Equity Through Assessment? Teachers’ Mediation of Outcome-Focused Reforms in Socioeconomically Different Schools

Abstract

Despite uncertainties regarding the effects of outcome-focused reforms on teaching practices, the political confidence in the potential of such reforms to create educational change remains high. This article problematizes the assumption that two such Swedish reforms (grades and national tests in younger years) can function as an impetus for educational equity. Analysis is directed toward how the reforms were enacted in six socioeconomically diverse teaching practices, framed by a conceptual framework built on Ricœur’s discussion on a critical hermeneutics and practical reasoning. The results show great differences; with the reforms benefiting established teaching practices in the socioeconomically privileged schools to a greater extent. In conclusion, it is argued that this poses a problem in relation to aims for educational equity.

Keywords:

• educational equity
• policy
• practical reason
• assessment

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

¹Two notes need to be made on the participating teachers: First, the study had an explicit aim to include male teachers. However, two of the teachers (both male) withdrew from the study for personal reasons. Unfortunately, it was not possible to find male replacements within the study's timeframe. However, female teachers constituted nearly 80% of all teachers in middle school during the year of data collection (Swedish National Agency for Education, 2013a). Second, the data from Teacher 6 were collected in the following school year in order to gather data from an equal number of schools from high- and low-SES schools (see below). However, this was the first school year that Teacher 6 implemented grades and national tests.