Bridges and breaks in a local school organization's work to develop research-based education

• Research-based education has become increasingly important, in Sweden as well as in other Nordic countries. The Swedish School Act explicitly states that all education should rest on scientific basis and proven experience. This has placed new demands on school leaders to foster organizational conditions to promote research-based education in teachers' classroom practices. However, the Education Act's authoritative, but vague, requirements have left local schools to interpret and handle the policy reform in practice. The aim of this study is to analyze and discuss a school organization's learning and transformation to fulfill the assignment regarding research-based education. The study is conducted as an ethnographic case study of a local school municipality which during several years has worked purposively to facilitate enactment of the policy in their organization. Theoretically, the study draws on policy enactment theory (Ball et al, 2012) with emphasis on local context combined with an activity theoretical understanding of organizational learning as an outcome of doing and learning together. Empirical data derive from participant observations, field notes and recordings from recurrent meetings 2019–2021 in a local research and development-group (R&D-group). The group consisted of three school leaders, a scientific leader and an inhouse researcher from the municipality. As researchers we had an active participation with an ‘engaged scholarship’ approach (Van de Ven, 2018) in the collaborative group. The R&D-group's agenda were characterized by discussions and valuation of previous, ongoing or future activities regarding the assignment. To identify and extract narratives from the data, Mishler's four categories for analysis were used. The approach enabled us to link together individual and organizational narratives as a way to structure past experiences representing organizational memory. The analysis highlights the longitudinal dynamics of continuity and discontinuity, as bridges and breaks, in the organizational learning (Engeström, 2016). Preliminary result indicates that organizational learning to develop a research-based education proceeds in small steps, balancing continuity and discontinuity. Horizontal dissemination of scientific knowledge and attitudes are important, and function as bridging by stimulating creative initiatives. Acts of bridging presupposes new ways of dealing with uncertainty and requires a transformed leadership compliant to variable leading positions and strategies. Results also show the importance of the R&D-group's function with strategic bridging at several organizational levels. Given that research-based education has become increasingly important in the Nordic countries, the study contributes with an understanding of how structured bridging in organizations can strengthen learning and capacity. Ball S. J., Maguire, M., & Braun, A. (2012). How schools do policy: Policy enactments in secondary schools. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge.Engeström, Y. (2016). Beyond discontinuity: Expansive organizational learning remembered. In Studies in Expansive Learning: Learning What Is Not Yet There (pp. 171-190). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Van de Ven, A. H. (2018). Academic-practioner engaged scholarship. Information and organization, 28, 37–43.

Ämnesord

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Utbildningsvetenskap (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Educational Sciences (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

research-based education

organizational learning

continuity

discontinuity

cultural-historical activity theory

policy enactment

utbildning på vetenskaplig grund

organisationers lärande

kontinuitet

diskontinuitet

aktivitetsteori

pedagogiskt arbete

educational work

Publikations- och innehållstyp

ref (ämneskategori)

kon (ämneskategori)