While
most will agree policy making is the responsibility of those at the higher end
of the hierarchy and implementation of those policies is handled at the lower
levels, as usual the truth is actually found somewhere in between. Lipsky
(2010) brings to light the factors which can affect policies at the
implementation level. The primary influencing factors include discretion and
relative autonomy from the organizational authority. Lipsky (2010) gives the
examples of police officers and governmental workers as lower or street level
employees who have “considerable discretion in determining the nature, amount
and quality of benefits … provided by their agencies” (p. 13). Their positions
give them the discretion to determine how policies are implemented and, truthfully,
without this type of discretion, little would be accomplished daily. In
business and higher education, this type of discretion is also referred to as
“empowering your people.” Additionally, many of these same types of employees
have and need a certain degree of autonomy from the organization but will
generally “more or less conform to what is expected of them” (p. 16).
Lipsky (2010) also references the inherent conflict that exists between
street level employees and their managers. This conflict often results in
street level employees to become more focused on their own interests than that
of their managers and leads street level employees to use other (new or
existing) regulations to circumvent implementation of policies. However, concern
begins to rise when these same lower level employees become street level
bureaucrats making policy and, in some cases, clearly changing the intent of
the original policy. It is even more interesting when street level bureaucrats
go so far in their refusal to implement a policy that it becomes necessary to
amend or change the policy.
No
Child Left Behind (NCLB), was the reauthorization of the Federal Elementary and
Secondary Education Act (ESEA) passed in 2001. For schools and districts, it
represented an ocean of change for the federal government's role in K‐12
education (Ladd, 2017). Under the NCLB and federal law, every student was
required to be tested on an annual basis in grades three through eight and at
least once in high school math and reading (Ladd, 2017). NCLB also provided for
proficiency and adequate yearly progress (AYP) toward the proficiency goals.
Failure to do so subjected the school and district to increasing consequences.
Although most teachers support the principles of NCLB and research indicates
some positive outcomes in test scores in the years following NCLB
implementation, the incentives provided for in NCLB have created some untended
responses that have reduced the quality of education delivered to some children
(Murname & Papay, 2010). These unintended responses included high level
burnout among teachers with many opting out of the system. It also brought a
demand by teachers and principals as well as other school district
administrators as street level bureaucrats to create a change in the policies
guiding K-12 education. These demands finally created a change in NCLB, when it
was replaced in 2015 with then President Obama’s Every Students Succeeds Acts
(ESSA), which was the latest reauthoring of the 1965 Elementary and Secondary
Education Act (ESEA).
References:
Ladd,
H. (2017). No Child Left Behind: A Deeply Flawed Federal Policy. Journal of
Policy Analysis and Management, 36:461-469.
Lipsky,
M. (2010). Street-Level bureaucracy: Dilemmas of the individual in public services.
Russel Sage, New York.
Murname,
R., Papay, J. (2010). Teachers’ Views on No Child Left Behind: Support for the
Principles, Concerns about the Practices. Journal of Economic
Perspectives, 24:151-166.
Hi Phyllis! Thanks for your blog! I can see in your first paragraph that your business/hospitality perspective shows, and I think that’s a helpful perspective to have when talking about street-level bureaucrats. In a 24/7 hospitality type of environment, there can’t always be a top-level administrator present, so it ends up putting a lot of autonomy and discretion on the lower-level staff who work outside the typical Monday through Friday 8am to 5pm schedule. I can see this in our Housing office especially, where we usually only have student workers working after 5pm. I appreciate you highlighting the Lipsky (2010) quote about how little would be accomplished during a day if the lower-level staff didn’t have discretion. In a guest or student-centered environment, our main goal is to serve and support people, so sometimes our frontline staff have to be empowered to make decisions.
ReplyDeleteOn the flip side, the LA Times Article (Winton, 2017) really struck me when it talks about legal settlements due to street-level bureaucrats using inappropriate discretion or causing breech in policies. It definitely seems like that empowerment to have street-level bureaucrats use discretion is risky. A few years ago, my student team expressed the desire to change our “try not to be on the same working team as your best friend” policy. I was uneasy about changing it because a lot of bad can happen when best friends work together (or at least it can in our office haha). This reminds me of the inherent conflict that Lipsky (2010) mentions between managers and frontline employees. Against my better judgement, I let my student team pick their own working groups, and two friends decided to work together. They ended up messing around so much that they accidentally caused $45,000 worth of damage to one of our apartments (via setting off the fire sprinklers). Empowering them and allowing them to use discretion in their role ended up costing us!
Thanks for your post!
Emily G.
References
Lipsky, M. (2010 originally published in 1980). Street-Level bureaucracy: Dilemmas of the individual in public services. Russel Sage, New York.
Winton, R. (May 2017). LAPD settlements soar as officials close the books on high-profile lawsuits against police officers. Los Angeles Times. Retrieved from http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-lapd-litgation-costs-20170509-story.html
Hello Phyllis,
ReplyDeleteWhen I hear NCLB, I always think about Locke High School in South Central LA. Growing up Locke had always been a low performing school, and when NCLB came into effect, no school has experienced more significant changes than Locke. Because of systemic problems and socioeconomic status Locke high school was closed multiple times since 2008. Locke was transformed into a Charter School, got some new paint, new administrators and teachers, but their success rights haven't really changed because of the systemic battles the people in the area face. I think the charter school and new administrators serve as a perfect example of street-level bureaucrats as policymakers and the limitations that exist.
Lipsky (2010), listed monetary, time, information, and psychological as the cost of street-level bureaucracy and Locke struggles with most of these. Green Dot is the Charter school that took over Locke and a lot of money has been thrown into improving the school aesthetically and, so money is not a problem. Time, information and the psychological toll is the real cost that has impacted the teachers, administrators, parents, and students in South LA/Watts where the school is located. Think about the psychological toll on the community and students at Locke High School consistently opened and closed for roughly five years. Administrators and teachers became a revolving door; I can only imagine how the students felt as their education, hopes, dreams, and aspiration were being pushed around by policymakers. As you mentioned in your post the consequences for NCLB was unintended because many teachers and administrators hearts were in the right place. However, as street-level bureaucrats enforcing these policies spawned a ton of different approaches which left students at Locke stuck in the craziness.
Really good post.
Lipsky, M. (2010). Street-Level bureaucracy: Dilemmas of the individual in public services. Russel Sage, New York.