‘It was just as political as it was pragmatic’: the (in)formal roles and policy work of ‘curriculum leaders’ in a federated education context

ABSTRACT

Politics and pragmatics are central and inseparable features of curriculum reform. In a federated system like Australia, many individuals and organisations are invested in reform at the national and jurisdictional level. This paper focuses on the policy work and roles of key actors positioned at the interface of national and state-based curriculum development, and at the juncture of curriculum policy and pedagogic practice. These were individuals formally identified as ‘curriculum leaders’ in the enactment of the Australian Curriculum in Health and Physical Education (ACHPE). The paper centres on data collected from eight (n = 8) curriculum leaders via semi-structured interviews. All were prospectively influential figures in shaping the path of the ACHPE. Our research explored the nature of their enactment work and how they were variously positioned and positioned themselves in relation to key ACHPE discourses. Analysis uses the policy actor/policy work framework as a starting point for deeper, Foucauldian informed analysis which provides insights into the complex nature of curriculum leadership by considering the additional (in)formal work and roles of these high-ranking policy actors. Data and discussion extends understanding of curriculum enactment as a process that spans policy networks and reveals the nuanced nature of curriculum leadership associated with curriculum reform.

KEYWORDS:

• Curriculum leadership
• curriculum reform
• education policy
• Health and Physical Education (HPE)
• policy actors
• policy enactment
• Australian Curriculum

Introduction

Progressing contemporary curriculum reform across the federated context of Australian education is inherently complex. As others have highlighted, power differentials and federal and state political agendas play out amidst fluid intergovernmental and inter-agency relationships (Reid 2018; Savage 2016, 2018). Policy actors in many arenas are consequently charged with ‘curriculum leadership’; and against a backdrop of the states and territories having ‘jealously guarded their curriculum sovereignty’ (Reid and Price 2018, v), such leadership was destined to play a significant role in shaping the enactment of the Australian Curriculum (AC). Reid (2018) has suggested that ‘whether Australia [now] has a national curriculum or a diversity of official curricula with some common characteristics, is a question which bears careful consideration’ (Reid 2018, 15).

This paper reflects our view that the scenario Reid (2018) describes calls for further investigation of the policy actors and policy work associated with ‘curriculum leadership’. More particularly, we direct attention to policy actors who were explicitly identified as working at the interface of national and state-based curriculum development and simultaneously, at the juncture of curriculum policy and pedagogic practice. These are individuals who were openly challenged to navigate ‘increased policy overlap and blurred lines of responsibility’ (Savage 2016, 835) in and for curriculum across Australia, while providing guidance, direction and support for teachers. In the learning area of Health and Physical Education (HPE) we consider them as amongst the policy elite (Ozga and Gewirtz 1994); individuals who would play an important role in shaping convergence or divergence in curriculum policy relating specifically to the Australian Curriculum Health and Physical Education (ACHPE) (Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority [ACARA], 2021a). Taking a lead from Ball et al. (2012) our research sought to critically examine the policy work undertaken by designated ‘curriculum leaders’ in HPE and investigate what sort of policy actors they were aspiring and able to be. Whilst our analysis expands insights around policy enactment (Ball et al. 2012) particularly, its main contribution is highlighting the less formal roles and more nuanced personal work which exemplifies the inherently political and pragmatic nature of curriculum leadership associated with curriculum reform in a federated context. Here and throughout the paper, we acknowledge that politics is frequently driven by pragmatics and vice versa. We use the term ‘political and pragmatic’ to direct attention to the intertwined agendas and influences. Our data reaffirms Ball’s (1994) emphasis that ‘we need to analyse and understand rather than assume the role of individuals’ in policy processes, ‘neither ignoring nor taking for granted “the individual”’. On the eve of publication of revised specifications for all learning areas in the Australian Curriculum, this research is also timely.

Policy actors, policy work and leadership in/of curriculum reform

As Ball et al. (2012) described, policy enactment prompts examination of policy actors, their various roles and corresponding policy work. Following Ball et al. (2012, 2), our particular interest is in the often ‘interwoven and overlapping’ processes of interpretation and translation (Ball et al. 2012, 47) inherent in curriculum policy enactment, and we contend, curriculum leadership. Individuals with a designated jurisdictional-level curriculum leadership responsibility are prospectively, key actors in curriculum policy enactment. For Ball et al. (2012) and others in our own field (see, for example, Alfrey, O’Connor, and Jeanes 2017; Hammond, Penney, and Jeanes 2019) actor roles are emphasised as fluid, such that actors may take on different roles at different times, combine roles, and be involved in a variety of policy work at any given time and context. The typology of actors or ‘policy positions’ (Ball et al. 2012) thus acknowledges overlap in the policy work that may be associated with different actor types.

In considering how actor roles and types of policy work link with notions of curriculum leadership (acknowledging the different forms that it may take), we suggest that it is also valuable to refer to Gale’s (2003) description of strategies employed by various actors. Gale (2003) observed policy actors bargaining, stalling, manoeuvring, arguing and lobbying. Strategies such as these align with an appreciation that the enactment of the AC was destined to feature ongoing contestation and negotiation, to reach points of settlement (Luke, Woods, and Weir 2013) in various state and territory arenas. Furthermore, the descriptions of policy work that Gale (2003) presented aligned with our anticipation that individuals holding formally identified curriculum leadership positions within jurisdictions (such as, curriculum manager for HPE) would prospectively be key mediators of policy discourses and possibilities, and as such, would employ various strategies to achieve particular curriculum ends. In saying this, we by no means wish to infer that such individuals enjoy complete agency. Rather, we reaffirm the need for analyses that speak to the dynamic interplay between individuals and structures to reveal why particular directions are and can be pursued in enactment. In starting with the ideas of both Ball et al. (2012) and Gale (2003) we signal our desire to be expansive of their work, to look for what they may have seen perchance to find it, but to also let the curriculum leaders define their own work in their own ways and contexts.

Below we expand upon the specific curriculum developments and possibilities that were central to the research. In doing so, we also address our own policy positioning as researchers invested in the curriculum features emanating from the ACHPE.

The ACHPE: policy agendas and possibilities

It is not possible to provide an in-depth account of the debates and processes integral to the development of the ACHPE. Rather, we acknowledge that as with all aspects of the AC, development of specifications for HPE featured many negotiated compromises (see, for example, Macdonald 2013; Penney 2013, 2018). Moreover, we emphasise that the ACHPE then (and now) openly sought to be ‘futures oriented’ and incorporated elements that prompted fresh thinking about curriculum and pedagogy in HPE. We also stress that adoption of these progressive discourses was/is far from assured as state and territory jurisdictions advanced their own translations and adaptations of the ACHPE.

