NAPLAN, MySchool and Accountability: Teacher perceptions of the effects of testing

Abstract

This paper explores Rizvi and Lingard’s (2010) idea of the “localvernacular” of the global education policy trend of using high-stakestesting to increase accountability and transparency, and by extensionquality, within schools and education systems in Australia. In the firstpart of the paper a brief context of the policy trajectory of NationalAssessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) is given inAustralia. In the second part, empirical evidence drawn from a survey ofteachers in Western Australia (WA) and South Australia (SA) is used toexplore teacher perceptions of the impacts a high-stakes testing regimeis having on student learning, relationships with parents and pedagogyin specific sites.After the 2007 Australian Federal election, one of Labor’s policyobjectives was to deliver an “Education Revolution” designed to improveboth the equity and excellence in the Australian school system1 (Rudd Gillard, 2008). This reform agenda aims to “deliver real changes”through: “raising the quality of teaching in our schools” and “improvingtransparency and accountability of schools and school systems” (Rudd Gillard, 2008, p. 5). Central to this linking of accountability, thetransparency of schools and school systems and raising teaching qualitywas the creation of a regime of testing (NAPLAN) that would generatedata about the attainment of basic literacy and numeracy skills bystudents in Australian schools