Relational Approaches to School Evaluation

2020 ◽  
pp. 132-154
Author(s):  
Kenneth J. Gergen ◽  
Scherto R. Gill
Keyword(s):  
Test Performance ◽  
Evaluation Process ◽  
School Evaluation ◽  
School Inspection ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Evaluation Practice ◽  
Whole School ◽  
Evaluative Concerns ◽  
Multiple Voices ◽  
The Many

School inspection based on the standardized measurement of student test performance is among the significant causes of teachers’ stress and school leaders’ frustration. To truly understand how a school provides meaningful educational experiences, it is imperative to involve the reflection of all stakeholders. Viable alternatives from a relational standpoint are now emerging, and demonstrate how school evaluation in the form of collective and mutually supportive inquiry can enrich understanding of school functioning and stimulate effective change. Among the many relevant practices, the authors focus on two relationally sensitive approaches to replace the traditional models of school inspection: first, a community-based whole-school evaluation drawing on the perspectives of teachers, parents, students, and school governors, and then and an integral evaluation practice combining the evaluative concerns of the school community and policy makers. These practices demonstrate the value of including multiple voices in the school evaluation process, thus empowering and engaging the wider community in improving schools.

Will Policy Makers Hear My Disability Experience? How Participatory Research Contributes to Managing Interest Conflict in Policy Implementation

2010 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 207-220 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karen R. Fisher ◽  
Sally Robinson
Keyword(s):  
Policy Implementation ◽  
Participatory Research ◽  
Formative Evaluation ◽  
Evaluation Process ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Evaluation Practice ◽  
Policy Theory ◽  
Interest Conflict ◽  
Participatory Policy ◽  
Service Experiences

Participatory evaluation gives primacy to the experience of people affected by the policy. How realistic is it for researchers to persuade government of its benefits, given the gap between participatory policy theory and government evaluation practice? We apply this question to the Resident Support Program evaluation. The program coordinates support for people living in boarding houses and hostels in Queensland, Australia. We found that a participatory, longitudinal, formative evaluation process facilitated service user contribution to research outcomes, service experiences and policy implementation. In addition, the values position of participatory research can contribute to managing interest conflict in policy implementation.

scholarly journals Education within public management in South Africa: A focus on external Whole-School Evaluation process’ contribution in Mpumalanga province

2015 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 145-156
Author(s):  
Richard Siphamandla Ryan Mathaba ◽  
Nirmala Dorasamy
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
School Improvement ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Evaluation Process ◽  
School Evaluation ◽  
Whole School ◽  
New Public ◽  
Performance Auditing ◽  
Management Functions

The study focused on the role played by public sector management in South Africa towards the country’s total development and improvement. This article also analyses how through the Whole School Evaluation (WSE) process, the education system in South Africa seeks to ensure that the schooling is effective. This paper examines public management, public administration as well as new public management (NPM). The aim is to illustrate a view of how education fits in the broader public management and how the WSE process assists schooling in South Africa and Mpumalanga in particular. This is to ensure that the schooling is effective and contribute towards service delivery and the country’s overall development and improvement. Furthermore, WSE as a process, is viewed through five of NPM undisputable and debatable characteristics of accountability for performance; performance measurement; performance auditing; policy analysis and evaluation; and strategic planning and management. Public management functions and public management principles are discussed from a point of how the WSE process strives to ensure that it complies with these function and principles, and how this compliance benefit school improvement. This paper came to a number of conclusions regarding education within public management from a WSE perspective. Firstly, education through the external WSE process conforms to this principle of New Public Management in that evaluation is aimed at improving the quality of education. Also, the external WSE, as a process, and education in general, through the NPM principles can be performed within public management. Furthermore, external WSE conforms to public management principles as well as Batho Pele principles.

School evaluation at Japanese schools: policy intentions and practical appropriation

2008 ◽  
Author(s):  
Masaaki Katsuno ◽  
Tetsuro Takei
Keyword(s):  
Education Reform ◽  
Empirical Research ◽  
Student Involvement ◽  
Evaluation Process ◽  
School Evaluation ◽  
Japanese Education ◽  
Evaluation Policies ◽  
Japanese Schools

In the present paper the authors will describe the development of school evaluation policies in the context of recent Japanese education reform. In doing so, the applicability of Neave's 'Evaluative State' thesis shall be examined. And then they will move on to the discussion as to how the policies will work in schools. Drawing on the findings of their empirical research into student involvement in the school evaluation process, the authors will deal with the 'politics of appropriation'. The process could be of a liberating nature at the present time, as opposed to the managerial intentions of policy.

Public Policy Making and Public Policy Analysis

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lee S. Friedman
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Public Policy ◽  
Policy Analysis ◽  
Policy Making ◽  
The United States ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Public Policy Analysis ◽  
Professional Class ◽  
The Many

This chapter reviews the development and growth of the policy-analytic profession. Historically, government decision makers have often called upon those with expertise to assist them in reaching their decisions. This chapter, however, concerns a new professional class of advisors that began developing during the 1950s in the United States. This new profession assists policy makers in understanding better their alternatives and relevant considerations for choosing among them. From here, the chapter offers some perspective on the research to date that has attempted to assess the effects of the profession—a perspective that emphasizes some important differences across the many types of governmental settings that utilize policy analysis, and the methodological difficulties that assessment efforts confront.

Future plant solutions by interfering RNA and key messages for communication and dissemination.

