Foucault, Education, and Me: Accountability, Assessment, and Authorship

Foucault, Education and Me: Accountability, Assessment, and Authorship... a paper presented in C&I 8150 by Ann Moeller to Professor Thom Swiss,  November, 2008...

In Who's Afraid of Postmodernism, Smith says (about Discipline and Punishment,)  that Foucault traces the historical development of penal theory from torture to punishment to discipline...and shows that "if anything, the later developments are more brutal.  The story of change in punishment is not a narrative of progress, let alone a story of the triumph of the humane, but rather the substitution of one form of domination for another" (89).  According to Foucault's analysis, Smith claims, the changes in the penal system "were not motivated by a desire to be more humane...but rather were a means of dealing with political...problems that attended the public display of torture....What began to happen was the opposite of what was intended:  instead of enforcing new allegiance to the king, the spectacles of torture tended to make the people identify with the criminal.  So punishment gradually became less violent and more secret" (89-90).  From here, Foucault proposes that what occurred was the formation of what he called a "disciplinary society,"  the goal of which is the "formation of individuals by mechanisms of power.   Society makes individuals in its own image, and the tools for such manufacturing are the disciplines of power" (90).  The first of three ideas I want to explore is the application of Foucault's theories of power and discipline as they connect to testing and accountability.  

Accountability

  First, I want to explore some ideas about how teacher/school accountability seems to tie into  Foucault's ideas about "normalizing judgment."  Gunzenhauser (2005) explores Foucault's theories "to analyze the ways in which the high-stakes accountability movement has appropriated the technology of the examination to redefine the educated subject as a normalized case....I contend, high-stakes accountability has so dominated discourse and practices in public education that dialogue about the purpose and value of education has been circumscribed to dangerously narrow proportions" (242).   He refers to Foucault's comments in D&P that, "... educators are encouraged to remake the individual as a set of attributes, each assessed by its deviation from the normal," and Gunzanhauser writes,  "In the context of high-stakes accountability, the examination has a particularly effective role to play to foreclose dialogue about student learning.  School are encouraged to talk about scores rather than students, scores rather than learning" (249).  

       Gunzenhauser goes on, "As Foucault articulates, the examination is one of the most powerful tools of normalization.  For Foucault, normalization is one of the effect of an expanded disciplinary apparatus found manifest in public schools....Foucault explains [that] the history of the school is a history of the exercise of power over children.  Public schooling developed partly as a way to discipline wayward youth, to get them off the streets and make them useful.  Over time, public schooling has continued in its role of creating and reinforcing the bounds of what it means to be normal and sorting students according to the relation of the normal" (249)

         

       In Discipline and Punishment Foucault says:  "The examination combines the techniques of an observing hierarchy and those of a normalizing judgement.  It is a normalizing gaze, a surveillance that makes it possible to qualify, to classify and to punish.  It establishes over individuals a visibility through which one differentiates them and judges them.  That is why, in all the mechanisms of discipline, the examination is highly ritualized.  In it are combined the ceremony of power and the form of the experiment, the deployment of force and the establishment of truth.  At the heart of the procedures of discipline, it manifests the subjection of those who are perceived as objects and the objectification of those who are subjected" (184-85).   It is here, although I am still struggling with this, it seems that the paradox lurks. The examiner is seeking a record of accountability, but in so doing, is turning the object into a "case."  Gunzenhauser points out that examinations have the effect of "categorizing students and making work more efficient," (250) .... allowing us to "study students as individual cases" (251).   But Gunzenhauser concludes, at least in part, that the measurements (the examination itself) "...becomes powerful not because of an epistemological basis, but because of the way in which it is used (by how power is exercised through its use)" (251).  And this is the point: testing is supposed to be one measure - one measure that does not take up all the time, does not erase the ability of child and teacher to question and explore outside the "measures" that will define who is accountable.

