Leaders’ views on the values of school-based research: contemporary themes and issues

Bryan, Hazel; Burstow, Bob

doi:10.1080/19415257.2016.1238835

Cited by 4 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 10 publications

(6 reference statements)

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“…In outline we (the researchers) were interested in what teachers saw as the enhanced qualities brought to educational practice by the attainment of a Master's degree (seen as essential for teachers in most western countries) and in particular the place of research in that. What seemed to be the case after preliminary discussion with groups of teachers in three pilot schools (all secondary) was that, where research was claimed to have been incorporated into schools, it was not as we had expected, a finding confirmed in the work of Bryan and Burstow (2017). This paper does not report that project, the preliminary findings of which are reported in Boyd and Constable (2014), but considers one issue arising from this early stage in more depth, which was that on the one hand, all the schools claimed to be committed to research yet on the other, what they did was not easily recognisable to university academics.…”

Section: Masters Degrees and Research Engagementmentioning

confidence: 76%

Universities, supporting schools and practitioner research

Constable

2018

Research in Education

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Practitioner research, as one example of research supported by universities, has developed in unexpected ways, some of them unhelpful and has not always generated the benefits predicted. This paper argues that practitioner research has become shaped more by the needs of universities than by the schools and teachers it was hoped it would serve. The paper goes on to explore the idea that the promise of practitioner research has been so beguiling that it has commandeered more than a wise share of attention in universities and that this has been at the expense of exploring some other avenues of engagement with schools. The paper notes that the evolution of practitioner inquiry has taken place at a time when regimes of accountability driven by central government have been visible globally and when universities and schools each had significant pressures to fulfil policy imperatives. The pressure towards performance has in England drawn the attention of universities and schools away from, rather than towards, each other: schools to revised curricula and performance, universities to research and funding. Practitioner research became developed as a skeleton for higher degrees and in that arena universities came to have a role in promoting and at the same time inhibiting and possibly damaging its development. Hopes that practitioner research would come to contribute to mainstream research were not fulfilled and both educational and more especially practitioner research remain problematic in the wider university research agenda. One response is to renew efforts to improve existing approaches and examples of this are now widespread. However, the paper observes that, at present universities’ support for schools seems to reflect only a small part of their much wider expertise and argues that education departments in universities might think much more radically about the range of expertise that they can offer schools, a more imaginative exploration. The paper continues by noting that the challenge for university departments of education of working together equally with schools and teachers is easy to aspire to, but not to fulfil, and this impacts on working with the authentic concerns of schools and on sharing expertise. Further opportunities are available: beyond education departments: for example, other university departments have expertise that education departments might link with which has hitherto remained unexplored. Additional areas which remain under-researched are the processes of incorporating educational change and in making judgments about educational initiatives. Readers are reminded that the accidental barriers produced by the categories of research, teaching and administration are accountancy categories and may demand creative and determined responses. The paper concludes that there is too much to lose by not exploring these or other wider possibilities and much to gain by doing so including opportunities in research.

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Section: Masters Degrees and Research Engagementmentioning

confidence: 76%

Universities, supporting schools and practitioner research

Constable

2018

Research in Education

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“…In this article, we look at how the school as an activity system is affected by ‘academic drift’ at a policy level in the form of the Swedish Education Act (SFS 2010:800). One conclusion is that this imposes considerable challenges on teachers, school leaders and municipalities (Bryan and Burstow, 2017). Another conclusion is that a need emerges for school leaders (Bergmark and Kostenius, 2012; Håkansson and Sundberg, 2016) and the university to be involved in the process in order to develop the necessary and permanent structures for teachers’ further development.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…We find few signs of an ‘institutional academic drift’ in that sense. Therefore, one remaining issue is, with reference to Bryan and Burstow (2017): how to involve school leaders in this unstoppable school development?…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A study from England, with a long history in academisation, shows that the change to a research-based way of working imposes great challenges for teachers, school leaders and non-academic organisations like municipalities (Bryan and Burstow, 2017). These challenges go back to the divide between, on one hand, research-based knowledge and, on the other, teachers’ contextualised-based, experience-based knowledge; in the literature this is referred to as ‘the knowledge problem’ (Cain, 2015; Dewey, 1929; Levin, 2013).…”

Section: Research Overviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Academisation and teachers’ dilemmas

Hansson

Erixon

2019

European Educational Research Journal

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In 2010, the Swedish Education Act introduced new provisions stating that education at all levels should ‘rest on scientific grounds and proven experience’. These requirements led to greater policy activities at the state level and enhanced the cooperation emerging between the municipality and higher education as well as between teachers and researchers at both the middle and micro levels. This study was conducted in a Swedish municipality that adopted a local strategy to meet the Education Act’s scientific requirements for teaching. As part of this strategy, together with a university the municipality designed a postgraduate programme, corresponding to a one-year master’s level under the Bologna Agreement, made up of four years of part-time studies and with a focus on practical research and school development. This article examines how a sample of 15 teachers participating in this postgraduate programme, and their school leaders, perceive this policy (namely, education being based on scientific grounds) within the development of the teaching profession’s practice and which dilemmas they face while trying to interpret and handle the Education Act’s provisions in their schools. Our overall theoretical perspectives are those of policy enactment, academic drift and activity theory. The results indicate that the teachers’ participation in the postgraduate course has caused tension among their colleagues. Moreover, the teachers expressed a feeling of being ‘isolated cogs’ in an organisation and lacking supporting structures. For some, their participation is a step in a more individualised project that contributes primarily to their own professional development; for others, it is more of a collective project with which one can ‘lift’ one’s school and colleagues.

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“…School improvement requirements have been identified as a driving force in encouraging teachers in participating in action research (Bryan & Burstow, 2016) by working with researchers in the university as this gives them the agency in deciding on their professional development needs and how to improve them. However, Biesta et al (2015) reported a mixed feeling about teacher agency in terms of their professional development as a driving force in school improvement as we know that some teachers may be reluctant in engaging in action research.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sectors together for professional development: a university team in an action research collaboration with school teachers and senior leaders

Magaji

Cabral

Lambirth

et al. 2021

Compass

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Action research promotes teaching and learning as it may allow teachers to explore areas of their practices that require improvement. The purpose of this case study is to highlight the steps involved in carrying out action research and any challenges that teachers may encounter in this learning process. This study was developed as a professional development course from 2015 to 2019 attended by more than 150 teachers from early years, primary and secondary schools in London and Kent in the last 4 years. The teachers were registered as students at the University of Greenwich and supported by a university team of researchers. The study identified five steps of the development of teacher-led action research and highlighted the challenges for each step. The steps included defining the field of action; planning; action; evaluation and reflection/(re)planning. This led to the development of an innovative model for the facilitation of action research and collaboration between the university team and participants. The model is used as a framework to enhance the development of teacher-led research in schools.Keywords: action research, teacher-led research, models, collaboration

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Leaders’ views on the values of school-based research: contemporary themes and issues

Cited by 4 publications

References 10 publications

Universities, supporting schools and practitioner research

Universities, supporting schools and practitioner research

Academisation and teachers’ dilemmas

Sectors together for professional development: a university team in an action research collaboration with school teachers and senior leaders

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