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New Policy Spaces in Education Molly Warrington, University of Cambridge

New Policy Spaces in Education Molly Warrington, University of Cambridge. Focus + structure. Spaces of inequality – places where educational deprivation concentrated Despite unprecedented emphasis on education + spatial policies – equity hasn’t improved

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New Policy Spaces in Education Molly Warrington, University of Cambridge

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  1. New Policy Spaces in EducationMolly Warrington, University of Cambridge

  2. Focus + structure • Spaces of inequality – places where educational deprivation concentrated • Despite unprecedented emphasis on education + spatial policies – equity hasn’t improved • Factors contributing to overall failure to improve equity • Although new policy spaces of education, policy still driven by the centre

  3. An emphasis on education • Education Acts passed almost every year • Emphasis on standards and assessment • Policy centralisation • But also localisation • Increasing focus on parental responsibility • Greater role for private sector – quasi-markets

  4. Spatially-focused initiatives • Education Action Zones • Excellence in Cities • Academies • Increased resources with a redistributive element • A government committed to a socially inclusive education system • New data (eg PLASC) enable greater knowledge of equity issues: who is achieving / not achieving and where

  5. A socially inclusive education system? • Little evidence that equity achieved (Ainscow et al, 2008) • Segregation between secondary schools increased (Gorard, 2009) • A widening achievement gap between the most and least successful schools (Barker, 2008) • Socially mobility stagnant (Cabinet Office, 2009) • Policies to improve education benefiting the middle classes (Commission for Social Mobility, 2009)

  6. Children of parents in manual occupations less likely to be in education, training or work post-16 (Archer, 2005) • Fewer students from working-class backgrounds go to university (Vandenberghe, 2007); tend to choose ‘new’ universities (Reay, 2001, Warrington, 2008), with poorer labour market outcomes (Keep & Mayhew, 2004)

  7. Overall impact of spatially-focused policies limited (eg, Morris & Rutt, 2005, Machin et al, 2005) • ‘No clear evidence that academies work to produce better results than the kind of school they replaced’ (Gorard, 2009) • though some • exceptions: ‘a phoenix • rising from the ashes • in the very heart of • the inner city’

  8. WHY DOES INEQUITY PERSIST? People & Places Schools Policies Socio-economic / Socio-cultural factors Context of challenging environments Choice and marketisation • Education holding • little value • Lack of cultural • capital • Effects of peer • pressure • Not all parents • equally able • to exercise • choice

  9. New policy spaces or a continuation of old ones? • Academies as the new policy space – private sponsors - have role in schools’ governance, staff terms and conditions – publicly-funded private schools • YET ‘old’ policy spaces remain • A growing centralisation, leading to tension between national and local space • Policy driven by needs of capital and demands of knowledge economy, with inadequate recognition of complexity of place • Thus, ‘in relation to social class the more things change the more they stay the same’ (Reay, 2003)

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