Selves, social factors, school sites and the tricky issue of 'school effects'

Abstract

Schooling policy is heavily driven by data-base evidence of inputs and outputs of different schools and of results for different ‘social categories’ of student. Good schools are seen as those with high retention rates and good year 12 results; the outcomes of ‘girls’ as a category are compared with those of ‘boys’ as a category. This article discusses some evidence from a qualitative, longitudinal project, based in four different school sites, and the more complicated perspective this throws on what different types of schools are doing and achieving in relation to different types of young people. The article discusses the methodological usefulness, even for policy purposes, of a research focus on particular students in particular school sites; the relevance of seeing schools and students as socially and culturally positioned, not simply as amalgams of ‘factors’ or as sites of ‘effective techniques’; and it draws particular attention to what is learnt in schools as an ‘effect’ we need to consider both in relation to individual life-chances, and to broad social formation.