Public governance and schools' performance. Improving students learning through collaborative public management

According to the New Public Governance paradigm, this paper analyses the institutional and organisational conditions that can lead to an improvement in student learning (a typical co- produced outcome) by acting on the promotion of genuine collaborative relationships. The distinctive features of Italian distributed governance and the challenges for school management are discussed by examining TIMSS and INVALSI data. The results show that collaborative public management supports schools in improving student learning, confirming the research hypothesis for primary schools (IV grade) and schools that operate in socially and economically poor contexts.