As the lead writer for the original ACHPE, Macdonald (2013) explained that five ‘key ideas, originally conceived as propositions’ could guide ‘values and directions for a futures-oriented HPE curriculum’, consistent with ACARA’s broader vision for the AC as a whole. The five inter-related propositions that shaped the original development of curriculum content specifications and expected progression in learning, and that could similarly guide curriculum development and pedagogy in enactment of the ACHPE, still remain in the proposed ACHPE consultative review (2021b). They are:

• Focus on educative purposes;

• Take a strengths-based approach;

• Value movement;

• Develop health literacy; and

• Include a critical inquiry approach.

(ACARA 2021b)

As several commentaries recognised, the propositions would individually and collectively be open to varied interpretations (Alfrey and Brown 2013; Brown 2013; Dinan-Thompson 2013; Leahy, O’Flynn, and Wright 2013; McCuaig, Quennerstedt, and Macdonald 2013). Furthermore, the extent to which they would shape future curriculum and pedagogy in HPE across Australia would potentially be strongly influenced by those individuals formally positioned at the fore of state and territory curriculum development. The following section expands upon the theoretical basis of this expectation, and hence, our research methodology. As we discuss later in the paper, rather than directly focusing on the Five Propositions, our data collection sought to explore their relative presence or absence in policy enactment through broad investigation of the policy work and roles of individuals holding formal curriculum leadership positions. That they have, to date, remained untouched in the review documentation of the ACHPE further reinforces the significance of the current project.

Foucauldian perspectives on policy and curriculum leadership

For Ball et al. (2011), following 219), policies are ‘about the “how” and the “who” … the effect of “sets of actions upon other actions”, both as enabling and inhibiting’ (611). This implicates subjectivity in policy enactment, and in the case of curriculum leaders draws attention to the tenuous operations of state apparatus from which subjectivity, and potentially agency might emerge. Ball et al. (2011) explain that policies are also about what is said, done, thought, created, imagined and enacted, in short what is produced – hence policies are productive. In this sense, curriculum leaders are subjects to/of power, occupying multiple positions within complex networks of political, social, personal, geographical, economic and intellectual power relations. Again, following Foucault (1972), we recognise curriculum policies and the fields in which they operate, as inherently discursive. Further, and because our bodies are also entrapped within these fields, schema or structure of power produced by and as discourse, the conditions for the emergence of the subject (in our case the curriculum leader) are created.

Importantly, such discursive formations are also historically located; what Foucault (1972) terms an archaeology of knowledge whereby traces of the past linger to help us make sense of the practices and processes of the present. This is particularly important when considering the work of curriculum leaders, because curriculum policies are ephemerally temporal and political, as the current six-year review cycle of the AC testifies. They are constantly re-iterated and re-inscribed in ways dictated by the proclivities of those in government and/or the social expectations or messaging at the time. The work of curriculum leaders is thus precarious, situated between the school and state, the personal and professional, as subject and subjected, and constrained by and complicit in this weighty, and ‘somewhat bizarre machinery’ (Foucault 1972, 135). From an analytical perspective the archaeology of precariousness opens a space from which to observe ‘how the prohibitions, exclusions, limitations, values, freedoms, and transgressions’ of power differentials, political agendas and subjects might signal a ‘certain “way of speaking”’ (Foucault 1972, 193).

As with Foucault (1978) we treat discourses as complex, multiple, discontinuous and unstable bodies of knowledge and social practice, that are polyvalent, that is, multiple and circulating and routinely produced by power. Foucault (1978) points out that power is not merely a mode of subjugation, a method of ensuring subservience or system of domination of one group over another. It is instead relational, omnipresent, a network of relationships, and power is a word, which ‘one attributes to a complex strategical situation in a particular society’ (Foucault 1978, 93). Power is thus integral to policy, policy relations, networks, and the relative authority of particular actors.

Particularly relevant to our work is the notion of ‘disciplinary power’ because of ‘who is speaking’ (Ball et al. 2011; Foucault 1972). Our research acknowledged that curriculum leaders are individuals who generate, embody and enact certain kinds of knowledge, often reproduced as fact or ‘truth’ through particular kinds of language, processes and practices. Their position within policy networks means they can speak with a degree authority to influence actions or behaviours in curriculum policy enactment. We thus recognise their policy work as integral to the ongoing legitimisation of knowledge and practices in curriculum reform, whereby certain knowledges and practices come to be deemed and promoted as permissible and/or desirable, and others do not.

Drawing on Butler’s (1999) and Foucault’s (1978) emphasis that it is language (and discourses) which make us think we occupy this or that identity, and do it in certain ways, we also recognise curriculum leaders as policy subjects, positioned and produced in the processes of ‘doing policy’ work (Ball et al. 2011, 611). Butler (1993) argues that to be a subject is not to be a being endowed with will, freedom and intentionality, or to be one who is situated within a set of social practices. Rather, subjectivity is dependent upon the effects of our situatedness. This means that we need to think seriously about the plurality of subject positions, each of which is a function of discourse. Thought of in this way, the curriculum leader subject is neither a free or active agent, nor ‘natural’ or ‘authentic’, rather they are crafted in different forms and given meaning over time, and importantly are self-aware, with choice about how and when to act (Foucault 1978). It follows then that resistance, subversion and/or agency become central concerns of subjectivity. Our research sought to consider such concerns.

Methodology

In this section, we explain our research methods and make a reflexive statement about our own investments in this research. Ethical approval for the research was gained from Monash University [project id 6051] human research ethics committee.

Participants

A list of twelve (n = 12) key HPE curriculum leaders from Australian, State and Territory authorities and departments of education was conveniently sampled from online information and through snowballing from the authors contacts. They were approached via email to participate. Eight (n = 8) agreed to participate; one was working at national level and seven at a jurisdictional level.

Method

Semi-structured interviews were used because they create a conversational and open dialogue between interviewer and interviewee, and enable the interviewer to build rapport, create trust and deepen the data collected. Two leaders were interviewed face-to-face and the other six interviews were conducted via phone. Interviews varied in length from 30 to 90 minutes, were audio recorded and transcribed verbatim. Transcriptions were sent to each interviewee for review and to enable redaction of any comments considered sensitive.¹

Reflecting on our own values

In their work interviewing education policy elite, Ozga and Gewirtz (1994) highlighted the pragmatic constraints of interview conversations where power relations can influence the research process. They called for education policy researchers to be explicit and reflexive about the theories and values that inform their work. As poststructural feminist theorists, we start with an acknowledgement that there is not one singular/official ‘truth’, but rather multiple constructions. Hence, language and practices merely carry the indicators (or effects) of how power/knowledge is structured and organised within systems and institutions. The language of research is no exception in this regard. In using terms such as ‘research data’ and ‘findings’ we are acutely aware of their potential to carry and convey particular (dominant) epistemological assumptions. We endeavour to counter such assumptions while leveraging the standing such terms have within research, including educational research. We are informed by critical theories of power and the discursive production of subjects through operations of power, alongside our own investments in the Five Propositions as a focus for pedagogical reform in HPE (Lambert 2018; Lambert and O’Connor 2018; Lambert and Penney 2020). We are driven by values concerned with social justice and equity in schooling and society. We recognise that as critical educational sociologists we work along the edge of the political and the social, and imagine our participants may also do this. We note openly and rather curiously that the curriculum leaders participating in this research were welcoming of us and supportive of our research trajectory. We hence bring to the fore our eagerness (and perhaps theirs) to seek out moments of resistance that draw attention to ‘the intrusive power of the State and the repressive character of much state action’ (Ozga and Gewirtz 1994, 123).

