Rethinking Education, Part 1: Environments, Institutions, Operators and Systems by Roy Anthony Zamora II

Many will state that a global pandemic upended our education system. But the truth is, it only highlighted the inequity of student performance outcomes, diminished the ability for students to maintain their own well-being and cultivate their own intellect, and tested the resilience of instructional capacity (Lewis et al. 2022). As for our teachers, not only has their trust, flexibility, and safeguards continuously diminished, their own resolve has been challenged as educators (Holt 2022; Texas Education Agency 2023). In the education system of this era, neither student nor teacher receive what they most desire. Whether through policy or institutional norms, student’s own basic hierarchy of needs are left unfulfilled and leads to their inability to engage in learning; teachers’ psychological needs for motivation are just as unfulfilled as their students and inevitably results in them regularly burning out (Mahnken, 2022; Zamarro et al., 2021). So, the question needs to be asked, how did we get to this point and how, or whom, should be responsible for change?

How We Got Here: Environments and Institutions

Environments

It was German biologist Jakob Von Uexull who first observed the notion of how individuals operate within their own perceptual world – the umwelt. Within this umwelt, only the individual themselves can understand their own environment while operating as a member of a collectively shared environment; or the individual and objective environments, respectively (Von Uexküll 1992). Now, to draw an analogous to Uexull’s work, we can begin to address the tenuous connection between student, teacher, and administration. Each occupant finds themselves focusing on cultivating their growth through intrinsic and extrinsic means in their individual environment, while simultaneously operating within the objective environment. The result is a constant state of friction to completely identify with each other’s perspective of what the objective environment may resemble, how to adapt to it, and reform it, without ever actually understanding it. Fundamentally, the objective environment is entirely abstract and devised by some form of educational authority who notionally concocts the essential skills each individual recipient must attain to match said authority’s vision. Therefore, the policies are subject to constant fluctuation with each authoritative figure, due to an ever-expanding world of ideas and innovations. Resulting in a copious number of top-down initiatives that only manage to fail in reaching its most imperative recipients – students and teachers.

The disconnect of these environments, and their inner workings, has left students’ and teachers’ individual needs, their intrinsic incentives, and agency, severely devalued. But, more importantly, the disconnect itself is a direct effect of an institution that has not only become so overarching that it dominates said environments but has produced individual organizations (state and local agencies) that now compete, and thus further entrenches the norms, for political power and institutional legitimacy all at the expense students and teachers.

Institutions

Institutional actors – the educational authorities (agencies) with the power to impose policy change – are in search of improving student performance not only for moral and ethical purposes, but because their success equates to increased political power and institutional legitimacy among other agencies due to the nature of institutionalism (DiMaggio and Powell 1983). Education policy itself, then serves as the red tape that shields and bolsters the institution. But while policy is responsible for promoting what happens, it cannot make those affected by it perform their task well. And so, the point to be made here is that these actors are falling victim to an ill-conceived “cycle” that does not focus on student and teacher personalization into their grand calculus of change. This cycle flows from policy makers and experts deciding what should be done to meet educational outcomes; local education agencies then scramble for funding and programs to help achieve said outcomes; teachers are then left to replicate programmatic results; it is then analyzed back up the hierarchy and the process repeats itself. Throughout each step, state and local agencies exercise the power and rules, to impose their institutional dominance on both student and teacher. The inadequacy of this cycle is the fact that programs are left responsible for the change in student performance, not the practice. Or, more pointedly, not the teachers. Resulting in only technical change that maintains the problematic status quo, rather than ending past practices and forming new ones.

It should be stated that there is a stark difference between programs and practices; one details what we implement and the other what we do – one is driven by the objective environment, and one is driven by the individual environment. And, when we only focus on the programmatic efforts, then they become the driver of your organization. While the two do work together, the problem of authentic and lasting institutional change remains – the individual environment is not the driver, the objective environment is. And appealing to the objective environment first, does not lead to institutional change. Thus, with no institutional change, the cycle continues, and the institution survives to continue and exacerbate the wedge between those in the classroom and those outside of it.

Who Is Responsible for Change: Operators and Systems

Operators

The deconstruction of both the environment and the institution indicates the notion that students and teachers, the operators within the education system, have become an afterthought when it comes to the work necessary to bring about institutional change. However, when it comes to tearing through the political red tape, disrupting the institution, and reversing the environmental focus of the education system, putting them at the forefront of change is the only authentic and sustainable option. To do such we have to recognize the fact the students alone do not have the ability to drive change, they need an individual with the agency and ability to drive policy to bend to their individual needs. They need someone that is operating on the frontlines with them and understands their individual needs.

To converse with a teacher about why they teach will lead you to the following conclusion: Teaching is a profession that offers them creativity, impact, and autonomy to guide student learning. Teachers are supposed to be in control of devising creative ways to impact their students emotionally, academically, and prepare them for life outside the classroom. In short, teachers are the ones responsible for putting policy into practice. Yet, the more the objective environment and policies are constructed without their insight or understanding of their role as the operators within the system, the more those aspects are diminished and the more the educator infrastructure deteriorates. If the goal is to improve student outcomes and positively alter the education sector in preparation for what is next on the horizon, then we must change what so many are reluctant to fix – the entire teacher career structure and their perception amongst the institutional authorities and societal members.

