Policies of autonomy in schools and accountability in education in Catalonia – the REFORMED project

The REFORMED project (Reforming Schools Globally: A Multi-Scalar Analysis of Autonomy and Accountability Policies in the Education Sector) aims to explore the implementation of decentralisation, school autonomy and accountability policies (through external tests such as basic skills tests) in different education systems. In particular, it explores how management teams and teaching staff perceive, interpret and implement these policies in their schools.

The main focuses are:

• Perceptions and attitudes of management teams and teachers towards pedagogical and management autonomy

• Management autonomy practices, leadership models and networking: description and comparison

• The relationship between autonomy practices, the external evaluation system and school selection processes

• The benefits and uses of the data of the external evaluation system at school and classroom level

• Pedagogical practices, teaching strategies and assessment models that predominate in schools

• The relationship between pedagogical practices, educational inclusion and the external evaluation system

The project, which began in the autumn of 2016, and which will end in 2021, is being carried out in four countries: Norway, the Netherlands, Chile and Spain (Catalonia and Madrid). The project is led by the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona and directed by Dr. Antoni Verger, professor of the Department of Sociology at the same university. The Fundació Jaume Bofill is collaborating in the study, carrying it out in Catalonia.

Specifically, the fieldwork in Catalonia consists of contacting a sample of 200 schools, the presentation and discussion of the project with their school boards and the provision of questionnaires addressed to head teachers, primary school teachers and those of Compulsory Secondary Education. The sample of schools has been selected at random from the main urban centres of Catalonia.