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Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 171 (2015) 1365 - 1372
ICEEPSY 2014
Policy delivery strategies for education reform: A formative research and development
Suwimon Wongwanicha*, Chayut Piromsombata, Piyapong Khaiklenga, & Kanit Sriklauba
aFaculty of Education, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok 10330, Thailand
Abstract
Thailand education reform in the first decade (1999-2009) seemed to be unsuccessful, partly because of the predominant use of
top-down policy delivery strategies. This report aims to develop new delivery strategies for education reform policy for
practitioners, especially teachers. Using concepts of assessment-based education reform and university-and-school collaboration,
the present study employed a formative research and development methodology to develop and examine policy delivery
strategies during 2011-2013. All strategies proposed here were the synthesized results from subprojects of the study. Findings
of the study lead to several policy recommendations. It is highly recommended for Thailand education reform to establish policy
delivery units. Results also suggest concepts and activities for empowering teachers. After using such strategies in the
participated schools, positive changes in practice of school teachers and students were noticeable.
© 2015TheAuthors. PublishedbyElsevierLtd.This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.Org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Peer-review under responsibility of the Organizing Committee of ICEEPSY 2014.
Keywords:education reform; policy delivery strategy; assessment-based education reform; formative research
1. Introduction
The first decade of education reform in Thailand started since 1999. Four years after the National Education Act (1999) of Thailand, study of Wongwanich & Wiratchai (2004) showed that teachers and administrators had drastically changed teaching behaviors and working methods according to education reform. However, their practices were not consistent with the success of the reform. National examination results reflected that goals of the country's education quality were not achieved. Research results also showed that policy delivery of education
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +668-6991-9330 E-mail address: suwimon.w@chula.ac.th
1877-0428 © 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Peer-review under responsibility of the Organizing Committee of ICEEPSY 2014. doi:10.1016/j.sbspro.2015.01.255
reform in the first decade was still problematic, especially when education organization according to education reform was not properly understood. In 2009, the government considered that development of education quality was an urgent agenda so education reform policies in the second decade (2009-2018) were announced with an aim to elevate education quality starting from developing education quality, learner quality, and education personnel. This 3-year project was sponsored by Thailand Research Fund (TRF) (2011-2013). The study primarily aims to develop new delivery strategies for education reform policy for practitioners, especially teachers. The project had four main objectives: to study policy delivery strategies and problems of education reform in the first decade; to seek new policy delivery strategies for the second decade of education reform; to implement the developed policy delivery strategies at pilot schools; and to synthesize research results for generating policy recommendations for related organization. The research findings herein will focus on the fourth objective since some parts of the first three objectives were reported elsewhere (Panhoon & Wongwanich, 2012; Wongwanich, Sapsombat, Intanam, Ajpru, & Prasertsin, 2011).
2. Objectives of the Study
This study aims to develop new policy delivery strategies and recommendations for education reform for the second decade by synthesizing research results from sub-projects of the study.
3. Literature Review
There are many studies on results of education reform in Thailand. Most of them pointed out similar results that the reform was not successful as expected (Kohengkul & Wongwanich, 2011; Suknaisith & Wongwanich, 2012). Study of Wongwanich & Wiratchai (2004) showed that schools that stricttly operated their educational management according to the education reform might not have students with satisfactory performance, while schools that reported that they did not make significant changes in their operations in accordance with education reform might have performed better.
During 2011-2013, Thailand Research Fund (TRF) supported the research projects entitled "Research and development of driving strategies for the second decade of education reform policy." Significant findings from this project revealed that strategies that delivered policies must be emphasized. No matter how good the policies are, if they are inapplicable, they are not useful. Policies might be understood, but cannot be implemented due to misunderstanding. Policies might also be well designed, but did not correspond to methods of operations of teachers in each school. Thus, methods of operations of teachers were needed to be adjusted (Kiewkor, Wongwanich, Kong-ngam, Panhoon, Yamtim, & Ajpru, 2011).
Wongwanich, Piromsombat, & Khaikleng (2012) synthesized guidelines of policy delivering in the first decade. Popular ways to deliver education reform policies that were used at all levels were distributing documentation and meeting organization to clarify policies and workshops. Policy delivery strategies in the first decade were mostly designed to involve relevant parties at all levels. Engagement and partnership were applied at each level at a low level. Although readiness of education reform was emphasized, involved parties did not know how to deliver successful education reform policy. The study proposed the use of assessment-based education reform concept to design new policy delivery strategies policy at all levels of related organizations.
