 
Week 3 - Outcomes and Standards
|  | Let?s Not Forget the Social Outcomes of Schooling |
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MRS JULIE RIMES
Tasmania, Australia
THERE IS NO DOUBT that the articulation and management of outcomes and standards in schools are important elements of the professional life of teachers and principals. Who could possibly argue about the centrality and importance of this? Schools are actively involved in quality assurance and measurement procedures. Accountability is an educational reality. Yet these measures do not necessarily reflect the concerns of parents and teachers about the nature of learning in school.
A Broader Social Accountability
Schools are challenged to create a learning and caring community based on cohesive principles, where students can feel that they are valued, that they belong, and that they are being supported as they develop their own identity and sense of self-worth. However, life in a school, as an example of how students can experience being a citizen in a democracy, is not always easy. The voice of the students is not always heard, their experiences are not validated, and their responsibilities are often given more priority than their rights.
The school and its structures and practices are already teaching students a civics and citizenship course. What is questionable is what is being learned directly and indirectly by students about becoming a critically literate citizen. Unless schools are consciously focusing on issues associated with student identity, civic agency, civic virtue, entitlement, and so on, in their everyday practice then schools can be poor places to learn democracy.
Teaching Students Democratic Principles
The purpose of this paper is to put forward a case for developing in students the principles that underpin our democratic society, to make schools places where students' voices are central and integral in the decision-making processes.
Australians in many sectors, and at many levels of society, are currently engaged in a series of discussions about the nature of democracy, civic involvement and our identity as a nation. This has been accompanied by an increase in political and academic interest in Australian citizenship in general, and civic education in particular.
Young people are involved throughout their schooling with making choices about their current and future interests, their identity and their obligations to other people. These choices will determine to some extent their relationships with civil society and the political order. What is the school's role in helping students understand how to become active citizens?
This paper puts forward a framework by which teaching practitioners can examine their own behaviours, pedagogy, and also what happens within their schools to help them better understand their individual and corporate actions in relation to developing citizenship education programs for schools. What this framework seeks to do is to make explicit some of the essential or salient elements of citizenship, and apply them to the school setting.
Currently there is considerable work being done in many parts of the world around the concepts of citizenship education. In Australia, to some extent, this has been prompted by the report of the Civics Expert Group (Boston, Macintyre, & Pasco, 1994) but beyond this it reflects growing concerns about issues related to deficiencies of knowledge, capacity and civic confidence. Debates on citizenship have identified minimal and maximal interpretations of the ways the concepts of citizenship have been used (McLaughlin,1992; Evans,1995). For schools, these interpretations have direct implications for the nature of educational approaches in teaching about civics and citizenship, and indeed, for a range of school practices. Evans (1995) states:
'Education for citizenship in its minimal interpretation requires only induction into basic knowledge of institutionalised rules concerning rights and obligations. Maximal interpretations require education which develops critical and reflective abilities and capacities for self-determination and autonomy.'
The adoption of any form of maximalist approach requires attention to not only what students learn in the prescribed curriculum but what students learn from the way the school is organised and from their prescribed or implied place within the school. The framework developed here is a suggested guide to assist school leaders as they develop a school setting which is committed to creating well-informed, critical thinking, active participants of a democratic society.
Seven Distinct Practices
Firstly we need to look at the kinds of practices of citizenship that the school engages in. Seven distinct practices have been identified and defined within this framework:
- Membership & Identity:Creating an Identity and a Sense of Membership. The kind of membership and identity practices that the school has helped the members of the school community to develop.
- Entitlement - Claiming rights. The extent to which the school formally allows participation by its constituents to make decisions, voice opinions and express their rights. The extent to which the school confers rights.
- Framing Interests. The concepts the school has of its students' interests and well-being, and the practices developed to achieve and protect these.
- Political Understandings - Developing Understandings and Forming Judgments. The opportunities the school provides for students to gain understandings and form judgements about how our common life operates as a political community.
- Civic Virtue - Exercising Responsibility. The opportunities the school provides for students to act responsibly, and to identify and practise a broad range of civic virtues, such as justice, civility, respect for persons, tolerance and public service.
- Civic Agency - Participating in the Public Life of the Community. The opportunities the school gives to students, parents and teachers to participate in the civic life of the school community.
- Civic Attachment and Allegiance - Forming Civic Identities. The ways in which the school provides opportunities for identification with, and attachment, to the local community and to the wider community.
