Public education in the age of Google : How human and non-human actors shape educational practices

• Political demands on Swedish school to be more “digitized” has increased the educational involvement of multi-national IT-companies. This is not unique for Sweden, neither for education; it is a global development changing the public sector. This paper discusses how Google’s learning platform G Suite for Education organize what school is; how and what students learn and how teachers teach and how future citizens are shaped. The study builds on interviews with 15 persons selling and implementing educational platforms and analyses of an online course for teachers. Theoretically it is inspired from studies on how education is governed through multilayered networks involving public authorities as well as business companies, humans as well as material actors. Educational technologies are not value free, they organize possible ways of “doing school”. The results show how entrepreneurial discourses organize school, through the digital tools as well as the people who sell them. There is a strong emphasis on skills as innovation, collaboration and creativity. The teacher is not seen as an authority but as guiding individual students in relation to supposed “learning capabilities”. Compared to traditional views in the welfare state, the focus is on the individual rather than the collective. Notably, the actors downplay the role of technology in itself. Soft skills are emphasized, as well as values and being able to “believe”. The paper illuminates how STS-theories and methods can be employed in the field of education and shed light on how school is shaped through cultural ideas and materializations of technology.

Nyckelord

Education

marketization of education

Digitalization

Google

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