According to Barber, Moffit, & Kihn (2011), the term "deliverology" was used in policy making and implementation. Deliverology is a work process targeting the public and private sectors that operate according to delivery units' goals. Delivery units are part of the deliverology process. Delivery units have a delivery process that includes developing a foundation for delivery, creating understanding of delivery challenge, planning for delivery, and creating sustainable delivery culture. The policy delivery process must have working groups implementing policies. The working process has five steps: establish a coordinating system between and within delivery units at each level, cooperate with personnel who are the target group at different levels, study the current delivery process and problems that occur, work with people to make plan according to policies; determine work strategies and work guidelines, work with all related work units according to plans and guidelines, and create working culture to deliver policies with sustainable plans.
4. Conceptual framework
This research is based on goals of education reform policy of Thailand: in order to have quality learners, teachers must be competent first. The education reform policy delivery is a strategy to develop teachers who will improve competency of students and keep them happy while working. Recommendations for policy delivery should be derived from the information obtained from previous research findings of the sub-projects of this study. Sources of information came from the study results of problems identification of delivery strategies used in the first decade of education reform, which led to suggestions of education reform concepts. New strategies of policy delivery will then be developed. These new policy delivery strategies will be implemented in pilot schools under the collaborative working between researchers and teachers. Results of the delivery process will affect the behaviors of teachers and students. Study results will be helpful to deliver recommendations, which are the goals of this research.
Policy Delivery Recommendations
Fig.1. Conceptual framework
5. Research Methods
This three years research (2010-2013) used the research and development method combined with the formative research concept. Formative research is a new way of research that leads to continuous and sustainable operations (Corey, 2011; Reigeluth & Frick, 1999). The principal research questions were: 1) What policy delivery strategies were used in the first decade of education reform in Thailand, and what were the consequences?; 2) What alternative concepts would be best to design policy delivery strategies for the next education reform?; 3) How could the designed delivery strategies be implemented at school level, and what were the consequences?; and 4) What recommendations did stakeholders have for the delivery strategies? In this formative research, sub-questions were emergent during the main research process where the principal research questions were being focused. These arising sub-questions were then used as guidelines for acquiring additional information needed for continuing the main study (Fig. 2). There were 26 researchers worked in a network, exchanged data and solved problems. The research and development method was conducted with five pilot schools and 40 voluntary educational service areas. Research results were then processed and drafted as policy recommendations on education reform policy delivery strategies. Opinions of the experts were suggested for practical possibility.
Fig. 2.The principal research questions and sub-research questions
6. Research Results
6.1. Policy Delivery Strategies and Problems in the First Decade of Education Reform
Thailand education reform in the first decade (1999-2009) seemed to be unsuccessful, partly because of the predominant use of top-down policy delivery strategies such as sending policy-related documents to practitioners, policy briefing meeting, and providing working manual. Previous strategies were distribution of documents/training manuals/formal workshops and supervision of teachers' operations. Education policies of the country were changed when the government changed, yielding inconsistent efforts for the reform of education. In addition, many reform policies and delivery strategies were implemented without harmonious and sufficient understanding of school contexts, teachers' needs, and teachers' active participation. Major obstacle in the past education reform in Thailand seemed to be the unwilling-to-change thinking of teachers.
6.2. New Policy Delivery Strategies of Education Reform
The goals of education reform policy delivery of this study were to change teachers' characteristics and behaviors to facilitate education reform and to change students according to the goals that teachers and schools set while the research was conducted. The main concept used to design delivery strategies was assessment-based education reform focusing on assessment of students' learning and uses of its results to adjust lesson plans or teaching methods. The concept of assessment-based reform did not use national test results as the goal to pressure teachers. On the other hand, the assessment results would be used to adjust teaching of teachers and students. The activities in policy delivery process using mentoring/coaching was aimed to empower teachers based on their needs. Teachers and researchers collaboratively set the goals and action plans, using concepts of assessment-based education reform, teacher-centered working, and multitask integration. Teachers' and students' needs were also collected by means of survey. Teachers and researchers then designed teaching improvement plans based on the needs and students' assessment results from various sources.
