What Works In Nordic School Policies

This book offers an original contribution to the area of international research on comparative education policies and the influence of transnational agencies on national school policy and reform. With a focus on grasping what the Nordic model or the Nordic dimension means in school and educational policy, the book explores in depth the school policy contexts of the five Nordic countries Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden. It demonstrates how these particular national contexts engage with and contextualize transnational collaboration on issues like school reform, accountability, evidence and what works, and digitalization. The book situates these policy issues over a long period of time while integrating the latest developments and reforms. It demonstrates how context matters. It shows how the often elusive, but pervasive Nordic dimension can only be fully understood by painstaking scrutiny of the five national contexts, their particular trajectories and mutual interactions in formal and informal education.

This book offers an original contribution to the area of international research on comparative education policies and the influence of transnational agencies on national school policy and reform. With a focus on grasping what the Nordic model or the Nordic dimension means in school and educational policy, the book explores in depth the school policy contexts of the five Nordic countries Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden. It demonstrates how these particular national contexts engage with and contextualize transnational collaboration on issues like school reform, accountability, evidence and what works, and digitalization. The book situates these policy issues over a long period of time while integrating the latest developments and reforms. It demonstrates how context matters. It shows how the often elusive, but pervasive Nordic dimension can only be fully understood by painstaking scrutiny of the five national contexts, their particular trajectories and mutual interactions in formal and informal education.

This book discusses principals’ prerequisites and work within the five Nordic countries and focuses on schools as formal institutions that carry out functions delegated to them by the social collective. It includes a discussion about what kind of state policy demonstrates autonomy in Nordic schools, as well as the ways in which school leaders as sense makers in local schools possess and enact policy in a globalized economy and a changing world. The book draws both on a range of theoretical frameworks and educational leadership and policy research to provide multiple comparative perspectives of school leadership in the Nordic countries, the moral purpose of schooling, school governance and power relations, expectations towards school leadership, handling of crises, and cultures of trust. The chapters range from in depth-case studies and policy document analyses to large-scale data sets and literature reviews. All chapters have multiple messages for practitioners, policy makers and researchers as they seek to engage with school leadership as a core activity in times of societal changes. As democratic welfare states, the five Nordic countries have many similarities, but also differences which makes it interesting to understand more about various ways to strive towards democracy and well-educated citizens.

This book presents a detailed analysis of the educational model in Nordic European countries. It describes the traditional idea of education for all, which can be characterized by the right for every child to have an education of equal quality in a common school for all pupils regardless of social class, abilities, gender, or ethnicity. Against this background, The Nordic Education Model traces the rise of neo-liberal policies that have been enacted by those who believe the School for All ideology does not produce the knowledge and skills that students need to succeed in an increasingly competitive and global marketplace. It examines the conflict between these two ideas and shows how neo-liberal technologies affect the Nordic model in different ways. The authors also show how social technologies are being interpreted in different ways in actual school practices. This process of translating national regulations into internal sense builds on the values in the culture to which they are introduced. In the end, this book reveals that a Nordic model can constitute a delicate balance between traditional values, institutionalized practices, and contemporary, neo-liberal forms of governance and policies. It may be argued from a new institutional perspective that the main structures of the Nordic educational model will sustain as long as the deeply rooted Nordic culture survives in the globalised society.

This book analyses local school district governance in a comparative, cross-cultural perspective based on national studies of local school boards in the Nordic countries, Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden. The overarching research question explored by the national studies contained in this volume is: How are transnational influences of standardization and accountability, alongside national policies, transformed into local policy cultures by the school boards? In all the Nordic countries, the municipalities are equivalent with the school district level, and municipalities, as such, play a role as the interface between state policies and the schools. This book discusses the variation across different national systems in the Nordic countries in the degree of decentralism, as well as the processes through which sources of political autonomy are put into practice by school boards. It explores the interplay between context and policy-making at the local level, and analyses how local discourses expressed by school boards differ from national policies and trans-national influences. The book’s analysis of the country-cases and thematic chapters shows that there are both important similarities and significant differences in governance functions, power relations and understandings of school board chairs and members between the countries studied. Moreover, the book analyses the many ways in which these similarities and differences affect the work context of school leaders and teachers in the Nordic countries.

This book discusses national school policy reforms in a number of key European countries and shows how these are framed in transnational collaborations that meet with national particularities and contestations. It gives an overview of school policy developments that represents the diversity of Europe within a comparative framework. It takes point of departure in the fact that European countries in their school and education policies have been increasingly aligning with each other, mostly via transnational collaborations, the OECD, EU, and the Bologna Process. Even the IEA has been instrumental to motivate alignments by means of influential surveys, knowledge production and methodological development. This alignment in terms of common standards, social technologies, qualification frameworks and so forth have aimed at facilitating mobility of students, workers, business and so forth as well as fostering a European identity among citizens from Europe’s patchwork of small and medium-size countries, representing a patchwork of different languages, cultures and societal contexts. In national recontextualizations, however, alignments have been continuously contested according to the particularities of what has been possible educationally and politically in the different national contexts. Furthermore, the return of national(isms) as well as the rise of edubusiness and digitalization have been increasingly influential. This book thus concludes that increasing transnational alignments have to be observed with meticulous attention to different national contexts that matter greatly.

This open access book is the first account of the whole diversity of teacher education in the Nordic region: Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Iceland, Greenland, the Faroe Islands, the Åland Islands and Sápmi (where the Sámi people live). Today, large parts of the world are looking to the Nordic model of social organization, and interest in the Nordic comprehensive school system and teacher education arrangements is no exception. A good education is a key to prosperity and well-being. And the quality of students’ education is undoubtedly linked to the quality of their teachers’ education. While teacher education in the Nordic region is globally admired, it also faces new challenges. The leading scholars writing in this volume discuss the challenges and opportunities that professional environments are facing. By providing solid portraits of each area as well as analyses across the region, this book will be a great resource to students, academics in teacher education and schooling as well as social scientists and policy-makers inside and outside the Nordic region. This is an open access book.

This open access book explores how policy makers draw on national, regional and international expertise in issuing school reform within five Nordic countries. In an era of international comparison, policy makers are expected to review best practices, learn from experiences from elsewhere, and apply international standards propelled by international organizations. Do they do so? What counts, for them, as evidence and expertise? The chapters draw methodologically on bibliometric data, network analysis, document analysis and expert interviews. They show compellingly how governments use “evidence” strategically and selectively for agenda setting and policy decisions. This book will be of interest and value to scholars of education policy, specifically within the Nordic region, and international and comparative education.