Mediating ‘School Direct’: The enactment of a reform policy by university‐based teacher educators in England

Abstract

The period 2010 to 2014 is widely acknowledged as a time of highly significant education reform in England, including of Initial Teacher Education (ITE). The Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government introduced a programme of 'school-led' education policies, of which 'School Direct' was intended to shift the balance of power, resources and modes of training teachers away from universities towards schools. Through an analysis of interviews with leaders of ITE in universities in two English regions, we examine the mediations of the School Direct policy from a socio-cognitive and activity-theoretical perspective. We identify three emotional frames for perceiving School Direct within the policy environment, drawing on the Vygotskian concept of perezhivanie. We also identify two policy enactment activities that involved bargaining within and rebrokering relationships between universities and schools. Consequently, we argue that the mediations of School Direct reported by the university leaders in our sample can be understood as limited appropriations of the policy within a highly charged emotional context where institutional risks were felt to be everpresent. We conclude that these leaders did not believe that School Direct achieved a transformation of ITE on the basis of a reconceptualisation of existing practices. The article contributes both to the scant research literature on School Direct as a significant reform by studying university leaders' accounts of policy mediation and the socio-cognitively informed literature on policy enactment by foregrounding the emotional-affective dimension of sense-making.

The university role in new teacher learning – why it matters: Teach First trainee perspectives

“…Provision became increasingly fragmented, with the development of 'branded and localised models of teaching', such as Teach First (Menter et al, 2019: 68). Power and resources for training new teachers moved away from universities and towards schools (Ellis and Spendlove, 2020), with 80 per cent of ITE places situated in universities in 2011/12, decreasing to 47 per cent in 2018/19 (Ellis and Spendlove, 2020). As in the USA, where new graduate schools of education (nGSEs) accredit initial teacher training without university involvement, the conception of new teacher learning has been fundamentally challenged (Cochran-Smith et al, 2020), and the university role in ITE threatened.…”

The quality conundrum in initial teacher education

“…For example, in New Zealand where there is a national concern about distribution of educational achievement after being described by the OECD as a 'high-achievement, local equity' nation, there is a growing emphasis on teachers who can address issues of equity in the classroom (Cochran-Smith et al, 2016). In England, there is a dominant discourse of crisis particularly in teacher recruitment and retention, which is then reflected in policies that encourage diversification of routes into teaching, educational privatisation, allowing unqualified teachers to teach in state schools, and an emphasis on teachers who are subject specialists over expert pedagogues, although the logic of this argument has been contested Ellis & Spendlove, 2020). In other words, conceptions of quality in ITE are contextual.…”

Quality conundrums in initial teacher education

“…The influence of these discourses is likely to relate to local concerns and priorities. For example, in New Zealand where there is a national concern , although the logic of this argument has been contested(Ellis, Mansell, & Steadman, 2020;Ellis & Spendlove, 2020). In other words, conceptions of quality, even around transformation, in ITE are highly contextual.…”