Public Education, Neoliberalism, and Teachers

Paul Bocking recently earned his PhD in geography from York University and is a sessional lecturer in the School of Labour Studies at McMaster University.

• Preface 1. Introduction 1.1 What Is Teachers’ Professional Autonomy? Why Is It Important for Public Education?1.2 Key Dimensions for Assessing Challenges to Professional Autonomy1.3 A Geography of Teachers’ Professional Autonomy1.4 Challenging Professional Autonomy1.5 Methodology1.6 Book Overview2. Geographies of Professional Autonomy and Neoliberalism in North America Preface: Dia Del Trabajo2.1 The Emergence of Public Education, Teachers’ Unions, and Professionalism2.2 The Postwar Consolidation of Public Education Systems and Teachers’ Unions2.3 The Neoliberalization of Education: Teacher Unionism on the Defensive 2.4 Transnational Elite Policy2.5 Counter Hegemonic Continental Networks3. New York City Preface: Visiting a Small High School on the Upper West Side 3.1 Structural Changes I: Centralizing Power to Facilitate Neoliberal Fast Policy3.2 Structural Changes II: Transforming Workplace Culture 3.3 Teacher Precariousness and the Weakening of the School Site Union and Professional Autonomy3.4 Scaling Up: Initiative in Neoliberal Policy Shifts from NYC to Albany3.5 Cuomo’s Expansion of Standardized Testing into Teacher Evaluation: Undermining Professional Autonomy3.6 State of Our Union, State of Our Schools4. Mexico City Preface: Teachers’ Day 4.1 Transitions in State Power, Decentralization, and Emergence of Elba Esther Gordillo’s SNTE as a Key Neoliberal Actor4.2 Re-Centralized Governance through School-Based Competition4.3 From Clientelism to a Neoliberalized Teaching Profession4.4 Enrique Peña Nieto and Fast Policy4.5 What Makes a Teacher? Marginalizing the Normals and Teacher Education4.6 Testing Teachers4.7 Precarious Employment and Professional Autonomy4.8 Acquiescence, Resistance, and the Challenges of Scaling Up: The CNTE in the City and the Countryside5. Toronto Preface: School Workroom Cultures 5.1 Centralizing Governance: Increasing Ontario Ministry of Education Control of the Toronto District School Board5.2 Quantifying Student Achievement: Policy from the Centre5.3 Quantifying Student Achievement: Impact on the Classroom and Professional Autonomy5.4 Quantifying Student Achievement: Intersection of Race, Class, and School Choice on Teachers’ Work5.5 Scaling Up: The Centralization of Bargaining and the Negotiation of Professional Autonomy6. Conclusion Preface: Confronting the Neoliberalization of Education 6.1 The Centrality of Teachers’ Professional Autonomy in the Struggle Against the Neoliberalization of Education6.2 Teachers’ Unions as Champions of Professional Autonomy 6.3 A Multi Scalar Geography of Teachers’ Professional AutonomyAppendix: List of InterviewsBibliography

"Though Public Education, Neoliberalism, and Teachers: New York, Mexico City, Toronto will prove most useful to those studying education in North America, it will give those interested in neoliberalism more generally much to reflect upon. Though it is not a work of history, Bocking is careful to historicize his social scientific work, and the wealth of detail he provides in all three of his case studies — much of it previously untapped by scholars — will undoubtedly enrich the work of educational, economic, and labour historians grappling with the development of the most potent and controversial ideological formation of our time."- Josh Cole (Historical Studies in Education) "This book will benefit audiences interested in labor relations and school governance."- C. B. Thurston, University of Texas at San Antonio (CHOICE)