Within the school setting there are a range of practices that can be identified in each of these areas. It is possible to consider, say, three functional areas of the school such as teaching and learning, leadership and culture, and management and governance and to consider ways and means of ensuring that effective practices happen in each of these environments of the school setting. Take for example, an area of practice, such as Entitlement or Claiming Rights. In relation to teaching and learning, we can observe whether teaching practices allow students to participate in choices concerning their learning. In regard to the leadership and culture of the school, does the school recognise the entitlement of all members of the school community to participate in aspects of school decision-making? In the area of school management and governance, the school should provide clear avenues for each member of the school community to participate in school decision-making.
This in turn can be further elaborated to identify possible indicators in each of the three functional areas. In teaching and learning, for example, is there evidence of negotiated curriculum and learning? Are students actively involved and responsible for their own learning? Are there opportunities for students to give feedback on class procedures or teaching practices? In relation to assessment practices are these participative or negotiable?
Still considering the area of entitlement or claiming rights in regards to the leadership and culture of the school, are there clear lines of communication in decision-making processes? Does the school have an open-door policy? Do students have equal access to participation in all activities, and is there evidence of inclusion of students with special needs, or gifted students? Does the school exhibit evidence of consultation practices with all members of the school community? Are the processes used to develop school policies and plans well known to all members of the school community? Do school leaders articulate a vision for the school based on shared ownership?
In relation to school management and governance we need to consider whether all participants including parents, students and teachers are able to present their opinions confidently and effectively. We would like to see evidence that all groups have a way of expressing their point of view. It is desirable to see evidence that the school provides a variety of opportunities for student engagement in decision-making in such things as SRC, curriculum development or review groups.
It is quite possible, although space here does not permit, to elaborate all of the seven practices of citizenship as listed earlier, and to provide possible indicators in each of the three areas of school life. Such practices are a challenge for school educators to consider as they review the kind of schools they are working in. To develop in students the central principles that underpin our democratic institutions, schools must be places that help students to understand what it means to be an active participant in civic life .As has been shown, this applies to whole school planning and organisation as much as it does to the learning that takes place in the classroom. If we want active, responsible members of society who will safeguard our democratic traditions, then we need students who can actively and critically participate in school policy issues. It is by working with others whose backgrounds and experiences are different from their own that students learn the value of human respect and tolerant, equitable communication. Students need to see that their school acts as an agent for change and that it explicitly models a sense of efficacy. They need to know how to participate if they want to change any areas of the world they live. If they can see at first hand that they are able to play an active role in helping to facilitate school improvement then they are learning and developing positive ways to replicate these actions in their present life beyond the school environment and in their future life as contributing citizens of the world.
Education for citizenship is not a new and partial form of education to be developed by itself, in isolation from general education practices. It is a necessary dimension of the education process as a whole and, as such, should be reflected in the explicit and implicit curriculum of the school. It should play a central part in the selection of teaching approaches, the organization of the school relationships and the conception of extra-curricula activites, in allowing for the involvement of the school actors, students, teachers and families, in school decision making, and in activities developed to the enhancement of peace, human rights and democracy as an everyday social practice.
This paper began with a plea for schools to focus on the centrality of the work of schools in imparting to students the principles of living in a democratic Australian society.
Where else will students learn this, if not from schools? Of course, the need to generate quality outcomes and high standards has to drive schools, but so to is citizenship education which is concerned with the integrated formation of values, knowledge and skills necessary to pursue a good life.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Mrs Julie Rimes is the Principal Curriculum Consultant at St Michael's Collegiate School, in Hobart, Tasmania. Her professional life has centred on schools in the independent sector. For fifteen years Julie has led the primary section of a large Anglican school in Hobart. At present, her focus is on curriculum structure and design, especially in the redevelopment of Years 5 -12 programs and curriculum.
Julie has been active at both the national and state level on advisory boards and committees such as the National Executive Council for APPA and as National Chairman and board member of the Junior School Heads' Association of Australia (JSHAA). She has worked as a consultant in leading school-based strategic planning exercises in various parts of the country. Her doctoral study focused on the role of the school in shaping students' civic and citizenship attitudes and behaviours.
She is a Fellow of the Australian College of Education and works actively at the chapter level for this organisation. As a founding member of ACEA in Tasmania, Julie is helping to organize the ACEA conference in Hobart in September this year. Her particular expertise is organising the social program.
Julie Rimes can be contacted by email at:
julie.rimes@stmic.tas.edu.au
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REFERENCES
Boston, K; Macintyre, S. & Pascoe,S. (1994). Whereas the People ...Civics and Citizenship Education. Report of the Civics Expert Group. Canberra: Australian Government Publishing Service.
Evans, K. (1995). Competence and citizenship: Towards a complementary model. British Journal of Education and Work. Autumn.
McLaughlin, T.H. (1992). Citizenship, diversity and education: A philosophical perspective. Journal of Moral Education. 21(3):235-250.
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