Data analysis

Analysis of interview data occurred via two sweeps of the data, the first seeking to identify the kinds of policy work the curriculum leaders were engaged in and the second focused on identifying the themes and discourses leaders drew upon to explain their work.

Sweep 1: We drew on Ball et al. (2012) policy actor typology as a framework for coding. This initial, open coding process was iterative in that whilst we were looking to identify policy actors as per the typology, we also remained open to the identification of hybrids, combinations, and other types of actor to emerge. Analysis ensued as follows,

1. Read the text closely

2. Identify relevant policy actor/s

3. Identify and/or name the type of policy work mentioned or suggested. Include both official/unofficial work (e.g. lead others)

4. Identify and/or name other policy actor roles not in the typology that might emerge to explain policy work (e.g. bureaucrat)

Sweep 2: We deployed a Foucauldian approach to discourse analysis that focused on analysing and deconstructing the regulatory power produced through and by institutional structures and practices which in turn shape and reproduce bodies and subjectivities in particular ways (Foucault 1972; Grbich 2003). Below, borrowing some guidelines from Grbich (2003), we describe how we have deconstructed the interviews to identify other discourses at play and not picked up in Sweep 1. Analysis ensued as follows,

1. Read the texts (transcripts) sceptically and critically

2. Identify concepts within and across the texts; highlight recurring ideas and develop themes.

3. Closely examine the margins and identify who is speaking, from what positions, and who is silenced or marginalised

4. Identify the sets of ideas or patterns (discourses) at play and that are shaping the texts and/or the speaker

5. When reading stay open to interpretations and do not foreclose on the data

The final part of this process of deconstruction is writing the findings, to which we now turn our attention.

Findings

Our presentation of findings in Table 1 reflects our concern to simultaneously interrogate our data for evidence illustrative of the descriptors provided by Ball et al.’s framework, while enabling analysis and descriptions of both policy work and actor roles/positions to extend beyond their categorisation. Data from all of the curriculum leaders in this study affirmed that the actor roles/positions that curriculum leaders are variously required, able and inclined to adopt, are necessarily fluid. Further, our data made evident that whilst a helpful starting analytical resource the policy actor framework proposed by Ball et al. (2012) is not finite and in line with thinking from others (Lambert and O’Connor 2018; Lambert and Penney 2020) can be challenged and stretched according to contextual and individual variations. As shown in column 3 of Table 1, our data pointed to the curriculum leaders aligning broadly with two or three of the ‘policy roles/positions’ described by Ball et al. (2012). The extent to which the curriculum leaders are identified here with narration, translation and transaction, is perhaps not surprising given their overt position at the interface of federal/state curriculum relations and also, a bridge between official curriculum policy and its enactment by teachers. All also clearly felt an overarching frame and set of expectations associated with ‘accountability to government’. How this was experienced and consequently, responded to and managed, varied.

Table 1. Curriculum leaders’ ‘official’ and ‘informal’ policy work and associated actor positions/roles and influences.

CL	Policy Work		Primary Actor Positions** (From Ball et al. 2012)	Expanded Actor Positions/Roles***	Influences Evident****
	Official	Informal*
1	Interpret curriculum Write/develop curriculum and support material including work samples Supervise reform process Deliver professional development workshops and presentations Manager Consult and advise stakeholders	‘Keep the peace’/Perform a balancing act (personal values/official line and expectations) Follow/communicate a ‘party line’ Observe, monitor others	Narrator Transactor Receiver Critic (Enthusiast towards the Five Propositions)	Insider/outsider Bureaucrat, civil servant Policy maker Cynic Peace maker Pragmatist Pawn	Previous employment Pedagogist Personal values – humanist, social justice, equity, wellbeing New to the organisation and role Politics and position
2	Policy and curriculum advice to government and Minister Curriculum support to teachers Connect and network with teachers, stakeholders, researchers, government agencies and across systems Write/develop curriculum and support material including resources and professional development Verify research and evidence-based practices in HPE Oversee compliance	Protect/buffer teachers Spy/Listen/‘Pay attention’ Be ahead of the game – plan for and react to school-based incidents, media reports, relevant HPE initiatives Consult and provide recommendations to key stakeholders	Translator Narrator (Enthusiast towards 5 Propositions)	Gatekeeper Conduit Connector Adviser Realist Pragmatist Optimist Leader	Teaching experience Short term appointment Personal views of reform Politics and position- ‘trained speak’ (redacting, language, editing, party line) ‘My role is the stay across everything’
3	Connect, a conduit between education, health; schools, state Interpret curriculum in order to translate and make ‘less white’ Advocate Policy ‘filter’ (government to ground)	Filter, ‘water down’ Fight, stand up; cultural advocate Be honest Re-languaging and giving voice to culturally diverse peoples and communities	Receiver Enthusiast (Enthusiast towards 5 Propositions – though not on agenda as in the ‘too hard basket’)	Advocate Realist Pragmatist Connector Sceptic	Teaching experience Personal values – social justice, equity Jurisdictional politics and context Doubts re jurisdictional curriculum reform uptake and teacher ability to implement change
4	Write/develop/advise curriculum and support material Deliver professional development workshops and presentations Oversee compliance Decision-maker re specific content focus	Observer of others, for example, jurisdictions, systems, teachers work Fight battles re content inclusions	Narrator Transactor Translator (Low level enthusiasm towards 5 Propositions)	Realist Defender Mediator Cynic Pragmatist	Background not HPE Politics and personal values – pragmatism, compliance Doubts re teacher change Concern about teacher qualification/training ‘Just get the job done’ approach
5	Supervise HPE reform process and oversee staff across learning areas Write/develop and interpret curriculum Facilitate curriculum consultation and implementation Recruit (teachers), outsource and development of support material, resources, for example, work samples, unit of work, assessments Oversee legislative compliance Deliver conference presentations	Modify,mould, make palatable (simplify curriculum) Recruit, hail and support outsiders	Translator Transactor Entrepreneur (Enthusiast towards 5 Propositions)	Leader Moderator Broker Gatekeeper Lobbyist	Teaching experience Time constraints Politician – cagey/cautious Jurisdictional politics and policyscape Legislative processes/ constraints
6	Oversee compliance Support teachers and provide information, for example, via website, webinars Provide specific support and advice on assessment and reporting, including developing examples and supporting standards Deliver workshops and presentations Respond to Ministerial directives	Fulfil public servant, ‘job’ Maintain advisory role to teachers Advance a broad education action plan, for exmaple, digital technologies Observer of others, for example, jurisdictions, systems, providers	Receiver Transactor (Low level enthusiasm towards 5 Propositions)	Pragmatist Bureaucrat	No HPE background New to role Politics and personal values – pragmatism, compliance, limited knowledge and investment, docile, self-protection ‘Just get the job done’ approach
7	Design/develop/create support materials and resources, that is, textbook Curriculum adviser Deliver conference presentations	Publish and leverage experience Textbook writer/contributor Influential HPE observer (‘sage’) – participant observer over time	Enthusiast Entrepreneur (Enthusiast towards 5 Propositions)	Insider/outsider Producer Pragmatist Opportunist Influencer	Not in HPE space directly HPE enthusiast Has profile/status in field Previous experience and career history Teaching experience Privileged political/policy position and insights Politics and personal values – optimistic re change
8	Supervise, manage, support and oversee curriculum consultants across learning areas Design/develop/publish curriculum Manage jurisdictional assessment, that is, establish standards, collect evidence against standards, gather data Administer and regulate assessment and examinations Consult with, influence and advise high-level stakeholders (e.g. Principals) and government	Have influential casual conversations re HPE, for example, lobby, cajoule, keep peace with stakeholders Provide informal feedback or advice (personal impressions) to other leaders Story-teller; stays in the know across jurisdictions Leverage reputation to influence curriculum reform Influential HPE observer (‘sage’) – participant observer over time	Narrator Translator (Enthusiast towards 5 Propositions)	Leader Consultant Orator/debater Researcher Influencer	Not in HPE space directly HPE enthusiast Career history and status – time in roles, fingers in pies In the know/known – reputation, profile Politics and position – high level (expert, elite), open/candour, mates/contacts

