Equity and Influence in the Funding of Schools - (Educational Leadership: Innovative, Critical and Interdisciplinary Perspectives) (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

This book traces the policymaking processes of the Review of Funding for Schooling (2011), which fundamentally changed school funding policy in Australia.

School funding is a key element of any equitable school system. This is because the distribution of government funding for schooling leads to significant differences in the educational opportunities available for individual students, schools, and communities. The book shows that although education policy is often thought about as an abstract process, it is a series of small critical moments that create the policy and progress implementation towards or away from equity in school funding. Sinclair offers a new theory for understanding and then impacting in real-time the policymaking process towards equity in school funding, the "critical moments theory". In doing so, he identifies where education leaders, teachers, policymakers, scholars, and community members all have the agency to influence policy from conceptualisation to implementation.

Review Quotes

Equity and Influence in the Funding of Schools offers an innovative framework that details the catalysts and critical moments that shape the equity trajectory of education policy. Sinclair's critical analysis carefully details the complexities of the school funding policymaking process in Australia and importantly, proposes strategies that will aid in more equitable processes and outcomes. This important contribution will help policymakers and practitioners alike in their pursuit of fostering equity in schooling.

This book focuses on the intractable equity issues associated with government funding for schools. It exposes the power dynamics of a fateful policy phase. The front and back policy stories are suffused with optimism and cynicism-seldom benign and always politically calculated. Potential equity turning points are identified. A revealing read for policy researchers and campaigners alike.

About the Author

Matthew P. Sinclair is a Lecturer in the School of Education at RMIT University, Australia.