An evaluation of educational reform experiences in Spain: the Andalusian case∗

Abstract

Abstract This paper offers a synthesis of the valuation reports of a substantial Reform of pedagogical practice in some Andalusian schools, stressing the implementation, development, impairment, reordering and later abandonment of the Reform experiment from the many‐sided perspective of the different agents involved. The experimental Reform, promoted by the Administration and affecting the secondary level (sixth, seventh and eighth levels) included 104 schools all over the eight Andalusian provinces. Quantitative analytical techniques for studying large samples were used, such as open, closed and semistructured questionnaires, ability tests and open interviews, together with qualitative techniques for studying individual cases, supported by observation, interviews and a process of triangulation with the different social workers involved, through a long stay in each school. Perceptions and perspectives of teachers, administrators, pupils and parents were compiled at two different points, pre‐test and post‐test, through several questionnaires, ranging from their pedagogical perceptions, as well as an analysis of the school's organization, resources and materials, up to their perspectives on the goals, foundations, development and outcome of the process itself. The complexity entailed by the pedagogical model the Reform is inspired by has its realization in the ‘Carboneras Proposal’ (which was based on a radical interdisciplinary approach, an open curriculum without official textbooks or concrete guidelines, pupil research as the most important teaching strategy and teachers’ and pupils’ teamwork). Lack of material, and worse, teachers’ insufficient expertise in tackling these kinds of tasks or a team curricular design, along with concerns about the supposed impairment of the quality of teaching and its effects on the pupils’ academic achievement, all resulted, in 1989, in a feeling of defeat and the abandonment of the core of the Reform. In spite of being an extremely complex project, despite all the obstacles found (improvisation, misorganization, lack of communication), and in spite of the unsuccessful development and outcome due to important political influences and circumstances, this was the very first time the Administration had aimed at a Reform based on stronger support for teachers attempting to do something different within the education system: improving the means and material they work with, welcoming personal initiatives, favouring an atmosphere of cooperative work among teachers and pupils. It was the first time, also, that the ideas stemmed from the correct assumption that qualitative reforms in teaching are not to be proposed as mere sets of rules or decrees to be published in the gazette or in official documents. What really matters is to care for teachers’, parents’ and pupils’ actual needs, working with them and being able to offer an atmosphere that encourages learning as a constant process of research and experiment. Pupils were very happy, involved in interesting and relevant work, and parents made clear their satisfaction. In a democracy every person has the right and the responsibility to participate directly in the control of reform of their institutions. Democratic control and management is as essential in school as it is in all aspects of our work, community and political lives. (The Public Education Information Network, 1985; p. 3).