Palomares, M; Poveda, D. and Hall, C. (2017). Implementing a point-based rewards system as an educational tool in children’s home: From standardisation to coconstruction and negotiation. Child & Society (on-line first). doi:10.1111/chso.12255
From a wider educational ethnography, we analysed the implementation of a point-based reward system as an educational tool in a Spanish children’s home. This is examined within a policy and ideological framework strongly influenced by Evidence-Based Practice, Standardization and New Public Management. The findings show, first, how this system relied on a balance between greater use of standard tools and the experience of the managers; second, how, in practice, basic procedures regarding the system’s rigour and objectivity were altered; and third, how the ratings given to evaluate children were very often co-constructed and influenced by broader individual, social and institutional processes. Link to read: on-line article