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The article argues for the importance of an open, reflexive-methodological approach when switching between studying text, context and researcher activity. Close linguistic analysis can benefit from being linked with the researcher's contextualisation of his empirical material as well as with more distanced readings. The more specific starting point for this article is that school development, like other similar terms such as school improvement and the like, makes use of linguistic building blocks with which whole narratives about today's and tomorrow's schools can be constructed. The subject of the study is a short text issued by the Swedish Schools Inspectorate (Skolinspektionen). Government language changes according to the authorities' role in society and their own definitions of their functions, and an important aspect here is the legitimacy of the authorities' texts. By means of various kinds of close linguistic analysis, the above-mentioned text is studied with regard to choice of categories, hierarchies of modalisation and the rhetorical effects of different types of formulations in a broader political-social landscape. The article concludes with a reflective discussion on the relationship between government language and irony as a stylistic device – a device that is based on the results of the close empirical analysis.[i] [i] The article is part of the project "School Development as Narrative", funded by the Swedish Research Council. The author would like to thank the two reviewers for very valuable comments.

The article argues for the importance of an open, reflexive-methodological approach when switching between studying text, context and researcher activity. Close linguistic analysis can benefit from being linked with the researcher's contextualisation of his empirical material as well as with more distanced readings. The more specific starting point for this article is that school development, like other similar terms such as school improvement and the like, makes use of linguistic building blocks with which whole narratives about today's and tomorrow's schools can be constructed. The subject of the study is a short text issued by the Swedish Schools Inspectorate (Skolinspektionen). Government language changes according to the authorities' role in society and their own definitions of their functions, and an important aspect here is the legitimacy of the authorities' texts. By means of various kinds of close linguistic analysis, the above-mentioned text is studied with regard to choice of categories, hierarchies of modalisation and the rhetorical effects of different types of formulations in a broader political-social landscape. The article concludes with a reflective discussion on the relationship between government language and irony as a stylistic device – a device that is based on the results of the close empirical analysis.1

The study examined how communities participate in school construction projects in primary schools in Somaliland and how community participation in school construction projects influences the performance of those projects. The study used a correlational design and was undertaken as a cross-sectional survey. The target population was 920 primary school headteachers in all the 13 regions of Somaliland and 82 District Education Officers. A sample of 257 headteachers was drawn using multistage sampling where purposive sampling and stratified random sampling with replacement were used to sample headteachers while 22 DEOs were sampled using simple random sampling. Data was collected from headteachers using questionnaires and from DEOs using semi-structured interviews. The questionnaire was pilot tested on 28 headteachers. The response was received from 247 headteachers and 20 DEOs. Variables relationships were analyzed using path analysis and tested using t-tests at α = 5%. The main methods used to involve the community in primary schools' construction projects were: involving them in decision-making processes, volunteering labour and fundraising. The study found that community participation had no significant influence on the performance of construction projects. Community participation in public primary schools in post-war Somaliland is a policy-driven initiative and a fill-gap measure of deficiencies left by the government's low and inadequate capitation to schools. Low social capital in the communities participated in projects coupled with the costs and the downsides of the community participation process can result in a negative impact on the performance of those projects. Urban schools tend to benefit more from community participation than rural schools due to higher social capital stocks in urban communities as compared to rural communities.Keywords: Community Participation, Performance, Construction Projects, Social Capital, School Development, School Projects.

This article problematizes evidence-based policies in the USA, using Dewey&rsquo ; s (1916) education theory and findings from a school development project in 71 culturally diverse Arizona schools. The study asked three questions: (1) How do formal and informal school leaders work in teams to mediate between evidence-based policy requirements at federal, state, and district levels and the needs of culturally diverse students? (2) What leadership team practices contribute to school development as measured by improved student outcomes in school letter grades? (3) What values from evidence-based policies and democratic education are evident in effective school development? Evaluation methods featured qualitative interviews with leadership team members in 71 schools as well as a descriptive analysis of school letter grades based primarily upon student outcomes. Results indicated improved student outcomes in letter grades and enhanced leadership capacity and democratic values as well as evidence-based values that contributed to school development. The article concludes with next steps to expand the project to another region of the USA and a call for a balanced use of evidence (including standardized test scores) constructed through Dewey&rsquo ; s notion of democratic values of education.