). Discourse networks set the terms of debate in policy-making domains as competing ideological coalitions vie to draw the cognitive map that determine how the public and policymakers think about policy issues.…”