         Add to this the voice of Levitt (2008) who asks, "...is it possible to hinder education by considering it only a transmission of knowledge and evaluating all students based on a single standardized test.  This leads us to the often asked question:  "Is the purpose of school to encourage learning and creativity" (49).   She goes on, "Foucault perceived power as the effect of attempting to act in the world, to use discourse, and to express thoughts....Foucault prompted inquiry, dialogue, and debate to clarify ideas or regimes of truth....Foucault asks one to engage in analysis, reflection, and change - applied not only to others, but to oneself, as well" (48). 

        The child, Gunzenhauser demands, needs to become educated, not constantly measured so that records of accountability take over the purpose.  "Measuring becomes the project of the schools," (251) he says, and  "With the advent of high-stakes accountability the role of the examination has never been more powerful....Seen this way,  NCLB [for example] is not so much the perfection of disciplinary surveillance but a more transparent technology of control" (251-52).  Overuse;  misguided use.  

Assessment

       Labeling the second idea I want to explore  - assess "ability"  -  could appear redundant, since I just finished talking about accountability and testing.  It is not.  Because I am particularly interested in studying the assessment of writing, I went in search of a way to try to look at applying some of Foucault's theory to the concept of writing assessment.  One of the things I found was quite surprising, but worthy of entry here under the category of "assessing literacy and learning."  In an article entitled, Happy to Comply":  Writing Assessment, Fast-Capitalism, and the Cultural Logic of Control,"  Tony Scott discusses his study of the two high schools in Kentucky.  The State of Kentucky (since 1991) has been using a large-scale writing assessment, and Scott decided to see what he could find out about how this testing affects writing pedagogy and composition processes.  Scott concludes that the assessment "makes learning writing synonymous with learning bureaucracy...." teaching and students' development as writers is subsumed by an explicitly bureaucratic framework that carries it own philosophy of literacy and learning, prescribes the form and content of the texts that students produce, and decrees the standards by which they will be evaluated" (141).  Scott ties in Foucault's theory when he argues that the " 'all assessment all of the time' approach to writing education identified in the study reflects a more general trend in assessment from a logic of discipline to a logic of control. [Similar to Gunzenhauser's conclusions above...]  The assessment erodes barriers between broad organizational procedures and goals and day-to-day classroom activities and subsumes teachers' and students' creative labors under a bureaucratic framework.  The result is highly rationalized literate activity that is explicitly employed toward the ends of a bureaucracy" (141).    Why does this fascinate me so?  Read on.

       I don't want to belabor this too much, but I want to try to explain Tony Scott's study in a way that makes sense on a couple of levels.  So, first let me summarize why I found myself unable to turn away from the pages of this study.  The "power" of the assessment was turned inside out.  The students in the studied classrooms were told exactly what to do and how to do it.  They studied the rubrics and samples of already evaluated work as they diligently prepared their writing portfolios.  In twenty pages, Scott describes the on-going procedures in two classrooms.  The activities included very proscriptive lessons.  Here is the genre.  Here is the audience, the purpose, the plan.  Here are the scoring levels - novice, apprentice, proficient, and distinguished - and the six scoring criteria which will be used.  In one of the classrooms, the students receive a copy of a student sample from the State's "benchmark portfolio" which is distributed to the teachers.  (The teachers receive these samples to help them learn how to score the passages.  They participate in calibration sessions, and when they consistently demonstrate their ability to match the state's score, they are ready to take over the task of scoring the students' work at their own schools.)  