6.3. Policy Delivery Design, Implementation in Schools and Results on Teachers and Students
Policy Delivery Design
Delivery units in this research project were designed based on the "deliverology" concepts of Barber, Moffit, & Kihn (2011). Five levels of policy delivery units were initiated for this study. First, at the top level, this study was set up by coordinating delivery units with university instructors who served as the unit leaders. The policy delivery was then moved to delivery units at the Office of the Basic Education Commission (OBEC) level and at the educational service area (ESA) level. At these levels, academics of OBEC and ESA served as main deliverers of the units. Next, researchers, who worked in pilot schools of sub-projects, and principals collaboratively served as delivery units at the educational institute/school level. Finally, teachers played an important role as delivery units at the classroom level.
Policy Delivery Implementation in School
How to work with teachers in schools. Whoever worked with teachers should understand teachers' working situations. Teachers should be motivated to change or adjust their teaching on their own. Shared goals setting, vision and collaborative learning were the techniques effectively used in schools.
Teachers' attributes to enhance success of delivery implementation. Teachers needed to be reflective teachers and research engaged teachers. The attributes included belief and confidence for learning reflection and reflection behaviors and skills. Thai teachers needed to develop the characteristics of reflective thinking such as open-mindedness.
Teachers' needed support from stakeholders. Teachers needed help from academics and/or university instructors to improve their teaching practices. Manuals of innovative approaches for instructional design, assessment-based instructional management, and classroom action research were also useful for teachers' classroom practices.
Results ofpolicy delivery of education reform on Teachers and Students
Characteristics of researchers to work as reform policy drivers. Researchers' characteristics including their knowledge, expression in presence of teachers, support for teachers to follow the policies, and useful suggestions for teachers were at good levels. Changes in teachers' characteristics that helped education reform policy delivery and their assessment-based behaviors were also satisfactory.
Changes of students. Students noticeably changed their attitudes towards learning. They were more eager to learn and seemed to think more often in analytic and synthesis ways.
6.4. Policy Recommendations for Education Reform Delivery Strategies
Delivery units
Results of this research project support the use of deliverology concepts, especially the concept of delivery units. Specifically speaking for Thailand education reform in the future, delivery units should be developed at five important levels of the education system. With the coordinating delivery units served as the connection among the other units, it is worth to set up delivery units at the OBEC or government level, service area level, school level, and classroom level. Policy drivers must be prepared and divided into two groups: mentors of teachers in schools and teachers serving as students' mentors in classrooms. Both groups must have skills to learn cooperatively. They should have skills to reflect on experiences that will be exchanged for criticism and solutions. Lessons from other people should be adapted in their work.
Delivery unit should have leaders possessing knowledge according to R-TPACK: research knowledge, technological knowledge, pedagogical knowledge, content knowledge, and knowledge about integrating knowledge components. In addition, they should have reflective skills, collaborative skills, and problem-solving skills. Critical
friends are the significant strategy that helps enhance teachers' critical thinking. Using assessment-based education reform, effective feedback system should be well designed.
Concepts of Education Reform
Results of this research found that assessment-based policy delivery strategies enabled teachers to assess their performance and utilize assessment results to develop themselves and learners. Therefore, teachers should focus on knowledge and make more use of assessment results. Adaptive teaching or differentiated instruction should be applied for each student.
Research results from five pilot schools showed that policy delivery strategies can be divided into two groups: generic strategies and specific strategies. Generic strategies focused on equal cooperation, such as collaborative learning and professional learning communities (PLC) (Fig 3). Specific strategies focused on working methods between researchers and teachers using new techniques that were different from old methods used in the previous education reform policy delivery process (Fig. 4).
Coaching & mentoring
Learning through reflection
Professional
learning community
Learning
together
through
critical
friends
University &
school collaboration J
Inquiry collaboration
Approaching teachers to work together
Creating feedbacking system
Changing classroom practices without additional work
Enhancing cooperation
between teachers and vresearchers .