*Informal: reflects aspects of policy work that were characteristically inherent in the policy actors’ work linked to their formal position and roles, but that were not aspects of work or ways of working that would be explicit in those positions/roles. Some aspects of informal policy work are nevertheless expected. Some reflect the actors pursuing opportunities for policy influence.

**Primary actor positions: reflects our annotation on the transcripts of frequency of policy actor work following Ball et al. (2012). Here we list the most frequently occurring.

***Expanded policy actor positions/roles: reflects our attempt to capture the complexities of the policy positions/roles being enacted, and particularly reflect the combination of formal and informal policy work in roles/positions adopted.

****Influences evident: indicate where the speakers’ position, authority, status, knowledge, experience, past history, personal interest, investments, motivations and values came through in interview data.

As column 1 in Table 1 shows, curriculum leaders’ policy work encompassed a range of ‘official’, specified tasks and roles typically outlined in position descriptions. Alongside this, our data in column 2 highlighted that the curriculum leaders were variously engaged in what we term ‘informal’ policy work, some of which reflects ‘unwritten expectations’ for the type of activities needing to be engaged in to effectively fulfil their official roles. The other component of ‘informal’ policy work evident from our data, relates to the personal-professional policy perspectives of the individual curriculum leaders and encompasses their varied interests in privileging or supressing particular policy discourses and/or expanding the reach and impact of their policy influence. For each of the curriculum leaders, this ‘informal’ policy work was in important respects, inter-woven with their official policy work such that it characterised how each approached their role as curriculum leaders. For example, one of the leaders commented,

… implementation, that’s where my heart lies. I said it in the job interview … the curriculum can be brilliant and the propositions can be brilliant, well founded in research, all of that sort of stuff … But unfortunately that’s not my domain … to translate that. So I leap at any opportunity to have a go, even though it’s [pedagogical support] not my core business. (Number 1)

Comments like this pointed to curriculum leaders simultaneously holding, negotiating and striving to balance ‘official’ policy positions and expectations with personal professional positions that reflect different histories, political/policy positional dynamics, status/influence within and beyond their organisation and personal perspectives informed by all of these factors. Hence, we draw important links between the ‘influences evident’ in column 5 of Table 1 and the nature of the policy roles/positions individual curriculum leaders were seen to pursue and the type of policy work that was in turn prominent in their descriptions of their curriculum leadership associated with the ACHPE.

The descriptors used to identify ‘expanded actor roles/positions’ in column 4 represent our attempt to capture the ways in which the breadth and complexities of curriculum leaders’ policy work is reflected in similarly diverse roles and positions that are inherent in (and often obscured by) official role or position descriptors. This list offers a significant extension of the work of both Ball et al. (2012) and Gale (2003), in identifying roles and positions specific to non-school-based curriculum leaders. Once again, we emphasise that contextual and personal-professional factors were evident in the scope, capacity and inclination for individual curriculum leaders to act in particular ways. Furthermore, we suggest that the complexities and subtleties of curriculum leaders’ policy work and roles is such that the ‘informal’ policy work and ‘expanded actor roles’ identified need to be acknowledged as integral to how the anticipated roles, such as transactor, translator, and narrator, are ultimately experienced and enacted. In the following section, we provide more nuanced analytical readings of the curriculum leaders’ policy work by interrogating what is produced beyond the coding of what constitutes policy ‘work’ and/or ‘roles’.

Foucauldian insights into curriculum leaders’ work

Our initial analysis (as summarised in Table 1) is helpful in making explicit the breadth and diversity of curriculum leaders’ work. It illustrates that curriculum leaders in this research, were challenged to fulfil multiple roles and expectations, directed towards different audiences and purposes, while working in varied and fluid circumstances. In articulating official and informal aspects of policy work, individual curriculum leaders are shown to expand their policy work often in creative ways, to facilitate aspects of official policy work, mediate perceived role tensions and/or pursue opportunities to influence other actors. What many describe as ‘a balancing act’ can open up some spaces yet foreclose others; the policy actor framework has quite pragmatically helped us to come to this conclusion. However, and in alignment with our desire to interrogate what is produced, by whom and how, we need to go beyond the coding of ‘actor’ or ‘work’ to identify the more complex discourses that circulate and influence agency.

In the discussion that follows, we suggest the curriculum leaders work is largely dependent upon such circulating discourses operating as the rules that govern their various contexts determining what is speakable and do-able. We also acknowledge the important role of one’s history, values and meaning making in such contexts and operations. Following Foucault (1978), we view discourses as multiple, and hence as intricately connected to other discourses, and as changing over time. Poststructural data analysis (sweep 2) helped us to explore the following circulating discourses: subjectivity, power/knowledge, and resistance/agency. Necessarily, the representation of data below is selective. In some instances, we draw across the data from multiple participants to show how the experiences and meaning making processes of the participants are similar or different. In others, we foreground data from one or two participants to expose operations of discourse, hence offering more nuanced analysis and depth of discussion.

