A new approach to researching (inter)nationalism in school settings

1. A new approach to researching (inter)nationalism in school settings Dr Michael Donnelly, University of Bath Alliance for International Education World Conference, 10th – 12th October 2014, ÉcoleMondiale School, Mumbai

2. Global citizenship education • ‘Internationalism’ as a key component of global citizenship education • Often focussed on formal curriculum delivery aspects • “Wheeling out the global”: a commodity to be delivered/used • What this misses: the way (inter)nationalism is routinely (rep)presented through internal properties of schools • Each school lives and breathes a particular version of (inter)nationalism through their internal mechanisms/properties

3. Studying institutions: insights from case study research of school settings • Organisational sorting of pupils and its impact on differentiation/polarisation of student body (Lacey 1970, Hargreaves 1967) • Impact of ‘banding’: band stereotypes, pupil friendship groups (Ball, 1981) • Temporal dimensions, movement and immobility in the school setting, home/school relations (Delamont and Gaulton, 1986) • Impact of testing and teachers on young people’s educational identities/trajectories (Gillborn and Youdell 2000) • School space (timetable, events/activities), teacher-student interactions, artefacts and resources (Donnelly, 2014)

4. Internal mechanisms of schools • Space and time in school: formal curriculum, events, activities, timetable, school calander • Selection, sorting and grouping of staff/pupils • Teacher-student interactions • Practices and processes: routine organisation and management of school, teaching and learning • Artefacts (both physical and virtual):school website, displays, school-home communications, learning materials etc.

5. Theorising institutions (Basil Bernstein) • Schools are not culturally ‘neutral’ institutions • Power (classification)and control (framing) underlies everything • Concerned with the selection, ordering, arrangement of school life – not ‘what is on the syllabus’ • Boundary strength: • strong classification/framing: emphasises difference, teachers/pupils have less choice • weak classification/framing: emphasis on similarity, pupils/teachers have greater choice

6. Tools for analysis • Classification and framing used to differentiate schools’ messages about (inter)nationalism • Used at two conceptual levels: • 1) Organisational level • Classification of pupils/staff, resources, school infrastructure/buildings etc. • 2) (Re)presentation of (inter)nationalism • Classification/framing of nationhood in a global context itself

7. 1) Organisational level Continuums: subtle modalities FRAMING + CLASSIFICATION - + Key: + = strong - = weak -

8. 2) (Re)presentation of (inter)nationalism FRAMING + CLASSIFICATION - + Key: + = strong - = weak -

9. Conclusion and future directions • Avoids deficit thinking… Nothing never happens! • Provides a degree of analytical precision • Captures all that is left un-said and/or hidden: potentially a more powerful influence? (but how can we research this?) • Transformatory potential of schooling: schools are not just representations of culture. • Implies an ethnographic approach: immersion in school setting capturing the mundane, routine, and taken for granted. • What next? … empirical work to apply the framework (Funding proposal to AHRC: Young people, place and (inter)nationalism: the role of educational institutions)

10. Dr Michael Donnelly Department of Education University of Bath m.p.donnelly@bath.ac.uk @Dr_M_Donnelly