Education Governance in Action

Means, ends and meaning in accountability for strategic education governance

“…This is because education systems cannot be considered as isolated (devoid of context), of limited connectivity or interdependency (devoid of collaborative governance and decentralisation) or static (devoid of interdependence over time). In turn, the complexity perspective has received attention within the literature and in practice over recent years (Burns, Köster and Fuster, 2016 [18]), including systems approaches to address public sector challenges more generally (OECD, 2017 [19]).…”

“…The nature of policy problems faced today do not respect ministerial portfolio boundaries, departmental mandates, territorial boundaries or even the work of one level of governance (Burns, Köster and Fuster, 2016 [18]; Hooghe and Marks, 2003[34]). As a result of this, there is an increased number of actors (multiplexity), who each need each other (interdependency), and their activity increasingly takes place across rather than within organisations (interactivity) (Osborne, 2006[35]; Head, 2008 [30]).…”

“…Complexity manifests in increased local voice and responsiveness for decision making, along with evolving perspectives and priorities for education (Burns, Köster and Fuster, 2016 [18]; Hui and Bonan, 1991 [46]). This is exacerbated by a relatively high propensity for stakeholder contestation given that there can be widely held experiential knowledge of education among interested parties (Hooge, 2016 [47]).…”

“…Moreover, the ideas of what education can and should achieve have transformed over time, accompanied by, at times, stark changes in the envisioned roles and responsibilities of those working in education. 3 A multiplicity of stakeholders places greater demand for negotiation and presents a diversity of interests to navigate (Burns and Köster, 2016 [49]). Accordingly, with these 'many eyes' 4 (Bovens, 2007 [1]) comes more varied, multiple expectations (Koppell, 2005[50]; Klingner, Nalbandian and Romzek, 2002 [51]), and being held accountable for achieving broader collective outcomes in service towards the public good (Moore, 2006 [52]; Stoker, 2006 [53]; Gains and Stoker, 2009 [54]).…”

Education policy implementation

“…In some contexts, studies have found that having higher accountability standards on education policy implementers resulted in a more effective and qualitative implementation. For instance the United States' School Wellness Programmes that had to be in place by 2006 were implemented more effectively and with fewer challenges when implementers were required to be transparent, subjected to careful oversight by the district and performing a systematic evaluation of the programme (Budd et al, 2012 [100] ).…”