School evaluation in Sweden in a local perspective: A synthesis

Abstract

This article synthesises the role of evaluation at the municipal, school, classroom and parental levels of governance, and discusses the results of the articles appearing in this special issue. The discussion concerns the role of evaluation in school governance, the value of evaluation for local school development, the constitutive effects of evaluation, what explains the present results, how knowledge produced by evaluation can be used, and methodological issues. The results indicate that evaluation systems legitimise and support governance by objectives and results, parental school choice, and accountability for fairness and performance. Evaluation systems emphasise measurable aspects of curricula and foster a performance-oriented school culture. The most important evaluations for improving teaching and schools are teachers’ own evaluations. The article suggests two explanations for the actual roles of evaluation in local school governance. First, both the governance structure and applied governance model delimit and partly shape the role of evaluation at local governance levels. Second, how local school actors use their discretion and interpret their role in the education system, including how they respond to accountability pressure, explains how their roles are realised and the fact that actors at the same level of governance can develop partly different roles.

• evaluation systems
• local school governance
• role of evaluation
• consequences of evaluations

Notes

1 This special issue emerged from the research project “Consequences of evaluation for school practice: governance, accountability, and school development” (2012–2015), financed by the Swedish Research Council.

2 SALSA stands for Skolverkets Arbetsverktyg för Lokala Sambands Analyser (NAE's tool for local correlation analysis).

3 Results of national evaluations and international assessments of the Swedish education system (PISA in particular) are also used by political parties when developing education policy (interviews with education spokespeople from five political parties).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Anders Hanberger

Anders Hanberger is Professor in Evaluation and director of research at the Umeå Centre for Evaluation Research, Umeå University. His research areas cover policy analysis and evaluation research and focus on public policy, governance, evaluation, evaluation systems, and methodology. Special interests include the role of evaluation in democratic governance. Email: [email protected]

Sara Carlbaum

Sara Carlbaum is a Doctor in Political Science and a researcher at Umeå University, Sweden. Her research centres on education policy and governance, with a focus on evaluation, school inspection, and marketisation. Particular interests are citizenship constructions, social justice, gender, rights and equity. Email: [email protected]

Agneta Hult

Agneta Hult is Associate Professor at the Department of Education, Umeå University. Her research interests mainly focus on the implications and consequences of evaluations and assessment in the field of education. Email: [email protected]

Lena Lindgren

Lena Lindgren is Associate Professor at the School of Public Administration, Gothenburg University. She works with teaching and research concentrating on evaluation and policy analysis, and has also conducted several evaluations on commission for government agencies, particularly in the education field. Email: [email protected]

Ulf Lundström

Ulf Lundström is Associate Professor at the Department of Applied Educational Science, Umeå University. His main research interests lie within the areas of education policy (e.g. focusing on marketisation and inclusion), evaluation and the teaching profession. Email: [email protected]