Ingrid Henning Loeb

Renaissance or a backward step? Disparities and tensions in two new Swedish pathways in VET

Abstract This article builds on results from studies of two new pathways in Swedish upper secondary VET. A major reform was launched in 2011 and the restructuring was presented by the Minister of Education as a ‘renaissance for VET education’. The conclusion of the Upper Secondary Commission is that ‘students shall be more specialised within their vocational or study area compared to today’s vocationally oriented programmes’. We conceptualize the restructured upper secondary VET and these two new educational pathways as a new ‘VET practice architecture’. Apprenticeship Education and Vocational Introduction are both regarded as alternatives to school-based VET, particularly beneficial for students with ‘practical’ learning styles and as alternatives for students who lack the motivation to study in regular VET programmes. The results from the empirical studies show a landscape of disparities and tensions and the vocational learning taking place challenges the notion of a ‘renaissance for VET education’.

‘Clear educational routes’: An example of conservative modernization in Swedish upper secondary schools:

This article concerns the development of education for young students in Sweden who do not attend regular pathways in upper secondary education, and analyses the changes of educational policy and the organizing of teaching for this group of students. The centre of interest is the upper secondary educational reform carried out in 2011. With this reform, a structure of five ‘clear educational routes’ was established for students who did not fulfil the eligibility requirements for the regular programmes. We show how, since the reform of 2011, two diverse national policies have co-existed regarding the organizing of studies for students outside the regular programmes: on the one hand a policy with imperatives of clarity, and on the other hand indistinct guidelines and with delegation. A survey of municipalities in two districts on the local organizing of the introductory programmes provides results. In this new era of ‘clear educational routes’ an increasingly differentiated, ambiguous and fragmented upper secondary school system is taking shape.

Internal marketisation and teachers defending their educational setting – Accounting and mobilisation in Swedish upper secondary education

The article shows how, today, internal marketisation processes are intrinsic to Swedish educational municipal managerialism, and how accounting practices are continual, frequent and dispersed and part of teachers’ professional work. A case study is presented as an outline of a teacher teams’ response to an accounting request and their mobilisation to defend their pedagogic activity for pupils ineligible for regular upper secondary education. The accounting response involves translating, collective editing and inscribing the pupils and the pedagogical activity. We show how teachers have become skilled practitioners of accounting practices. Our case provides an empirical example in line with research on performance management: there is no possibility for teachers not to involve themselves in the techniques in use and employing the right signifiers when defending their pedagogical activity. As accounting practices are dispersed and teachers have acquired accounting skills, the practice of accounting is continuously reinforced and strengthened.

Development and Change in Swedish Municipal Adult Education: Occupational Life History Studies and Four Genealogies of Context

This article is based on the authors dissertation work on development and change in Swedish municipal adult education (MAE), investigated through occupational life history studies of four teachers in different municipalities who have worked in MAE since the mid 1970s. Three periods of development – three ‘eras’ – in MAE have been identified in terms of its relationship to the state, comprising two restructuring shifts: (1) from centralization to decentralization in the early 1990s, and (2) the establishment of quasi-marketization of adult education in the late 1990s, with a variety of adult education providers, municipal boards and procurement processes. Comprehensive analysis of the four teacher trajectories and their genealogies of context has been carried out relating to the three eras, and concepts on mechanisms for institutional isomorphism have been used for analysis on why and how the different MAE organizations that the four teachers work in have developed in similar or homogenous ways. In the article, tensions and contestation in development and change in the local context are made explicit, and are analysed and provide the basis for problematizing late national reformation and restructuring efforts.

Using the Theory of Practice Architectures to Explore VET in Schools Teachers’ Pedagogy

The focus in this chapter is on the teaching practices of novice Vocational Education and Training (VET) teachers in Australian schools. An Australian case illuminates the local practice architectures that shape teachers’ vocation and their ways of working, the ways practice architectures constrain and enable their practice, and the ways these teachers respond to challenges they perceive in the school as a workplace. The case examines the practices of newly qualified Australian VET in Schools teachers with extensive industry experience gained in their previous occupations.

Zooming in on the partnership of a successful teaching team: examining cooperation, action and recognition

Abstract This article investigates the cooperation of a teaching team in Swedish upper secondary education over a period of five years. The data collection builds on field studies and partly on a collaborative research approach. Three areas of cooperation have been identified: collaboration among the staff; interactions between the staff and the students; and the partnership between the staff and other stakeholders/local workplaces/institutions. The cooperation has been analysed with concepts from different practice theories and from Honneth’s theory of recognition. The results illustrate: the importance of different kinds of connections of actions for sustainable cooperation and partnership that are socially based and flexible actions as well as action based on rigorous routines; the importance of objects and inscriptions for durable social connections; and how recognition is present and manifested in all successful areas of cooperation. Recognition is not only essential for building and maintaining prosperous ‘external’ partnerships. The results and analysis show how recognition is also a key to durable forms of staff collaboration and for student school connectedness.AbstractThis article investigates the cooperation of a teaching team in Swedish upper secondary education over a period of five years. The data collection builds on field studies and partly on a collaborative research approach. Three areas of cooperation have been identified: collaboration among the staff; interactions between the staff and the students; and the partnership between the staff and other stakeholders/local workplaces/institutions. The cooperation has been analysed with concepts from different practice theories and from Honneth’s theory of recognition. The results illustrate: the importance of different kinds of connections of actions for sustainable cooperation and partnership that are socially based and flexible actions as well as action based on rigorous routines; the importance of objects and inscriptions for durable social connections; and how recognition is present and manifested in all successful areas of cooperation. Recognition is not only essential for building and maintaining prosp...