   

       Scott watched as the students, in their classrooms, took sample portfolio items (from the State's samples, as mentioned above) and, guided by their teachers, discussed every aspect of the items - evaluating whether the sample fulfilled the required purpose,  addressed the audience, demonstrated appropriate persuasiveness,  represented good vocabulary choices, and so on.  The goal in this class was, Scott writes, "...to facilitate the students' internalization of the scoring criteria and refresh their understanding of one of the required modes....Throughout the school year...virtually every aspect of students' writing was in some way subsumed by the state-wide assessment and system of accountability.  Students learned the nuances of the five required genres through explicit definitions and other materials--such as outlines, checklists, and examples-- distributed by the district and state.  Students drafted and redrafted the five required pieces, and revision decisions were based on students' and teachers' applications of the scoring criteria....The minimum goal in both classes was the minimum goal for the state assessment more generally --a proficiency rating.  At the end of the year on a date that was identified by the state department of education, students handed their portfolios in to their teachers....Every school's accountability scores are made public.....English teachers are evaluated, in part, according to how well their students are scoring on their portfolios [Gunzenhauser again...] From a purely bureaucratic perspective, the Kentucky portfolio system has been thoroughly effective....However, the drawbacks of such a thorough subsumption of teaching and student labor under the umbrella of a bureaucratic system were ...evident....students' sense of agency over the writing they produced was significantly affected, as was their conception of literate activity more generally. The assessment method itself is a powerful means of enacting systematic control and conditioning students to organizational work in fast capitalism. A significant amount of intellectual freedom is sacrificed to bureaucratic imperatives" (146-49). Foucault?  Yes, I do believe so.

    

       Scott goes on to trace the history of writing assessment;  he addresses the advantages of portfolio writing over timed writing assessments - specific audiences and purposes, more control over the content, revision, feedback.  But, he concludes:  "...the Kentucky system shows that when they [portfolios] have become mandatory in writing programs, writing portfolio assessments can actually be a means for test designers and administrators to exert more control over the work of teachers and students.  Changing the means of testing does not necessarily undermine the organizational logic and goals of testing.  The Kentucky system is an example of how the movement from 'objective' assessment to an assessment that is more a part of the everyday work of classes might even be read as a movement from a logic of discipline to a logic of control.  Testing has certainly long been used and recognized as a means of 'discipline' in the Foucauldian sense of the term" (150).

      So, where am I going with this?  Well, on a simple level,  assessment and control.  No matter how we assess, we can mess it up.  Portfolios offer some advantages which timed essay writing can't achieve - having a real audience, having some control over content instead of writing to a one-and-only-prompt, revising, getting feedback.  Since writing is (isn't it?) an almost indisputable method of learning, it is obvious to see (isnt' it?)  that no matter how hard we try to come up with a way to evaluate student writing, we can mess it up.  When do we let it (the writing) really be authentic? How do we encourage the real voice inside the (student) writer without exercising unbearable control over what is said and how it is said?  Whether they are trying to prepare themselves to gain access to the university (or are already "in" the university) we tell them they need to find their own authentic voice, while at the same time "controlling" that voice to ensure that it is in sync with the normalized and formalized.  (I think we got into this a bit one evening in class a couple of weeks ago, and I'll end this part with it in the paragraph after next.)

       But, on a more complex level, before he wraps up some of his concerns about the Kentucky writing assessment system (I'm coming to that)  Scott goes on to talk about some of the cultural studies scholars - Hardt, Negri, and Lazzarato - who have taken Foucault's concept of "the society of control," and "more fully differentiated it from discipline than does Foucault himself" (152).   Scott discusses the "society of discipline" as characteristic of the industrial society, and the "society of control" as a "fast capitalist phenomena" (152,) and he gets into some intriguing ideas about how society exercises control over workers by fostering attitudes which help them feel "creatively and emotionally invested in the success of their companies" (152).  I found this excellently intriguing, and I wanted to mention it at least.  I hope to go back to it in my own studies, but Scott strays quite far from the Kentucky writing assessment in this part of the article, and I need to go back to his conclusions.

