Managerial Implications of Accountabilities for Learning in Education

Accountability can be connected with the management of diverse expectations generated within and outside the organisation. The expectations can sometimes be contradicting, and the degree of authority and control of key actors can differ. This emphasise societal concerns, political pressures, bureaucratic concerns, top-down management, responses to market dynamics, professional responsibility and ethical principles. In that frame researches on translating outside expectations into schools will be presented. The importance of aligning external expectations with the context, priorities, capacity and visibility of teachers and leaders will be stressed. Paper will discuss accountability for outcomes in education, considering dilemmas of accountability for students’ achievements on external testing on international and national levels. The questions will be raised how far we can hold schools and teachers accountable for student results in particular year. Importance of managerial aspects in order to make external initiatives work in schools will be discussed in conclusions.