Abstract
The idea that teaching and school leadership should be informed by research and other evidence has developed traction recently in England and other jurisdictions. Yet, such research has too seldomly involved the student perspective in leadership decision-making. This article presents a case study of an ‘all through’ academy in the south of England (Academy x) that attempted to address this issue through research that was close to practice in nature. Here, school leaders, teachers, parents and, specifically, disadvantaged male students’ perspectives of barriers and enablers to their attainment were explored with a view to working collaboratively with these stakeholders to respond to the findings. However, we had not taken into account that the credibility of the students’ perspectives and the nature of the messages emerging from the findings would be questioned, and would influence a decision by school leaders not to act upon them. We consider how these issues might be addressed if student voice as a form of close-to-practice research is to become a reality.
Highlights
British Educational Research Association (BERA) (2017: n.p.) noted that: Close-to-practice research refers to educational research that is based on problems in practice, often involves researchers working in partnership with practitioners, may address issues defined by the latter as relevant or useful, and will support the application of critical thinking, and the use of evidence in practice
BERA’s interest in close-to-practice research is informed by a theory of action that suggests that if teachers and school leaders are able to access and engage with high-quality research evidence, and if this evidence helps them identify areas for development and improvement, this should lead to teachers and schools using such evidence to develop new and effective approaches to teaching and learning
These calls respond to concerns that, the notion of student voice has become commonplace in mainstream schools across England (Sellman, 2009) and is an institutionalized concept (Connor, 2015; Cook-Sather, 2013), ‘voice’ has largely been interpreted as meaning having a say as participants in the institutions they attend, but limits further participation in the processes of change
Summary
Close-to-practice researchCurrently in England, as well as in many other jurisdictions worldwide, the idea that teaching and school leadership should be informed by research and other evidence has developed traction (Whitty and Wisby, 2017). BERA’s interest in close-to-practice research is informed by a theory of action that suggests that if teachers and school leaders are able to access and engage with high-quality research evidence, and if this evidence helps them identify areas for development and improvement, this should lead to teachers and schools using such evidence to develop new and effective approaches to teaching and learning. This should enhance outcomes for children and young people. Enabling a form of student voice and participatory action with practitioners and researchers, these forms of action research are still limited to a tradition that ‘is a form of self-reflective enquiry undertaken by participants in social situations in order to improve the rationality and justice of their own practices, their understanding of these practices, and the situations in which the practices are carried out’ (Carr and Kemmis, 1986: 162)
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