Teachers’ positionality as policy actors and assessors: assessment policy enactment in Victorian secondary schools

Despite the push for accountability-driven assessment policies to ensure quality learning and teaching in schools, there is a lack of understanding of how junior secondary school (Years 7–10, students aged 12–16) teachers enact policy and position themselves within assessment procedures. Assessment procedures in junior secondary are often overshadowed by a focus on the high-stakes assessment procedures and practices in senior secondary (students aged 16–18), given their impact on the secondary school certificate. Drawing upon the concept of policy enactment and the positioning of teachers as policy actors, this paper investigates how junior secondary school teachers in Victoria, Australia, interpret and engage with state-based and institutional assessment policies and how these enactments are realised in practice. Findings suggest that while policy enactments are shaped by school type (e.g. government versus independent), year level (e.g. junior versus senior secondary) and teacher beliefs, teachers positioned themselves as policy actors in distinct ways. These policy positions were influenced by their school’s confidence in teacher judgement and their capacity to create spaces for quality assessment practices. This paper argues that teachers are often precariously positioned as they must actively navigate and move between policy actor positions.