Building networking & mentoring
Fig. 3.Generic strategies Fig. 4.Specific strategies
Teacher Empowerment Strategies
Strategies for developing teachers' abilities and traits needed to create change and improvement in classroom under unfavorable circumstances. Empowering teachers to be adaptive agents should be focused so that they will have capability to work under situations when education policies could be changed anytime. Results from this research project suggested theoretical principles and practical guidelines by empowering teachers to be able to continually work for improving students' learning. To successfully empower teachers to work as adaptive agents, a mentoring system with high quality mentors and coaches is needed. High-performed teachers with research experience are potential candidates for mentors and coaches. It is worth to enhance university-school collaboration networks for every district.
7. Discussion and Recommendations
Conventional ways of policy delivery, such as meetings, distribution of documents and manuals and trainings were not so effective. At the policy level, the methods used were document distribution and meeting and training organization. After policies were forwarded to educational service area offices, it was found that training was emphasized and circular letters were increased to inform all involved parties at all levels. Most schools distributed documents and organized training sessions. It was also found that knowledge exchange and collaborative working
were hardly used at the three levels. This showed that most policy delivering units used the methods of transmitting knowledge and receiving information from the central government. They did not learn together or create new knowledge regarding education reform. Document distribution, meetings and training sessions can be done easily and widely across the country. Learning together requires a large number of experts and knowledge exchange in educational service areas and educational institutes. Personnel at the policy level, the educational service area and existing networks may not be enough to make changes to education reform at the school level.
New policy delivery concepts in this research focused on teacher-centered empowerment and give importance to teachers' needs. Main methods used in this research supported teachers' work through coaching/mentoring with university-school collaboration. Researchers found that these methods would help teachers learn starting from their needs and according to their individual context. Most researchers were scholars in higher education institutes and mentors for teachers in schools.
Delivery units of the Ministry of Education were at different levels. The policy level: operations of most personnel working at Office of the Education Council (OEC) and scholars affiliated to the Basic Education Commission and offices of educational service areas. Offices of educational service areas were the most important because they are close to schools and delivery units at the classroom level.
Policy delivery of delivery units at different level must have coordinating delivery units. The coordinating units must be in the organization's structure under the Ministry of Education. However, this study found that it was not clear which units coordinated with delivery units at all levels. In this research, researchers worked as coordinating delivery units (called higher-education-level delivery units/central delivery units) even though they did not have roles of policy delivery leaders. They played that role in this research only. It was found that policy delivery especially at the school level required scholars who understood teachers' operations and realized teachers' policies. This research suggested that the Ministry of Education should set up a working group or a work unit to study coordinating units in a systematic way. The group or unit should be able to connect delivery units so they work in unity with coordination.
It can be concluded that coordinating units should be flexible and scholars should do research to find assistance or support (Moir, Barlin, Gless, & Miles, 2009). Therefore, people working in coordinating units must have research skills so they have data to support their decisions. Research-based work is the focus of delivery units with empirical data to support. Educational service area offices should set up a working group to work as coordinating units. They should comprise of local scholars affiliated to higher education institutes. Policy delivery should be based on research.
Successful policy delivery would need professional mentors or supervisors. Mentors should be able to help teachers become reflective teachers and research engaged teachers in order to enhance a professional learning community in schools (Wongwanich, Sakolrak, & Piromsombat, 2014). Moir et al. (2009) suggested that professional mentors should have ability based on ICF framework (instructive, collaborative and facilitate framework). This means that teacher education should also be revised to prepare pre-service and in-service teachers, including supervisors, to possess some key factors for reform policy delivery in the future. However, key success factors of education reform require collaborative working, particularly university-school collaboration network. Related documents/manuals developed from this project are also recommended to distribute to teachers (Ajpru, Wongwanich, & Khaikleng, 2014; Khong-ngam, Wongwanich, & Piromsombat, 2014; Kiewkor, Wongwanich, & Piromsombat, 2014; Na Wichian, Wongwanich, & Saengsiri, 2011, 2012, 2014; Panhoon & Wongwanich, 2014; Phonapichat & Wongwanich, 2014; Soisangwarn & Wongwanich, 2014; Sriklaub & Wongwanich, 2014; Thongnin, Wongwanich, & Piromsombat, 2014; Yamtim & Wongwanich, 2014).
Acknowledgements
This research is part of the "Research and development of driving strategies for the second decade of education reform policy" project. Special thanks to Thailand Research Fund for the financial support (RTA5380011).
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