ILSA-the subordination of Education to Economic Theory (ILSA-Wirtschaftstheorie statt Bildung)

Abstract: Narrative: In the beginning of the 21st century a trend became apparent; the increasing production of education monitoring data. It was the outcome of international large scale assessments (ILSA) breakthrough; quantitative comparative education (QCE) studies said to be able to give important information on the state of education systems. Germany, which until then had not taken part, became an ardent advocate of the testing, the reason was the poor results in TIMSS 1995 backed by PISA 2000 three years later. However, by the participation in ILSA concepts with origin in economic theory, concepts such as quality, standard and assessment, are brought into the education context in the partaking land. Although these terms have a history in education, they change meaning and content, they become concepts for Human Capital theory. The reason is that by focusing on comparisons based on scales (test results) students become comparable numbers, valueated1 by competitiveness, or in other words, by their thought Human Capital. This study tries to empirically demonstrate the consequences of this conceptual transfer by a case study in form of a German Land, Bavaria. It deals with how these concepts become articulated and reconstructed, the effect on the different levels in an education system and on the working practice. Furthermore, the study gives a frame narrative on how QCE became a dominant research field in education. Methodology: The research methodology was foremost qualitative, though supplemented with quantitative data in the form of descriptive statistics. The data was collected by interviews and literature studies. Pierre Bourdieu´s field working theory was the main tool in the analytical work because of the possibilities and flexibility it offered, to explain and display collective and relational positional changes associated with altered societal norms. Main findings: Bavaria was the main proponent of the introduction of ILSA in Germany. The main reasons were a combination of an already economized education system and close links between the political and economic fields. The introduction meant that the notion of education as the prime savior of future success was established and by that, a rush and demand of best secondary schooling was created. This demand was handled by the dominant within Bavarian politic, CSU, through the establishment of transitional paths between the different forms of secondary schooling. However, instead of raising the number of transitions to Gymnasium, the majority of transitions have been departures from Gymnasium. This is a consequence of the increased number of students that mean a more heterogeneous mass of students in Gymnasium with the outcome of an increasingly complex work situation for teachers. The exemptions are Humanistic Gymnasiums, the traditionally most advanced form of secondary school, with much symbolic capital that has maintained their composition of students. The partaking in ILSA has raised the number of tests, assessments and evaluations, and also brought in a different test culture (format, interval, cohorts etc.). Quality, that instantly became the sought dimension in education, has proven very hard to define in practice even for the state institution, ISB/QA, specially created for the task. Finally, the balance in the relationship between the Bavarian state party Christlich Soziale Union (CSU) and Empirische Bildungsforschung (EB, the German equivalent of QCE) has changed, that is, in the establishment of EB in Germany the dependence on local, Land or state, backing has decreased which marks a shift of relation and positions.