Whose Image is it Anyway?: Some Considerations of the Curricular Importance of Subject Image in Secondary School Design and Technology Education

This paper explores the idea that a sense of school subject image is a necessary feature of curriculum management and a potent force for change. The discussion centres on the view that all school subjects have an image and that if those intimately involved with the subject do not control the image then someone else does! In such circumstances the image is the product of past encounters and old euphemisms and is unlikely to hold the changed realities.The UK developments in Design and Technology education (the term Design and Technology is used to denote the school subject defined under this heading by the UK National Curriculum, 1995) have created something of an image problem which has interesting international parallels. Some of these problems are due to clearly discernible internal tensions and an ambiguous relationship with other subject areas.Through greater attention to subject image internal controversies might be acknowledged and resolved, relationships with other subject areas can be more meaningfully understood and practitioners can be helped to make sense of curriculum change.