Subjectivity

Curriculum leaders emerged from the preceding analysis as ‘policy subjects’ positioned and produced via multiple discursive elements in the processes and strategies of ‘doing policy’ work (Ball et al. 2011, 611; Foucault 1978). Here, we highlight some of the ways in which subjectivity is dependent upon the effects of our situatedness (Butler 1993) as well as hinting at the importance of resituating the subject. Three subthemes guide the discussion namely, incoherent subjects, political subjects, and personal subjects.

Incoherent subjects

Despite being key messengers in policy networks, curriculum leaders are often limited in their ability to speak or act outside the remit of government mandates and requirements, and yet there is an expectation to know,

Look, there is new content knowledge. There’s no doubt about that. But I think we’re crying out for a greater understanding of those propositions. (Number 7)

Curriculum leaders are expected to know and in that knowing, become known. As the conduit of generally agreed upon knowledge that filters from government above to teacher below, they straddle a rather precarious and often tense space. In this space coherency is expected, yet incoherency lurks, with some leaders openly acknowledging the limits of their specialist and/or applied knowledge and experience,

I don’t consider myself an expert on anything. (Number 1)

I think, as I said, I’m not a health and physical education teacher, I haven’t come from that background. (Number 6)

In a policy role charged with delivering a consistent reform message for mass consumption across large jurisdictions, the self-doubt evidenced above delivers a rather tentative under tone of ‘don’t shoot the messenger’. Thus, the passive and doubtful (full of doubt) incoherent subject emerges in at least two ways. In one way, they may appear unaware of the potential of their own influence and hence constrained in terms of creative policy enactment. Yet, such self-doubt may speak more precisely to their complete awareness of that potential. This is not to say that the message presented isn’t clear or that the knowledge delivered is ‘incorrect’. Rather, and more likely, it insists who owns the message, and who communicates the message are key factors that determine the direction of curriculum reform. The next quote hints at such direction making. An experienced HPE leader suggests that the key ideas (Five Propositions) are an ‘integral’ message, signalling a departure from content-based knowledge by encouraging others to engage with the front end of the curriculum. Whilst this challenges regulatory power (i.e. content knowledge), the degree to which it is possible for ‘colleagues’ appears constrained, again drawing attention to the viability of a coherent subject,

The key ideas are integral to the successful implementation of that document but because they’re at the front of the document, I don’t believe my colleagues have really engaged with them to any great extent, have a really solid understanding of those five key ideas (Number 7)

The political subject

The previous quotes suggest that curriculum leaders are constrained by both their histories (e.g. no HPE background) and the regulatory systems they operate in. This should be of no surprise given their rank and the clear government mandates to which they must yield as the condition of their employment. To paraphrase reoccurring message across all interviews, the role/remit is clear – government, politics, and systems, not teaching and never pedagogy,

We’re not actually allowed to talk so much about professional practice … we can talk about assessment. We can talk about curriculum content. We can go and talk about examinations, we can talk about standards, but how to teach the stuff it’s a bit like, oh. It’s almost a bridge too far. (Number 7)

In signalling, the legitimacy of engagement with matters of examinations and standards, this comment implicates broader discourses of neoliberalism and broader political agendas for education, as the core business of curriculum leaders. In the case of HPE more specifically this also extends to other often powerful external agendas at play in curriculum reform (e.g. health and sport). The curriculum leaders’ role/remit necessarily shifts from teachers and teaching, students and learning, towards ‘politics and pragmatism’. During interviews, several participants conveyed a sense of being sure to say ‘the right thing’, described by one participant thus,

You know, because I think there’s, as with any sort of policy document, you know, the wording and you’ve got to be so politically correct. (Number 1)

Discourses of correctness manifest as a national focus on assessment and reporting across the jurisdictions, with all curriculum leaders speaking to their work as ‘navigating’ (e.g. the new ACHPE), ‘explaining’ (e.g. the achievement standards), ‘collecting’ (e.g. evidence and making judgements), and ‘reporting’ (e.g. on student achievement). This imperative and the notion of ‘towing the party line’ compels the curriculum leader to align to a defined role, again limiting the emergence of an apolitical subject. With this constraint, curriculum leaders’ opportunities for creativity, innovation, and pedagogy (including a focus on the Five Propositions) significantly diminish. Yet, all curriculum leaders were acutely aware of being positioned through the operations of regulatory power, the remit of the job versus the reality of reform, and importantly, recognised that this narrow enactment potentially has a knock-on effect to teachers and schools,

… how do you get teachers who are in that teaching space to actually appreciate, understand and value it [Five Propositions], because it’s about, that’s another way of thinking. (Number 6)

Space for either curriculum leaders or teachers to engage in/with such thinking is, in essence, closed off by enactment processes that are an expression and mechanism of regulatory power.

At the same time, and amidst the broader politics of curriculum reform in Australia, the curriculum leaders reported that the school sectors that they liaised with (i.e. the public, Catholic, and Independent school sectors in each jurisdiction), had made business boundaries clear,

The sectors have been very assertive to us about professional learning, and teaching, and pedagogy – [saying] that’s our business. (Number 7)

This comment highlights the upward press of schooling sectors to assert their own stakes in the reform process and arguably, exemplifies Foucault’s ‘bizarre machinery’ of subjection, begging the question, what other subject positions become possible for curriculum leaders constituted by discourse, and constituting themselves through discourse? In other words, how might curriculum leaders stand in resistance to such operations of power?

The personal subject

The discussions above suggest that the curriculum leaders are constituted through operations of power. There is an obvious tension in some of the ways in which they constitute themselves via simultaneous investments in the political machinery of government. For example, the dialogue below reveals concerns and hunches around the realities of curriculum reform processes and the prospective outcomes,

Number 1

Because in their hearts most people do it [engage with curriculum reform] for the right reasons, but unless you invest that time and money for them, then I think you’re going to go through the motions for five years until the next iteration comes out and then you’ll go through it again.

Interviewer

So it’s doomed.

Number 1

I hate to say that, but yeah. For many people, it’s not going to change their practice.

