School culture and values-related change: towards a critically pragmatic conceptualisation

While ‘school culture’ is a topical issue, there is some consensus on a knowledge deficit regarding its subterranean dynamics and influence on change effort. This article describes an exploration of the mediation of a values-related change effort by school culture in Irish post-primary schools from the perspective of a research project which focused on the dynamic interface of change, special educational needs (SEN) and information and communication technology (ICT). The study identified how an inclusion-orientated polycultural entity can be enabled in schools, but also tracked and modeled the contestation and bounding of that phenomenon. The findings point to the inadequacy of the dominant monocultural conceptualisation of school culture, and alternatively construct school culture as a zone of polycultural contestation and ideological settlement. This interpretation suggests the dominance of a naïve reformist discourse on school culture and change, and suggests that an alternative discourse of critical realism be applied. A range of interpretations and recommendations arising from the study are outlined in relation to our understanding of school culture and values-related change.