The importance of commercial products increased in schools during the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly as leaders grappled with school closures. Pre-COVID principals viewed their schools as mainly procuring commercial services for administrative support and teacher professional development. After school closures, principals came to emphasise…

This paper explores the issue of how children come to be treated as workers in schools that are run as though they were businesses. It describes how the 'soft' form of human resource management provides a useful model for school reform, since it seeks to increase the productivity of the worker through 'humanistic' means, treating the worker as a…

The intensification of data collection practices in schooling -- often due to state accountability requirements -- has resulted in the widespread adoption of commercial student management systems (SMS) in schools. Drawing on a qualitative case study of a New Zealand primary school, this paper investigates its adoption of a commercial SMS, and the…

Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are becoming increasingly important participants in educational programmes and implementing education policy. This study explores governmental policymakers' perceptions and reactions to NGO involvement in the implementation of education policy. We applied a qualitative research method, conducting in-depth…