From generic skills to behaviour monitoring: exploring materialisations of the key skills framework in public–private relationships

Abstract

This article explores how responses to a generic skills framework are materialised in Irish schools, and the main aim is to shed light on multiple dimensions of policy enactment. The Key Skills Framework (KSF) was introduced as part of a curricular reform in Irish lower secondary schools – a reform that has met substantial resistance locally and nationally. This study investigated local responses to the KSF specifically by interrogating its particular materialisations in practice through Actor-Network Theory (‘spaces of prescription’ and ‘spaces of negotiation’). The findings indicate that there is an inherent multiplicity to the KSF that nevertheless suggests it has been reduced to represent national traditions of behaviour monitoring and disciplinary routines, rather than intentions of enhancing thinking, learning and living more commonly found in generic skills frameworks. These findings are coupled with discussions of the nature of governing actors in Irish education, including the presence of (new) private vendors.