School Boards in the Governance Process

✍ Scribed by Lejf Moos, Jan Merok Paulsen (eds.)

• Publisher: Springer International Publishing
• Year: 2014
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 180
• Series: Educational Governance Research 1
• Edition: 1
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

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.

✦ Table of Contents

Front Matter....Pages i-vii
Comparing Educational Governance....Pages 1-10
Front Matter....Pages 11-11
School Boards in Denmark....Pages 13-29
School Boards in Finland....Pages 31-48
School Boards in Norway....Pages 49-65
School Boards in Sweden....Pages 67-83
Front Matter....Pages 85-85
Educational Governance: Politics, Administration and Professionalism....Pages 87-100
Control and Trust in Local School Governance....Pages 101-115
The School Boards Between Power and Influence....Pages 117-133
Role and Influence of School Boards on Improving Educational Quality....Pages 135-148
Multilevel Governance....Pages 149-163
Globalisation and Europeanisation of Nordic Governance....Pages 165-178
Back Matter....Pages 179-180

✦ Subjects

Administration, Organization and Leadership; Educational Policy and Politics; International and Comparative Education