2021 ◽  
pp. 167-173
Author(s):  
Hilde-Gunn Opsahl-Sorteberg
Keyword(s):  
Food Security ◽  
Plant Breeding ◽  
Environmental Impacts ◽  
Sustainable Food ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Crop Varieties ◽  
General Terms ◽  
Key Issues ◽  
The Many ◽  
Interfering Rna

Abstract Communication is an increasing prerequisite to justify academic existence and value, and for project funding of all kinds to show relevance and value, including the future of European networks like COST Actions. Academia is slowly adapting to this expectation and learning the profession of communication. Language and vocabulary are key issues in communication, and particularly to reach the many important non-scientific audiences. Therefore, this chapter starts with a description of some new plant breeding technologies relevant for communicating, in general terms, the science behind plant improvement. This is followed by selected examples of the application of these techniques to improve current and future crop varieties. Finally, key messages gathered from the European iPLANTA project for policy makers, non-specialists and specially interested citizens are communicated. This is to show a wider audience how RNAi can contribute to sustainable food solutions and food security with minimal environmental impacts.

The Top 10 Concerns about Recovery Encountered in System Transformation

2008 ◽  
Author(s):  
Larry Davidson ◽  
Michael Rowe ◽  
Janis Tondora ◽  
Maria J. O'Connell ◽  
Martha Staeheli Lawless
Keyword(s):  
At Risk ◽  
Mental Illness ◽  
Systems Of Care ◽  
System Transformation ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Recovery Orientation ◽  
Federal Mandate ◽  
Commission Report ◽  
The Many

The second chapter begins with descriptions of some of the many ways in which people with serious mental illness are key agents in their own recovery. In these descriptions, we fi nd that the cornerstones of recovery are both the hope that a better life is possible and the desire the person has to pursue such a better life once this hope has taken root. For an individual, both hope and action appear to be required to make recovery a reality. As we begin to understand more fully the role of systems of care and of the practitioners within those systems in facilitating recovery, we suggest that achieving, in the words of the New Freedom Commission report, “profound change—not at the margins of a system, but at its very core” also will require both hopeful attitudes and concerted efforts. While the remaining chapters in this volume will deal more explicitly with the kinds of concerted efforts required to achieve transformation, this chapter focuses primarily on attitudes toward recovery and the kinds of concerns systems and practitioners have raised (to date) as they have gone about the process of understanding and implementing recovery principles in practice. It has been our experience, however, that the federal mandate to transform systems of care to promote recovery has left many policy makers, program managers, practitioners, and even the recovery community itself under increasing pressure to move to a recovery orientation without fi rst examining the concerns of stakeholders within those systems about this new notion of recovery and its implications. As a result, we are all at risk of overlaying recovery rhetoric on top of existing systems of care, failing to effect any real or substantial—not to mention revolutionary—changes due to our urgency to just “get it done.” In this chapter, we pause to consider some of the more common concerns we have encountered in attempting to introduce and implement care based on the vision of recovery that we have articulated thus far. Addressing these concerns, we believe, is a necessary fi rst step in changing the attitudes that underlie current practices in the process of replacing these attitudes with the more hopeful, empowering, and respectful attitudes demanded, and deserved, by people in recovery.

The Contribution of Teleworking towards a Green Computing Environment

2016 ◽  
pp. 1723-1738
Author(s):  
Iheanyi Chuku Egbuta ◽  
Brychan Thomas ◽  
Said Al-Hasan
Keyword(s):  
Conceptual Model ◽  
Green Computing ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Computing Environment ◽  
Theoretical Frameworks ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Working Definition ◽  
Future Research Directions ◽  
The Many ◽  
Definition Of

The aims of the chapter are to consider the strategic green issues of teleworking in terms of the environment, transport, location, office space, and resource use for modern organisations and business sectors and to formulate a conceptual model of the processes involved. In fact, teleworking technologies are variously implemented for green computing initiatives, and the many advantages include lower greenhouse gas emissions related to travel, greater worker satisfaction, and as a result of lower overhead office costs, increased profit margins. The chapter initially investigates the appropriateness of a working definition of teleworking with regard to green computing, and following this, explores the benefits and barriers of teleworking in a green computing environment. The theoretical frameworks and models of teleworking are then considered, and a conceptual model of the contribution of teleworking to green computing is formulated. It is the intention of the chapter to identify and articulate those teleworking concepts that will be useful to academicians, scientists, business entrepreneurs, practitioners, managers, and policy makers, and to indicate future research directions for research scholars and students with similar interests.

Deep diving into values: A way to enhance empowerment evaluation

2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (4) ◽  
pp. 204-210 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kerrie Ikin ◽  
Peter McClenaghan
Keyword(s):  
Stakeholder Engagement ◽  
External Validation ◽  
Evaluation Process ◽  
School Principal ◽  
Evaluation Team ◽  
Empowerment Evaluation ◽  
Whole School ◽  
Deep Diving ◽  
Government Education ◽  
Organisational Values

In recent years, the New South Wales government education system changed the way whole-school evaluation occurs. Moving away from external school reviews when data suggested underperformance, principals are now required to develop 3-year strategic school plans and self-evaluate them in consultation with their staff, parents and students. An external validation process is then undertaken by principal peers. The internal school process presumes a stakeholder-engagement approach to school planning and evaluation. It further presumes that stakeholders are not only consulted but also feel they understand and own the plan. One school principal, realising the challenges that the new model posed for himself and his staff, engaged an evaluation team to develop and implement a process that would help his school rise to these challenges. This article describes the empowerment evaluation process that ensued. It first explains the context of the school that gave rise to empowerment over other forms of stakeholder-engagement evaluation processes. It discusses how the literature on values underpinned the conceptual framework and operational model. The article then illustrates how the process enabled the staff to engage explicitly with personal and organisational values and how a focus on these values was built into every stage of the process. Finally, the benefits as well as the challenges of this approach are described.

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