There is scepticism and elements of fatigue here. For curriculum leaders, the policy space is demanding and tiring to occupy day in and out. It is work ‘doomed’ to be ignored, and this is known from the outset, yet curiously they prevail for their two, or three-year term. Why? How? We suggest that in order to cope and survive curriculum leaders have to draw upon their own personal histories and biographies, experiences and values. They do this to make both realist and pragmatist ‘readings’ of curriculum policy and weigh up bureaucratic ends against, with, and alongside social and personal ends. In their exploration of the ethics of policy research, Ozga and Gewirtz (1994) suggest that our values and hunches guide our choices. The curriculum leaders in this research illustrated this and also identified teacher values as a barrier to the reform process, and most especially, to the enactment of the Five Propositions. In asking the question below one leader failed to recognise that their own values might get in the way of reform,

… how does a teacher’s own values, attitude and behaviours impact on whether that student can explore a critical analysis? As teachers we guide the discussion and the exploration around a critical inquiry and sometimes teachers’ own values can restrict that. (Number 5)

For two of the leaders particularly (Number 1 and 5) traces of past experiences of curriculum reform are constantly re-iterated and re-inscribed in ways that still linger. We do not wish to foreclose on the more personal subjectivities this might suggest, as such observations can help to make sense of the practices and processes of the present. For example, this may indicate how certain forms of knowledge become speakable and knowable (e.g. physical literacy) and others are problematised (e.g. health literacy) as in the comment below,

… well, there is health literacy. Why isn’t there physical literacy there? Which is obviously over the last few years become a bright shiny thing. A bit of debate around that.² (Number 8)

In answering a question with a question, this curriculum leader shows that despite mandates and remits embodied experiences and personal values do get in the way. There is discomfort in ‘health’ seemingly displacing ‘physical’ in the ACHPE. Following Foucault (1972, 193) this displacement provides an opportunity to observe how power differentials and political agendas are articulated as ‘prohibitions, exclusions, limitations, values, freedoms, and transgressions’, thus creating the conditions of emergence of particular kinds of subjects (e.g. incoherent, political and personal). Arguably, this opens space for curriculum leaders to be less invested in the strict rules and apparatus that govern, and more attuned to the systems of circulating ‘prohibitions and values’ (Foucault 1972, 193). Such atunement requires thinking about how power and knowledge are implicated in processes of subjection and to what effect, and calls for the seeking out of moments of resistance to the norms that (re)produce the viable curriculum leader subject.

Power/knowledge

In this section, we foreground that whilst we have teased out separate discourses and sub-discourses in our work they cannot (and should not) be considered in isolation, as stable or uniform, good/accepted or bad/excluded, dominant or dominated (Foucault 1978). This acceptance of variability and multiplicity, along with sensitivity, should likewise be applied to both the apparatus of government and to the subjects that emerge from within operations of power. Perhaps, Butler (1993) best explains this in remarking that we must discern ‘the difference between the power we promote and the power we oppose’ (241). This Butlerian (1997) notion of power as promoted and opposed aligns with Foucault’s (1978) suggestion that power is neither simply oppressive or repressive, it is instead everywhere and relational. Such a contextualisation implies that subjects are simultaneously invested in their own subjection (Butler 1997) and hence able to wield power in unpredictable ways (Foucault 1978). Such wielding is invested in and dependent upon who knows what, what can be said, by whom, when and where, and so the reproduction of discourses of knowledge in particular ways and contexts is important to consider.

Knowledge (re)production

Our specific interest has been the interpretation and enactment of the Five Propositions – a particular feature of the curriculum underpinned and informed by particular sets of knowledge. A reasonable assumption is that by virtue of their positions the curriculum leaders would have a certain degree of ‘knowledge’ about the Five Propositions. One of the curriculum leaders recognised this expectation,

But that’s probably one of the things; if I have not got it, then how am I expecting people on the ground to go, “Yep, I get that.” (Number 1)

We found that the extent and depth of knowledge varied, reflecting curriculum leaders’ different experience, backgrounds and contexts. While some leaders questioned their own level of knowledge, what remained constant was agreement upon the importance of the Propositions as a key driver of both the curriculum and pedagogy. However, one barrier to ‘knowing’ is not knowing what one’s organisation or jurisdiction might do with the curriculum and when,

I’m not sure how [deleted organisation] is going to write them in. I don’t know if they’re going to call them the propositions, if they’re going to be principles, I’m not really sure what the language will be either. (Number 2)

Officially rendered powerless in this ‘writing in’ process, this curriculum leader is left in limbo, waiting for direction, hamstrung and yet concerned that delays open the reform process to other influential agendas to make powerful claims on the space,

I really hope that the external influences that always impact on us can kind of stay at bay long enough so that we can have a fair go with implementation without being forced into teaching about anaphylaxis because something has happened or focus back on water safety because a drowning report came out. (Number 2)

Another challenge to ‘knowing’ the Propositions is the language used to define/explain them. A number of the curriculum leaders found them ‘academic’ suggesting that to be understood and used by teachers a more ‘plain language’ approach was required,

Like, even in the valuing movement one. You know, it kind of talks, I don’t know, it’s just not - plain English enough. It’s academic and it’s right, but I think there’s a gap between that and how we want it. (Number 1)

This quote also highlights that the curriculum leader expects to be able to bring the curriculum to the people. From their perspective,

If it isn’t easily digestible by the person on the ground you have wasted all that time and effort. It has to make sense to those people and it has to be delivered to them. (Number 1)

This curriculum leader positions themselves as the deliverer of knowledge ‘to those people’, again highlighting the complex workings of power relations.

In again illustrating the strategy of answering a question with a question curriculum leader Number 6 exposed their own uncertainty in relation to defining the proposition Health Literacy,

[Health literacy] what does that mean? What does it look like? And how would you encourage that happening in the classroom? (Number 6)

Such a comment comes despite Health Literacy being the only proposition that is explicitly defined and detailed in the ACHPE (ACARA 2021b).

For curriculum leader Number 4, personal knowledge of a Strengths-based Approach sits uncomfortably alongside their recognition that government assessment agendas in particular, continue to constrain policy reform processes,

I think it’s going to take a little while before we can actually fully - get a fully strength-based approach, but – yeah, because assessment often drives what you can do. (Number 4)

There is recognition here that assessment discourses that overlay curriculum reform and provide lenses through which new curriculum texts (and the ACHPE specifically) are read, remains highly influential and a source of tension for these curriculum leaders.

