Education reform framed as efficiency actually aims to erode teacher autonomy and spread anxiety

Evidence

MF:The broader agenda here is the imposition of what I have called business ontology: the idea that only outcomes recognised by business count. It’s gradually become accepted that the principal — if not the only — role of education is to turn out the kind of compliant individuals which “business” wants. As systems from the private sector are increasingly introduced into education, the influence of managerialism grows, and the status of the teacher is downgraded. The pretext for the battery of bureaucratic and self-surveillance techniques that have been implemented by successive governments is that they “increase efficiency”, but their effect is to spread anxiety and erode the autonomy of the teacher. This isn’t an accident: it’s the real aim of these measures. Education has been corralled into naturalising and intensifying capitalist competition; it’s easy to forget, for example, that league tables were only introduced relatively recently. League tables produce the kind of Market Stalinist distortions I was talking about earlier. Teaching becomes a matter of training students for examinations; anything else is a luxury. Contrast this with the much-praised education system in Finland, which is fully comprehensive, has no league tables or inspectorate, and is based on trust in teachers. — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk, 2215

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the market-Stalinist critique of audit culture; pairs with the ‘Grafting & Growth’ infrastructure essay’s theme of systems designed for purposes other than their stated goals. — connects to: Education suffers a crisis worsened by progressives disregarding teaching; Accountability-driven evaluation forces teachers into fabricated performances that erode their sense of self — James D. Kirylo (ed.), Reinventing Pedagogy of the Oppressed:…, 675; Managerial surveillance techniques in education deliberately spread anxiety and erode teacher autonomy — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk: The Collected and Unpublished…, 2215 (+2 more)
• DEFINE: Defines ‘business ontology’ — only outcomes recognised by business count — a recurring Fisher term.

Broader Connections

• Managerial surveillance techniques in education deliberately spread anxiety and erode teacher autonomy #expands (0.93) — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk, 2215
• Performance-measure bureaucracies deliberately spread anxiety to erode professional autonomy #corroborates (0.90) — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk, 2215
• Accountability-driven evaluation forces teachers into fabricated performances that erode their sense of self #corroborates (0.82) — James D. Kirylo (ed.), Reinventing Pedagogy of the Oppressed, 675
• Rightward education policy advanced by reframing schooling as industrial productivity #exemplifies (0.72)