         The logic that drives the Kentucky writing assessment, Scott claims, is "a logic of control - a 'perpetual circuitry of social production' " ....The beliefs and assumptions that inform the assessment procedures are myths...widely shared in the culture.... During assessment years, the demands of the system are too great to leave room for much exploration of different genres or to explore how writing might be evaluated in different ways. Students are encouraged to produce certain texts according to institutional guidelines without being encouraged to ask why or to pursue topics and genres that aren't required or valued by the assessment.  Personal success is subsumed by the goals of the bureaucracy, as favorable scores are sought by students, teachers, and the organization itself....Teachers coach students to produce texts according to what 'they' want, but who exactly 'they' are remains murky" (155).  Apparently, the Kentucky writing assessment system has been controversial and much-discussed, but this is my first look at it.  Tony Scott's study drew me - through his use of Foucault and others - into a new way of "gazing," I think.   My current view is from a setting in which we have some control over the decisions about whether to test or not to test, and the debate doesn't get easier because of this - in fact, I think it gets more complicated.  Reading Scott's study gave me a new way of looking at (and discussing) how the pervasive testing in American public education "...is uncritically accepted as a means of raising standards and evaluating the effectiveness of teachers and schools....the curriculum is shaped to conform to the measurements....education ...becomes a means of generating highly prescribed outcomes, and students become the agents who produce those outcomes" (158).  Poorly thought-out, poorly managed, and poorly understood control!

       Authorship

          For the third and final idea in this Foucault exploration, I actually had chosen a couple of other articles I wanted to incorporate into my discussion, but I am feeling now that I need to rein this in.  Foucault's commentary on authorship, which I talked about in my Foucault notes in an earlier posting, simultaneously pleased and frustrated me.  At times I thought I "got," what he was saying, and at times I wanted to scream,  "Why would you, an author, say this about authorship and ideas and ownership?"

   

         But, now I want to come to the final part of my Foucault paper by addressing some of his ideas about practices (care) of the self - particularly his idea of "self-sponsored writing."   I thought I could tie some of Foucault's ideas about sexuality and gender into this as well, but I fear that in the interest of time, I need to try to go back and do some of the sexuality and gender commentary in a posting of "notes" on the blog, instead of in this paper.

          Mark Faust, a professor of English education at Athens, Georgia, turns to Foucault to make a connection between his idea of self-writing and what successful educators say about their lives beyond the classroom.  In an article from the International Journal of Leadership in Education, (1998,) entitled "Foucault on Care of the Self:  Connecting Writing with Life-long Learning,"  Faust makes this point:  "Even a brief summary of Foucault's work in this area (the care of the self) is suggestive of the overall relevance of his findings for educational leaders....the attention Foucault gives to writing provides an interesting framework for understanding the appeal of organizations like the National Writing Project, and practices like the creation of teacher stories, narratives and portfolios" (182).  From personal experience with the Minnesota Writing Project (and because of the link which the director of the MWP makes for those of us who teach the College-in-the-Schools Composition, Literature, and Speech courses through the U of MN,) I  was pleasantly surprised to find (and eager to see) what Faust had to say about Foucault's ideas on self-sponsored writing.

       At the time of his death, Foucault was writing his work on the history of sexuality, and in the process he discovered some Graeco-Roman literature - composed in the first and second centuries AD - which describe practices "which permit individuals to [sic] effect by their own means or with the help of others a certain number of operations on their own bodies and souls, thoughts, conduct, and way of being, so as to transform themselves in order to attain a certain state of happiness, purity, wisdom, perfection, or immortality."   Faust goes on to say that Foucault refers to these practices (such as meditation, exercise, counseling, conversation, philosophical speculation, reading, writing, and so on,) as 'technologies of the self '(182).  

       Foucault goes on to identify, Faust says, three categories of "practices of the self."  Foucault called the risk-taking practices 'testing procedures,'  the method of goal-setting as 'self-examination,' and the critical-thinking, [Foucault's]  ' labour of thought with itself as object,'  - the purpose of which is to 'cultivate self-awareness and a discriminating mind' (184).    Faust reminds the reader that in the last of Foucault's works to be published, he directly links writing to taking care of the self, honoring it and describing "the real product of writing" as the "ongoing sense of self."  And, Faust goes on to mention the work of literary critic Lee Quinby, who, in referencing the works of Thoreau, Agee, Kingston and others, says that they "appear to use writing as an 'askesis' or 'progressive consideration of self, which is a process of acquiring and assimilating truth as a function of self-creation' (186).  