Collectively, the above quotes suggest that discourses of knowledge construct notions of curriculum work through language, processes and practices. Furthermore, they reveal that power operates via networks of relationships (e.g. curriculum leader-government, curriculum leader-teacher) that are both strategic and unpredictable. Importantly, they are also personal. A consistent storyline in our data positioned the curriculum leader as trapped between policy and playground. Arguably this is far from a position of oppression or devoid of agency. As the expected translators of knowledge, or the ‘knowers’ of curriculum, what becomes known or do-able to/for others rests largely on what they read as desirable and/or permissable. In narrating feelings of policy fatigue, political constraints and their own uncertain knowledge around the Five Propositions, the curriculum leaders leveraged into a ‘gate keeper’, simultaneously pessimistic about the politics of reform and optimistic about the practicalities of genuine change. Compelled in this way, they play an important first role in decoding, meaning making, translating and interpreting curriculum documents and concepts which determine their future approaches and ultimately their influence. Yet, because of what we know about both discourse and subjectivity, such actions (whether intentional or not) are not available to all curriculum leaders all of the time. Rather, they are intertwined with contextual complexities inherent in a large, federated education and political system that carries a long history of inequity across and within jurisdictions (Brennan and Zipin 2018). Although the basis of the Australian Curriculum was a vision of a National curriculum that was fair and equitable for all (MCEETYA 2008) each of the curriculum leaders spoke to inequity in relation to the process of developing, rolling out and/or supporting the ACHPE,

… if the Australian Curriculum is designed for every student in Australia, you’ve got to be so careful about, you know, it has to be accessible to everyone and the interpretation has to be overarching … an example … remote communities … this will be a litmus test of how the Australian Curriculum can be contextualised for kids in remote Aboriginal areas. (Number 1)

It’s a white dominant society and that’s what we’re living in … Indigenous cultures are different, and it’s undervalued. Currently that knowledge and ways of learning is undervalued. (Number 3)

Our data reaffirmed that jurisdictions had very different starting points, as well as needs, skills and experiences; and that differences in geography aside, wide variations in the needs and interests of students, teachers, communities, schooling systems, and political parties limit what is possible with regard to reform in HPE and education more broadly. These quotes illustrate the contrasting contexts and possibilities,

… bigger states have more money to do whatever and the smaller states are desperate and crying out for support. (Number 1)

… in the Independent system there’s obviously someone in there who’s thinking, “Let’s absolutely get our head around this” … the Independent [sector] has run some pretty significant professional development for teachers around the Australian Curriculum. (Number 7)

Systemic differences such as these raise a number of questions, most especially ‘is this fair?’ and in relation to this research, ‘what policy work is made possible amongst so many contextual complexities?’ More particularly, we question what is possible in a context that has repeatedly pitted jurisdictions against each other exposing inequity as a discourse of ‘difference’ that is in some sense unspeakable, and yet is everywhere (Foucault 1978), and must be spoken. The case below provides some insights to these questions.

Power promoted and opposed

Here, we use a single narrative to explore some of the messy everywhere discourses that draw attention to issues of inequity as a way to legitimise one’s own choices. Rather than opposing power as such, utterings of discontent call out inequity by exposing the apparatus of government alongside the investments of subjects that emerge from within the very operations of power (Butler 1993, 1997; Foucault 1978). However, there are unintended impacts in contexts that are already positioned as deficit, or as needing to deal with educational basics first,

I don’t see at this point for <deleted jurisdiction>, like there’s a lot of good intent and there’s a lot of action around learning the content, and that’s the initial stages of learning what the content is and how to place that within the year. (Number 3)

Below they answer a question with a question and in so doing, deflect their own position of insecurity around knowledge, suggesting that others may ask,

What is this term? What does this one term mean? (Number 3)

This curriculum leader reinforces the very inequities of which they speak by drawing attention to the incapacities of others to move beyond intention and towards more ‘higher order planning’,

There’s not a lot of higher order planning around amalgamating different focus areas into a more holistic unit, and there’s not a lot of looking at the [Five Propositions]. (Number 3)

These comments have a legitimising effect on this curriculum leaders’ role, and could be read as ‘I don’t get them, therefore they are not on the table here’,

… the five underlying practices of health and PE, and I would say that’s not on the table really amongst people in [deleted jurisdiction name] yet. (Number 3)

The idea of selecting and/or opting out of the Five Propositions illustrates how certain curriculum knowledges and practices get through, whilst others do not. Further, geographical and language barriers determine what gets through to who and where. By virtue of their utterance, they include some and exclude others, thus constraining reform beyond the curriculum leader and making the Five Propositions conceptually unpermissable knowledge,

I just think it’s aspirational [the Five Propositions], and I think for the majority of mainstream students and schools I think it’s probably inline with what’s possible. It’s just that in remote communities and noninteractive … and the language barrier … it’s a big ask actually. (Number 3)

In this case, the calling out of inequity has operated as a way to legitimise an individuals’ views, displaying at least one of the ways in which spaces or places for resistance and creativity are often foreclosed. Yet, while the above comments display how the power opposed is likely to be quite different to the power promoted, we also recognise that the fringes of isolation and disadvantage are often places where disruption and innovation can/does flourish.

Resistance/agency

Foucault (1991) described poststructuralism as a resource, a tool or ‘an instrument for those who fight, those who resist and refuse what is’ rather than what ‘needs to be done’. In this sense, poststructural insights are linked to resistance and agency (Butler 1999). We direct our attention to these discourses via collective narratives from three curriculum leaders, and a sharper focus on one curriculum leader’s words.

The (un)official party line

As explained, several curriculum leaders had been involved in past curriculum reform developments and/or may have been involved in the writing, advising or supporting of the ACHPE. Through multiple roles over time, they carried the memories of past reform processes making them aware of what was expected of them from on high, and what might be possible on the ground in schools and with teachers. This included an acute awareness of the impossible narrative of cohesion across the country, and associated cynicism,

… there was a bit of dropping the ball, and it was between states, and federal government, and even districts, and even employers about where do we go to get the consistent messaging from, and who is holding that. (Number 8)

For this curriculum leader, the reality was, that in a federated system consistent messaging and cohesion would not be possible. This ‘dropping the ball’ around messaging was echoed in another who expressed concerns about the burden of professional learning,

I think my concern will be that there won’t be a bucket of money that’ll go with this rollout and so professional learning is going to be light on the ground. (Number 2)

This individual was highly aware of the risky terrain that inconsistent messaging and inadequate professional learning support was generating. The groundedness of their work with schools, as well as past memories, experiences and values meant they foresaw a return to the status quo,

… the risk is then teachers will take what comes out and adapt it to what they’ve been doing already. So that’s probably my concern. (Number 2)

By virtue of their historical positioning, the curriculum leaders know exactly what the (un)official reform narrative will be and become, and in the process constitute themselves between state and school, complicit in both reinforcing and resisting the discourses that emerge from such a space.

