‘Pastoral Care’ as Curriculum Discourse: a study in the reformation of ‘academic’ schooling

Abstract

This paper explores the significance of the recent development of pastoral care as a distinct category of secondary school provision. It argues that existing accounts of the rise of pastoral care fail to take on board the relationship between changes in the school curriculum and their wider context. It also suggests that the separation and construction of pastoral care as distinct from the 'academic' is only one dimension of, and can only be understood in the context of, a changing curriculum. Pastoral care is not a 'new' area, but results from, and was made possible by, a reformulation and fragmentation of what counts as 'academic'. Finally, it proposes that this consolidation of social/personal concerns under the category of 'pastoral care' acquired particular significance in response to tensions created through the reorganization of secondary schooling. Pastoral care provided the means by which the contradictions embedded within comprehensivization could be reconciled.

The Pedagogy of the Pastor: The Formation of the Social Studies Curriculum in Ontario

“…----------------Several scholars have written about the conceptual formation of the social studies curriculum in the first half of the 20th century (Barth 1991;Goodson & Marsh, 1996;Lybarger 1987;Tomkins 1986) and the development of pastoral care in Western school systems (Best, Jarvis & Ribbins, 1977;Duncan, 1988;Goodson & Marsh, 1996;Lang, 1985;Power, 1995Power, ,1991Ribbins, 1985;Sarup, 1982). Most educational historians agree that social studies education in the North American context was a response to rapid technological innovation, industrialization, urbanization, immigration from non-English-speaking countries, the declining role of the church in public affairs, the rise of scientific rationality, and a belief in universal humanism.…”

“…Educational scholars writing on pastoral care understand its focus on the social and emotional needs of students as an extension of the modern welfare state, and as having an intricate relationship to the development of comprehensive schooling in England (Power, 1991). Lang (1985) argued that in Canada the pastoral-care program manifested itself in "counseling and guidance practices"(p. 125) and educators had not incorporated it into the content of the curricula at that time.…”

“…To develop my thesis I questioned the line of demarcation between the subject component of social studies education and pastoral care as a pedagogical practice and orientation to student welfare. Power (1991) argued that teacher practitioners and academics have seen the principles of pastoral care as being at odds with the more academically entrenched subject areas. This, she suggested, leaves a gulf between pastoral care initiatives on the part of individual teachers and the mandate of rigorous academic training.…”