          I do not need to be convinced of the value of this theory, nor of its truth;  the MWP philosophy leaves no doubt because it operates on the "try it, you'll buy it" theory.  It would not be possible to over-estimate, in my opinion, the value of  nurturing self-writing in the lives of teachers.  It cannot help but make us better teachers.  //  I think that Faust overrides the wide variety of teacher self-writing, and jumps to a category of writing called "teacher narrative." And, although I like to look at this task more broadly, I can go there - to the teacher narratives.  I believe he is supporting the idea that as teachers self-write, they create the stories of the classroom, of how students understand, of how students strive, of what they intend, of the ways that social processes enhance or inhibit progress, of how personal identities - both of teacher and student - impact everything.  And although I "get" the resistance that exists regarding the use of teacher narratives as a "source of research data....from those who fear an erosion of quantitative precision and scientific rigour,"  who among us would not rise to defend the priceless knowledge which teachers hold and can tell in their stories?  Those who do this understand Faust's claim that we teachers should be invited to create portfolios of our own, invited to step back and re-examine our teaching in light of our goals as learners (190).  He talks about the 50% of new teachers who leave after five years and the 80% who leave after ten (191,) and then he humbly adds that he is not so naive as to think that writing the self will turn this statistic around.  Instead, he offers the possibility that self-sponsored writing can improve the quality of life for teachers - can be a valuable staff development tool.  This application of a theory from Foucault is ultimately appealing - I have seen it at work in self and colleagues.  

           To maintain the energy and enthusiasm for the work of the classroom Faust knows that "...writing curriculum involves envisioning possibilities; it means imagining what students might be experiencing while being a student oneself"  (188).  It means, Faust goes on to cite Gordon Wells, "(fostering) a continuing dialogue, in which the students are equal partners with their teacher in the co-construction of knowledge and understanding" (188).  We bring more of our best to the classroom when we "write ourselves."

        Finally, Faust offers this:  Foucault reinterpreted a "way of writing that was widely practised at the time - Graeco-Roman - despite having been soundly criticized by Plato" (188). It was a practice centered on the creation of 'hypomnenata,' which literally means copybooks or notebooks. Plato's attempt "to discredit writing as a legitimate way of establishing truth failed to limit the growth of what was then a 'new technology' (189). Foucault argues that others have overlooked "the profound significance of  'the hypomnemata'  as expressions of  'the idea of a self which had to  be created as a work of art' " (189).  As teachers of composition struggle with the painful joy of trying to help students "speak" their messages in clearly written, authentic, willing voices, (during writing assessments and beyond those assessments) who among us wouldn't enjoy "owning" this application of another of Foucault's theories.

     

Works Cited

Faust, Mark A.  "Foucault on Care of the Self:  Connecting Writing with Life-long Learning," International Journal of Education, 1998, 1:2, 181-193.

Foucault, Michel.  Discipline and Punishment.  trans., A. Sheridan.  New York:  Vintage Books, 1977/1995.

Gunzenhauser, Michael G.  "Normalizing the Educated Subject:  A Foucaultian Analysis  of  High-Stakes Accountability,"  Educational Studies, 2008.

Levitt, Roberta.  "Freedom and Empowerment:  A Transformative Pedagogy of Educationa l Reform," Educational Studies, July-August, 2008, 44:1, 47-59.

Smith, James K. A.  Who's Afraid of Postmodernism?  Grand Rapids, Michigan:  Baker Academic, 2006.

Scott, Tony.  "Happy to Comply":  Writing Assessment, Fast-Capitalism, and the Cultural Logic of Control,"  The Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural Studies, 30: 140-161, 2008.