OECD Schooling Scenarios in Brief

Educational systemic change is in the air - Teach for Australia, McKinsey report, Rudd's "education revolution"

I came across this 2003 article from the OECD which provides a framework to think about how the future of education might evolve as these different scenarios battle it out: The OECD Schooling Scenarios in Brief

1. ATTEMPTING TO MAINTAIN THE STATUS QUO:

Scenario 1.a: "Bureaucratic School Systems Continue"
... the continuation of powerfully bureaucratic systems, strong pressures towards uniformity, and resistance to radical change

Scenario 1.b "Teacher exodus - The 'meltdown scenario'"
... a major crisis of teacher shortages ... triggered by a rapidly ageing profession, exacerbated by low teacher morale and buoyant opportunities in more attractive graduate jobs

2. RE-SCHOOLING:

Scenario 2.a "Schools as Core Social Centres"
... school here enjoys widespread recognition as the most effective bulwark against social, family and community fragmentation. It is now heavily defined by collective and community tasks

Scenario 2.b "Schools as Focused Learning Organisations"
Schools are revitalised around a strong knowledge rather than social agenda ... ICT used extensively alongside other learning media, traditional and new. Knowledge management to the fore, and the very large majority of schools justify the label "learning organisations"

3. DE-SCHOOLING:

Scenario 3.a "Learning Networks and the Network Society"
... the abandonment of schools in favour of a multitude of learning networks, quickened by the extensive possibilities of powerful, inexpensive ICT. The de-institutionalisation, even dismantling, of school systems as part of the emerging "network society"

Scenario 3.b "Extending the Market Model"
Existing market features in education are significantly extended ... schooling is commonly viewed as a private as well as a public good. Many new providers are stimulated to come into the learning market, encouraged by thoroughgoing reforms of funding structures, incentives and regulation