how has globalisation impacted education? & conservative policy 2015+ Flashcards
what direct policies have been influenced through globalisation?
- variety of schools eg free schools and academies
- skills for global marketplace competition
- additonal funding for maths + science
- raising standards for teachers
what influences of globalisation other than policies have been identified?
- privatisation and marketisation
- university entrances for overseas students, make more money
- EAL and ESOL funding
- looking into other cultures to find solutions to problems
- international comparisons between edu systems for example pisa ranking
2 what impact has globalisation had on education?
- changes to teaching and learning strategies
- curriculum changes
- multiculturalism, many residents are immigrants so pupil population is now more diverse
- the EU has shaped policies and laws
what problems are identified with globalisation?
- limited range of subjects
- cultural differences between nations
- validity and reliability of testing
- expensive
- shortlived policies
PISA tables (international league tables) impact and evaluation
impact: Labour and Conservative have both been concerned by these and have shaped policy as a result (labour literacy strategy, con-free schools)
evaluation:
- Torrance states PISA isn’t comparable because there are different sample sizes, tests and ages involved. This gives an invalid picture
- Wiliam states each country organises their education differently, so it is impossible to say what could work for the UK
Schools run like businesses, growth of capitalism (Rikowski) impact and evaluation
Impact:
Privatisation- businesses taking over education
(endogenous and exogenous factors)
- sponsorship of academies
- marketisation of schools
- schools subletting facilities or teachers
- performance related pay
Evaluation:
- Schools running like a business is for the benefit of shareholders not students.
- Money for teaching and learning goes to marketisation :(
- Creates sink schools due to formula funding
- Academies and Free Schools can employ unqualified teachers and pay low wages
Expansion of UK education services impact and evaluation
Impact:
- Nord Anglia has over 42 schools worldwide offering a ‘global british education’
- Eton, Harrow and other private schools also operate like a franchise
Evaluation:
- Acts like cultural imperialism- spreading the west’s promotion of education
- Schools are commercial enterprises and need to make profits
How has globalisation impacted the national curriculum?
- national literacy and numeracy hours (1998-2010).
- slimming down of the NC (2010-2015) to ‘essential knowledge’ Michael Gove.
- raising entry requirements for teachers, as done in Finland.
- ‘master teachers’ (2014) in all state schools (if elected), as done in singapore.
globalisation definition
increase in the interconnectedness of cultural, political, and economical services around the world
Cola-isation
Private companies using their brands in schools. This makes schools seem the same (homogenised)
for example culinera, bic, postura
Privatisation
- the transferring of assets and services from the state to private providers= not state funded, they take it over and run it (private companies)
NOT private schools
Fragmentation of ownership
postmodernist idea?
the breaking up of state run services as these are sold off to private companies for them to make a profit (Ball!!)
endogenous
internal privatisation
exogenous
external privatisation
Key concepts of conservative educational policy from 2015
- multi academy trusts (MATs)/academy chains
- progress 8
- global educational league tables
- PISA tests
- EBacc
- Meritocracy
- Selective schools
- Grammar schools
- Social mobility
conservative educational policy (2015+): globalisation (PISA tests)
- big feature of edu policy since 1997
- this is primarily a result of needing to compete in a global marketplace
- in order to compete in a global economy, politicians argued we need a good edu system that provides a well qualified labour force
- good education is seen to lead to good workers and good economic prospects
- educational performance has been measured globally using PISA tests: every 3 years, 70 countries take tests in maths, reading and science using a sample of 15 year olds. Asian countries usually dominate
- However, not all students answer all questions, instead an algorithm is used to calculate a possible outcome.
conservative educational policy (2015+): academies
- by 2016, 61% of secondary schools had become academies. There was a growth in academy chains (or MATs). The government wanted all schools to become academies
- Hannay (2016) identified that there had been little evidence that convertor academies has better results than LEA schools. He found the same for sponsored academies
- However, the sponsored academies do achieve better results for low attaining and disadvantaged students compared to similar LEA schools
- MATs make up a disproportionate number of the lowest performing schools
conservative educational policy (2015+): progress 8 & evaluation
- introduced in 2016, P8 replaced the 5A*-C measure of school performance
- P8 uses the KS2 results to predict an outcome of results
- for every result above the predicted, additional points are added to a school’s performance table
strengths:
- removed ‘educational triage’ from previous measures
- means every student counts
disadvantages:
- should schools be blamed for underachievement which occurs because of poverty?
- it is unfair to compare schools in wealthy areas to those in poor areas
conservative educational policy (2015+): EBacc & evaluation
- in 2010, a ‘core curriculum’ was introduced called the English Baccalaureate (EBacc)
- students should take 5 ‘academic’ subjects to study: maths, english, science, history, or geography and a language.
- This was made compulsory in 2015
- In 2023, only 38% of students were entered for the EBacc
Evaluation:
- less room for vocational and creative subjects to be studied
- shortage of specialist teachers to meet the target set by the government (90% by 2020)
- improved results for all in English and maths including disadvantaged students
conservative educational policy (2015+): Theresa May’s policies & evaluation
- Meritocracy is key to success for the individual and society
- She saw selective schools as a key way to make this happen, she wanted them to be able to selct by ability
- She saw more grammar schools in disadvantaged areas to be a solution
- she wanted ‘tutor proof’ tests so that middle class families couldn’t just pay for tutors to teach to the test
Evaluation:
- no evidence that grammar schools would improve social mobility
- most grammar schools today are middle class, <3% of students are on FSM
- this would create more ‘sink schools’
- selective education= inequality
what is progress 8?
take best 8 subjects, if on target it is zero. below target= negative and above target = +
(privatisation) some practices that have been employed that mirror businesses are:
(these are ENDOGENOUS, within schools)
- performance targets (they report progress on)
- performance related pay for teachers too, similar to bonuses
- marketing = more funding
- greater efficiency and profitability = sponsor activities PTA, teacher hours increase, class sizes up.
- schools opt out of LEA control and manage their own school because it was seen as limiting their authority to do what is best for their school (during labour gov, 2nd wave of academisation)
- academisation- importing business principles into education establishments
outsourcing of services:
(exogenous)
- management via academy trusts (brand!), colaisation
- educational consultants
- examination services
- developing educational brands (g classroom)
- private investment (PFIs-privately funded initiatives) in building of schools
criticisms of privatisation
- large companies influence the content taught
- colaisation (Ball)
- focus on profit rather than progress- some courses cut if unprofitable
- academies can use unqualified and unskilled teachers!
- can opt out of national curriculum
