The Simple Art of Governing Complex Systems

Transcription

1 The Simple Art of Governing Complex Systems OECD/CERI Seminar June 2013 Ben Levin, OISE/University of Toronto Homespace.utoronto.ca/~levinben/

2 Outline Why governance in education is complex Basic principles for managing Illustrated with examples from Ontario and elsewhere

3 My Background Half in government senior management in education Half in academia working on education policy and the impact of research Also experience in school districts and with NGOs Drawing on international experience

4 Starting Points Governance is less important to better outcomes than many other aspects of education policy But if badly done can get in the way Many different structures can work; there is no ideal system form Number of levels Power at each level

5 Surprises At any given moment, there is a high probability of low probability events. In other words, surprise dominates. Yehezkel Dror, Policy Making Under Adversity, 1986

6 Why Education Governance is Complex Multi-level system local, regional, national Diversity demographics, values Increasing number of stakeholders who are increasingly vocal Internal and external Education is a field with strong a priori beliefs Ideology is important Turbulence and surprises Growing cynicism about government and public institutions Expectations rise faster than performance

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8 Why Governance is Complex 2 Elections at multiple levels create short-term ism Growing knowledge about good policy/practice not always aligned with public or professional beliefs Rise of social media makes politics more volatile

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10 Ontario 13 M people, huge area 2 M students, 5000 schools, 72 districts, 4 systems Highly diverse more than 25% foreign born Complex governance systems Provincial ministry, local school boards, many other interest groups Highly conflicted up to 2004

11 Ontario 2011 All student outcomes significantly improved Teacher morale improved Public satisfaction improved Little conflict, consistency in outlook across the sector

12 Stance on Governance Key principles: Open Inclusive Positive Evidence-informed Value stability and improvement Pragmatic but with strong outcomes focus

13 Four Areas of Focus Structures Vehicles for input and dialogue Use of evidence Capacity-building

14 Structures Not that important Don t spend much time changing them i.e. governance changes not central focus Many different approaches can work Ontario examples Legislation on role of school boards - late

15 Input and Dialogue Need formal and informal vehicles for this

16 Input and Dialogue Need formal and informal vehicles for this Multilateral as well as bilateral Public as well as professionals Put ideas on the table early, get input Listen to opposition carefully Ontario examples Partnership Table Consultation processes Student Success Commission

17 Evidence

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19 Evidence Make lots of data available Do not get caught up on single indicators Improve research capacity and use Disciplined innovation with evaluation Avoid destabilizing changes without strong evidence Use third parties Ontario examples Education research strategy Statistical Neighbours External evaluations

20 Capacity Building Helping people get better at this work Skills are not automatically there; have to be created Training/certification Can be provided by third parties Politicians and political staff Civil servants School and district leaders Teachers Parents Media

21 Implementation These ideas are do-able Many countries using at least some of them, though few use all Dialogues require more political leadership and support Evidence and capacity building less so Can put elements of this in place everywhere

22 Challenges Mindsets the idea that structures are key Mindsets- desire to exert authority Habits conflict as a primary way to do things Belief in driving change through policy and documents or through gross incentives

23 Excessively Optimistic?

24 Thank you!