‘Becoming European’? Respatialising the European schools system through PISA for Schools

Journal article

Lewis, Steven. (2020). ‘Becoming European’? Respatialising the European schools system through PISA for Schools. International Studies in Sociology of Education. 29(1-2), pp. 85-106. https://doi.org/10.1080/09620214.2019.1624593
AuthorsLewis, Steven
Abstract

This paper examines the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development’s (OECD) PISA for Schools, a local variant of the more-renowned ‘main PISA’ test that measures and compares individual school performance on reading, mathematics and science against international schooling systems. Here, I address the governance implications of how PISA for Schools data has been taken up by the transnational European Schools System (ESS). Drawing suggestively across new ‘relational’ thinking around data-driven modes of governance, as well as interviews with key policy actors within the ESS, I show how PISA for Schools reflects contradictory logics within the ESS, in which the inherently context-based goal of ‘becoming European’ is juxtaposed with the desire to employ decontextualised international evidence. I conclude by exploring how the perceived need for such data, associated with the global authority of the OECD, can produce a problematic focus on data-driven practices.

KeywordsPISA for Schools; European schools; OECD; data; topology; European education policy space
Year2020
JournalInternational Studies in Sociology of Education
Journal citation29 (1-2), pp. 85-106
PublisherRoutledge
ISSN0962-0214
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)https://doi.org/10.1080/09620214.2019.1624593
Scopus EID2-s2.0-85066832103
Research or scholarlyResearch
Page range85-106
FunderAustralian Research Council (ARC)
Publisher's version
License
All rights reserved
File Access Level
Controlled
Output statusPublished
Publication dates
Online31 May 2019
Publication process dates
Accepted21 May 2019
Deposited19 May 2021
ARC Funded ResearchThis output has been funded, wholly or partially, under the Australian Research Council Act 2001
Grant IDARC/DE190101141
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