Digital Margins: Constituting and Challenging Inequity Through Data Infrastructures in Queensland Education, Australia

Abstract

This chapter addresses the manner in which marginalised students are viewed, governed and even “created” through the performative and representational power of data. Data infrastructures have become the means by which power is exerted over others, so that it creates the subjectification of the datafied student. Data infrastructures govern educational practices globally in ways that constitute, maintain and challenge inequity. Two situations are presented in which OneSchool (an online student management system) governs the educational practices in Queensland, Australia. Firstly, I discuss how Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students’ Indigenous languages were rendered invisible to policy-makers. Secondly, I analyse how a student’s acceptance of the performative character of data became the datafied version of that student, thereby accepting that student’s representation as a “fringe dweller”.