Education in Times of Change: Understanding School Outcomes to Inform Evidence-Based Policy

In the search for economies of scale and driven by New Public Management theories which focus on professionalism and optimization, there is growing tendency to increase the scale of operations in public sector entities (Alonso et al., 2013). This results in mergers, acquisitions and joint-ventures. The trend is spreading towards education (e.g. Jarl et al., 2012). The Flemish government, for example, is looking for opportunities to implement an increase of scale due to enhanced cooperation among schools. There are a number of examples in recent history: the introduction of school communities in primary and secondary education, or the associations and mergers in the higher education (universities and university colleges). This PhD research project seek to understand the determinants of school district performance. In particular, the researcher aims to answer the following research questions: (1) How should compulsory education schools be organized in an effective and effective way? (2) How does the organization of compulsory education schools matter for the professionalism and management of schools? (3) What are efficient and effective management practices in education?