Joakim Landahl Score Fellow

Joakim, tell us about your research.
My research is primarily focused on the history of education. For instance, I have studied the emergence of international comparisons of school performance, ranging from the World's Fairs of the 19th century to today’s PISA assessments. In an upcoming book, I examine an organization (the IEA) that conducted the first quantitative comparisons of school performance in the post-war era. I am particularly interested in this as an example of transnational scientific collaboration, and I study how the organization developed, the practicalities of test construction, and how it communicated with the mass media and funding bodies.

I have also conducted research on democratic influence within schools, focusing both on the history of the student movement and on the relationship between parents and schools. In both instances, national organizations were established to exert influence over education. Another research interest concerns professional issues; for example, I have studied the Minister of Ecclesiastical Affairs Fridtjuv Berg, who—as a primary school teacher—was both a political actor and a representative of a professional group.

What will you be working on during your time at Score?
In a newly launched project, we are examining the role knowledge has played in the school system’s so-called experimental initiatives from the early 20th century to the early 21st century. While the most well-known such initiative in Sweden is the work on the comprehensive school reform in the 1950s, we are broadening the scope of our study to include individual experimental schools and more specific projects, such as the experiment with schools operating without fixed timetables. During my stay, I also look forward to new encounters and finding inspiration for future projects.