Dilemmatic spaces: high-stakes testing and the possibilities of collaborative knowledge work to generate learning innovations

Abstract

This paper examines collaborative researcher-practitioner knowledge work around assessment data in culturally diverse, low socio-economic school communities in Queensland, Australia. Specifically, the paper draws on interview accounts about the work of a cohort of school-based researchers who acted as mediators bridging knowledge flows between a local university and a cluster of schools. We draw on the concept of recontextualisation to explore the processes of knowledge mediation in dialogues around student assessment data to design instructional innovations. We argue that critical policy studies need to explore the complex ways in which neoliberal education policies are enacted in local sites. Moreover, we suggest that an analysis of collaborative knowledge work designed to improve student learning outcomes in low socio-economic school communities necessitates attention to the principles regulating knowledge flows across boundaries. In addition, it necessitates attention to the ways in which mediators navigate dilemmatic spaces, anxieties and affects/feelings in order to generate innovative learning designs in the current global context of high-stakes national testing and accountability regimes.

Keywords:

• knowledge work
• affect
• assessment data
• recontextualisation
• boundary crossing
• dilemmatic spaces

Acknowledgements

The project described in this article was funded by the Australian Research Council Linkage scheme (LP0990585). Ethics Approval Number: GU Ref No: EPS/23/09/HREC.

Notes

1. Official website developed by ACARA (Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority, 2012a, 2011b) (http://www.acara.edu.au/default.asp) which provides school performance data on NAPLAN and encourages comparison of test results across schools according to an ICSEA scale (The Index of Community Socio-Educational Advantage) – a scale developed specifically for the ‘My School’ website for the purpose of identifying schools serving ‘students from statistically similar backgrounds’ (ACARA, 2012a, p. 4). The formula for ICSEA is: socioeconomic advantage + remoteness + percentage of Indigenous students + percentage of disadvantaged students with languages background other than English. Socioeconomic advantage is calculated by drawing data from student enrolment records and Australian Bureau of Statistics data on parental occupation, education level, and language background (ACARA, 2012a, pp. 10–12).

2. Following Dean (2014, p. 151) we distinguish between neoliberalism as a ‘thought collective’ and a ‘governmental or regulatory development’ with specific apparatus or techniques, such as high stakes testing, league tables, and so forth through which policies are enacted. A thought collective or discursive regime is ‘engaged in a kind of conversation comprising a field of dissension. It has spaces for different voices and processes of discovery while at the same time permitting the crystallization of a consensus’ (Dean, 2014, p. 151).

3. Braun, Maguire, and Ball (2010) use the term ‘enactment’ to reflect an understanding that policies are interpreted and translated by diverse policy actors as they engage in making meaning of official texts for specific contexts and practices.

4. The National Partnerships are described on the Queensland Government website as a ‘historic investment of more than $900 million from 2009 to 2015, to improve educational outcomes for all students, under a joint state and federal partnership’. The focus of the partnership agreements is in the areas of: teaching quality; literacy and numeracy, low socio-economic school communities, students with disabilities and empowering local schools. The schools identified as receiving additional funds under this agreement are listed on the website. http://education.qld.gov.au/nationalpartnerships/index.html

5. We focus predominantly on the accounts of the 5 SBRs who took on the key role of SBRs, as one SBR was also a Lead University Researcher.

6. The data analysed in this paper is taken from interviews with the following participants. In addition, a total of 290 teachers participated in the partnership project over the course of three years (mid 2009–mid 2012). High levels of teacher mobility meant that changes in staff were frequent resulting in large numbers of teachers being a part of the project at different time intervals and for different time periods. In one audit instance, March 2012, 121 teachers were involved in the project.

7. This approach is similar to that proposed by Lai and McNaughton (2009, p. 22) who describe a ‘researcher-developer’ model of ‘research-practice collaboration’ between one university and a cluster of schools serving a poor suburban community of largely Indigenous and ethnic minority groups in New Zealand. Specifically, they suggest that school staff needed both technical and theoretical assistance in learning to make meaning from both externally and internally generated data.

8. The interview protocol guide and research information sheet were sent to participants a week prior to the interview. The guide covered nine questions under five themes. The themes included: (1) Smart Education Partnership, (2) Multi-Level Capacity Building intervention around a diagnostic approach to assessment and needs-based teaching, (3) Collaborative Innovative Model of School Improvement, (4) Implications for Educational Policy: Schooling for Social Justice, and (5) Sustainability: Leadership, Professional Capacities, Quality Classroom Instruction.

9. The ‘Navigating Thinking’ program encouraged students to become knowledgeable, creative, critical, and strategic thinkers. The program implemented Higher Order Thinking as CORE curriculum in a similar way to Project Zero, Harvard University, Graduate School of Education: http://www.pz.harvard.edu/news.php; and The Fair Go Project, University of Western Sydney: http://www.uws.edu.au/education/soe/research

10. The interview instrument of 10 broad questions aimed to elicit information about: (1) the role of SBRs, (2) the range of work activities undertaken, (3) the most rewarding and challenging experiences in this role. The SBRs worked specifically with a cluster of schools, and also across the whole set of 12 schools, in collaboration with the lead university and industry partner researchers. All the SBRs were experienced teachers and had undertaken professional development work with teachers prior to joining the project. They all had limited research experience, with only one of the SBRs being an experienced researcher with 15 years of experience, and two with doctorate qualifications. Each SBR worked with a cohort of approximately 17 teachers and had worked on the project for 12 months or more.

11. School Leader interview data collected by Author 1, SBR interview data collected by Author 2, Learning Innovation Project led by Author 3 who spent three years in the local schools supervising work of SBRs, working closely with classroom teachers, lead literacy teachers, principals and district administrators.

12. All of the respondents dealt with this topic and frequently made reference to this topic throughout the interviews.