Pedagogical resistance

The ACHPE identified and embedded a set of five foundational propositions to guide and inform pedagogy. In framing them as propositions or key ideas, the curriculum writers opened a space for various policy actors to think critically about the purpose of the learning area alongside the kinds of skills it sought to develop in young people. The curriculum leaders in this research all viewed the propositions as important and as ‘non-negotiable’. They conceived them as underpinning and driving the ACHPE, as inherently pedagogical in nature, and hence as subversive,

Because it’s the closest the curriculum comes to how you teach … And do you know what? I think it’s because people outside health and P.E. don’t realise that we’ve touched on methodology … (Number 1)

and radical,

… because the curriculum is not allowed to do that. (Number 1)

This transgression of curriculum into pedagogy enabled the curriculum leaders to ‘speak’ certain narratives, in certain ways, around the Five Propositions. For example, whilst direct enactment advice was foreclosed, support (by way of facilitation, advice, guiding, translating) could be provided in their everyday work as part of the process of basic curriculum navigation and introductions. Whilst this was usually low level, with little time allocated, the consistent message about the Five Propositions was, ‘these are important, start with them’. This message alone exemplifies resistance through/as pedagogy and as a step outside their remit/role, that is, assessment and reporting, and into the more agentic work of making change happen.

‘There will be a shift’

The previous comments and analysis highlight tension between, across and within systems and individuals, and demarcate ongoing contextual struggles and possibilities that produce power at the same time as offering resistance (Foucault 1978). The curriculum leader narrative below exemplifies this by firstly starting from a position of comfort about the Five Propositions, then a prediction about uptake, and finally a commentary about how the propositions infiltrate their work,

As to how many [teachers] actually go and read [the propositions] I couldn’t tell you, but in most of my presentations there is always a slide in terms of where we’re at in terms of curriculum development and what should I be doing; and I’ve put those propositions up and a reference. (Number, 5)

This inclusion of one slide, comes despite jurisdictional focus on assessment and reporting, and is an act of resistance based on a personal view of the propositions. Number 5 continues,

These propositions are the foundation for our curriculum. So, if we haven’t embedded this successfully, from the rationale all the way through to content then we need to ensure that that’s happened. (Number 5)

In some sense this is ironic, because the overt focus on assessment and reporting in this jurisdiction has enabled subversive inclusions. By enhancing the profile of the Five Propositions beyond the original curriculum, this curriculum leader offers creative readings and further resources for teachers. Yet the tension between resistance and power that accompanies subversive acts is noticeable,

I guess one of the challenges in our new curriculum, and I guess that’s attributed to the Australian Curriculum is the new way of doing or presenting information for issues that have been around forever. (Number 5)

Here curriculum reform comes not from the new content associated with HPE, but rather as the ‘new ways of doing or presenting’ that might more suitably address issues ‘that have been around forever’. As a form of jurisdictional agency, such a comment resists both the local and federated message, further enabling opportunity for the progressive and innovative enactment of content to come into being. For this curriculum leader, the Five Propositions offer new ways of doing that will change teaching. Their prediction was that,

… there will be a shift, there is no doubt … there will be a shift in teaching of HPE from what teachers are used to. (Number 5)

A definitive shift in practice is a bold call from such a leadership position, though in being followed by a referral back to the pragmatics of the role (i.e. ‘to meet outcomes’), it is somewhat tempered by (governmental) concern,

We’ll be concerned, and I don’t think they will be able to meet the outcomes, if teachers … are teaching the same way they did. (Number 5)

These sentences highlight the complexities of power relations and the continuous struggles, challenges and adaptions inherent in the role of curriculum leaders in reform. Whilst this might appear tiring and ineffective, above we have argued that change comes from questioning what matters to and for the various actors within the networks in which they operate. Importantly, one’s personal biography and positioning can strengthen certain messages above others from within the constraints of government, and this appears to be the case in relation to the Five Propositions.

Conclusion

This research has affirmed the centrality and inseparability of politics and pragmatics in curriculum reform. Within a federated system, many individuals and organisations are invested in reform at the national and jurisdictional level. In this paper, we have directed attention to those individuals identified as ‘curriculum leaders’, who bore interpretation and enactment responsibilities of the ACHPE. The findings in this paper help us to better appreciate the roles and work of such individuals in policy processes. In using the policy actor/policy work framework of Ball et al. (2012) as a starting point we have usefully contributed to their project and a growing body of work exploring the ways in which policy is taken up and ‘done’ in HPE (see Alfrey, O’Connor, and Jeanes 2017; Hammond, Penney, and Jeanes 2019; Lambert 2018; Lambert and O’Connor 2018; Lambert and Penney 2020). By drawing on Foucault to critically analyse what might be considered ‘other’ types of policy actors/policy work the paper extends the work of Ball et al. (2012) by offering deeper insights into the complex nature of curriculum leadership. In this regard, the paper makes a worthwhile contribution to policy sociology by identifying additional (in)formal roles and work of these high-ranking policy actors and illustrating these in empirical data. This contribution is of interest to observers for three main reasons.

Firstly, our analyses suggest that whilst national and jurisdictional curriculum leadership is a complex task driven by powerful political agendas, it is also one imbued with subtle and sophisticated nuances and at times nervous interplay between individuals and structures, policy and pedagogy. Therefore, our research extends understanding of curriculum enactment as a complex, dynamic process that spans policy networks and that for curriculum leaders, demands engagement in policy work that is inherently both political and pragmatic. Secondly, curriculum leaders such as these are uniquely positioned and yet, in terms of policy enactment, are under researched. We consider ourselves privileged to have captured rich data from these curriculum leaders and acknowledge both their generosity as well as hesitancy to depart from the political lines that dictate their official policy work. This exposes the politics around research in and with government officials. At the same time, our analyses highlight that the actor roles/positions that curriculum leaders are required, able and/or inclined to adopt are necessarily fluid and their corresponding policy work is diverse and complex. Finally, this research provides compelling support for the claim that curriculum reform is not static, is never ‘done’, and is thus entirely unfinished (Penney 2013). It prompts us to suggest that curriculum policy enactment needs to similarly be understood as in a constant state of discursive and material ‘becoming’. This, together with the critical influence of curriculum leaders, is exemplified in our research. Amidst complex and changing structural relations across the federated system of education in Australia, alongside cycles of curriculum reform, curriculum leadership has thus been highlighted as an important focus for policy enactment research.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This research was approved by Monash University research ethics number 6051.

Notes on contributors

Karen Lambert

Karen Lambert is a Senior Lecturer within the Faculty of Education at Monash University. Karen is a queer poststructural feminist theorist and critical pedagogist whose research interests lie in curriculum policy reform, embodied learning and pedagogies in physical education and mental health in community sport. Twitter: InfinityKaren. LinkeIn: https://au.linkedin.com/in/drkarenlambert

Dawn Penney

Dawn Penney is a professorial research fellow in the school of education at Edith Cowan University and an Adjunct Professor in the Faculty of Education at Monash University. Dawn’s research centres on developments in policy, curriculum and assessment in Health and Physical Education and seeks to bring to the fore issues of equity amidst ‘reforms’. Twitter: @profdpenney. ResearchGate https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Dawn_Penney2

Notes

1. Several participants stipulated this as a condition of their consent to be interviewed.

2. See Macdonald and Enright (2013) for discussion of this debate.