From trust to control – the Swedish first teacher reform

Abstract

In this study, the implementation of the Swedish first teacher reform, where especially skilled teachers get an opportunity to advance in their careers, is examined. The scene is an upper secondary school, Baxter High, in the southwest of Sweden. In this particular school, a new system with first teachers replaces an old system of so-called head teachers. The teachers’ response to this is multilayered: at the same time as it reveals an unwillingness to change everyday work rhythms, it is also a response to cultural change, and to change in the discourse of political life in Baxter High. The implementation of the first teacher reform results not only in a change in administrative categories, but also in a change in ideology, intertwined with and embedded in the cultural and social life of the school. In this article, the authors connect the first teacher reform to the neoliberal transformation process that the Swedish educational system has undergone over the last three decades.

Keywords:

• Educational change
• policy
• reform
• teacher
• neoliberal
• new public management

Notes

1. However, the state still has control over school law and curriculum. Government agencies are responsible for monitoring, supervision, and evaluation.

2. In the latest study (2012), Swedish students performed significantly below average in all tested subjects (PISA 2013).

3. The numbers should not be taken for granted since the old government lost the election in 2014.

4. Even though our discussion above concerns conditions, the idea of performativity has been a major trend internationally, discussed and analyzed extensively by for example Ball.

5. The ‘Head teacher’ in our article refers to a local administrational category of teachers that had a few formal but many informal obligations. This category is not to be mistaken for more principal-like head teachers in for instance UK.