Systems

As is, the institutional norms and their lack of policy focused on the educator infrastructure – teacher effectiveness, autonomy, and professional growth – has led to the decline in instructional capacity and the role of the teacher. Research conducted by the Education Endowment Foundation found that the interventions that were the most cost-effective and impactful were those that were student-teacher centered (metacognition & self-awareness, reading comprehension strategies, and peer tutoring), or bottom-up policy reforms (https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/). While it is no secret that effective teachers and quality teaching have the greatest impact on student outcomes in the classroom, their legitimacy as institutional change agents has been nothing less of an afterthought (Darling-Hammond 2010; Gordon, Kane, and Staiger 2006). Rather, the institution has consistently countered and adversely influenced the opposite with top-down policy initiatives. Teacher autonomy has consistently been reduced, and the continued negligence to address the infrastructure has led to systemic issues when it comes to teacher pipelines, matters of effectiveness, and the multiple aspects that lead to teacher retention (Texas Education Agency, 2023). Reliance on reforms that shy away from student-teacher driven are contradictory to the institutional forces that have become entrenched, and the education infrastructure needs to be modernized with a keen focus on teacher autonomy and development.

This pathway begs one to ponder, where do we begin? Well, to do so will be dependent on institutional actors to assume a different role and devise a systemic vehicle that provides a ubiquitous support system that guides teacher effectiveness and growth to impact student outcomes. The nature of this vehicle consists of an intricate holistic evaluation system and a career structure that provides a system of leadership, expertise, and institutional power within the teaching profession that leads to sustainable change. Institutional actors and policy makers will have to grapple with the disruptive forces that prompt institutional change, while relinquishing their own inherent power to allow students and teachers to assist in creative institutional development and bring legitimacy to the classroom (Lawrence et al., 2006).

Conclusion

Practice versus program. Students and teachers versus administrators and legislators. Individual agents versus institutional actors. Doers versus talkers. There is still more to be discussed on the intricacies of the design of the systemic vehicle itself, the phenomena of its engagement with the institution, the environments, and the operators within it. But, if we want to address the disconnect between environments and who, or what, is driving positive change in education, then an endeavor to bring institutional power to our students and teachers should be at the forefront of political agendas.

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About the scholar

 Roy Anthony Zamora II is a PhD student in Educational Leadership Policy at Texas Tech University. He holds a M.Ed. from Harvard Graduate School of Education and a B.S. in Secondary Education – Social Studies from Texas Christian University. Prior to becoming a teacher he served in the United States Air Force as a Civil Engineer. He is currently the Coordinator for Performance Outcomes at a school district in North Texas. His research interests focus on evaluation and accountability systems, institutional change, and organizational theory.

References

Darling-Hammond, Linda. 2010. The Flat World and Education: How America’s Commitment to Equity Will Determine Our Future. Teachers College Press.

Dimaggio, Paul, and Walter W. Powell. 1983. “The Iron Cage Revisited Institutional Isomorphism and Collective Rationality in Organizational Fields.” American Sociological Review 48(2): 143–66.

Gordon, Robert1, Thomas J.2 Kane, and Fouglas O.3 Staiger. 2006. “Identifying Effective Teachers Using Performance on the Job.” Hamilton Project: Discussion Papers (1): 1–35.

Holt, Seth Gershenson and Stephen. 2022. “How Much Do Teachers Struggle with Stress and Burnout?” Brookings. https://www.brookings.edu/blog/brown-center-chalkboard/2022/02/08/how-much-do-teachers-struggle-with-stress-and-burnout/.

Lawrence, Thomas B., Roy Suddaby, and Bernard Leca. 2006. “Institutions and Institutional Work.”

Lewis, Karyn et al. 2022. “The Widening Achievement Divide during COVID-19.” NWEA. https://www.nwea.org/research/publication/the-widening-achievement-divide-during-covid-19/.

Mahnken, Kevin. 2022. “‘Nation’s Report Card’: Two Decades of Growth Wiped Out by Two Years of Pandemic.” https://www.the74million.org/article/nations-report-card-two-decades-of-growth-wiped-out-by-two-years-of-pandemic/.

McGee, Gema Zamarro, Andrew Camp, Dillon Fuchsman, and Josh B. 2021. “How the Pandemic Has Changed Teachers’ Commitment to Remaining in the Classroom.” Brookings. https://www.brookings.edu/blog/brown-center-chalkboard/2021/09/08/how-the-pandemic-has-changed-teachers-commitment-to-remaining-in-the-classroom/.

Texas Education Agency. 2023. Developing a Thriving Teacher Workforce in Texas. Texas Education Agency.

Von Uexküll, Jakob. 1992. “A Stroll through the Worlds of Animals and Men: A Picture Book of Invisible Worlds.”