Neoliberal Logics: An Analysis of Texas’s STAAR Exam Writing Prompts

This article adds to a growing body of research tracing the influence of neoliberal education reforms on policy and practice by showing the ways in which student writers are positioned within market-oriented discourses and values through Texas state exam writing prompts. As a genre-in-use, the writing prompts are seemingly mundane texts that privilege certain perspectives for viewing the world. This article uses critical discourse analysis to examine seven years of Texas state exam high school writing prompts, focusing on how the grammatical design of the prompts and the recontextualization of informational texts or quotes demonstrate traces of neoliberal logics such as individualism, self-reliance, and superficial multiculturalism. We call for critical pedagogies that help teachers and students resist the naturalization of dominant discourses and imagine collective responses to creating a more just world.