Episodes
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This seminar explores the process of formal and informal exclusion from the macro, meso and micro level to understand some of the complex interactions between policy, school and individual factors. Government statistics indicate that children and young people with special educational needs are five times more likely to be excluded from secondary schools, and account for just under half of excluded pupils. This seminar will explore the process of formal and informal exclusion from the macro, meso and micro level to understand some of the complex interactions between policy, school and individual factors. The significance of these on the lives of young people will be illustrated with reference to data drawn from the topical life histories of autistic girls. These portray the experience of having ones’ needs continually underestimated or misunderstood coupled with a lack of in-school support.
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Combining legal analysis, theory, and evidence from practice, Lucinda Ferguson argues that the law is ill-equipped to support children at risk of permanent exclusion from school, particularly children with disabilities or other additional needs. The House of Commons’ Education Committee (2019) criticised the education system’s treatment of children with disabilities on the following terms:
“[C]hildren and parents are not ‘in the know’ and for some the law may not even appear to exist. Parents currently need a combination of special knowledge and social capital to navigate the system, and even then are left exhausted by the experience. Those without significant social or personal capital therefore face significant disadvantage. For some, Parliament might as well not have bothered to legislate.”
In this presentation, I combine legal analysis, theory, and evidence from practice to argue that the law is ill-equipped to support children at risk of permanent exclusion from school, particularly children with disabilities or other additional needs. I focus on the English experience, which is quite distinctive from that of other nations in the UK. I first outline the reality of permanent exclusion and introduce the legal framework.
I then consider the extent to which children’s rights arguments might support improvements in practice for these vulnerable children. I proceed to argue that much of the difficulty lies in our current conceptions of the nature of childhood, how we regard children compared to other ‘minority’ groups, and the implications of this for the legal regulation of their lives. I consider whether an intersectional perspective might assist here, and offer some concluding thoughts on how to bring about the necessary cultural shift and make the law work for vulnerable children at risk of exclusion from school. -
Missing episodes?
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This talk discusses the latest understanding of mental health needs in adolescent populations in the UK and the potential role that mental health services in schools can play. This talk will discuss the latest understanding of mental health needs in adolescent populations in the UK and the potential role that mental health services in schools can play. An example of current research alongside clinical service development will be discussed. The opportunities and challenges of mental health services working in schools will be explored, including how to navigate some of the ethical complexities of working in this areas as well as some of the main unanswered research questions that can be addressed through schools-research. A particular focus will be on how this relates to excluded children- what we know about their mental health needs and the role of services.
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This presentation will discuss the place of Alternative Provision (AP) in the process of exclusion in England, with a particular focus on issues related to social justice. This seminar is part of our public seminar series on ‘Exclusion from School and its Consequences’, led by the Department of Education and convened by Harry Daniels (Professor of Education) and Ian Thompson (Associate Professor of English Education & Director of PGCE). This presentation will discuss the place of Alternative Provision (AP) in the process of exclusion in England, with a particular focus on issues related to social justice. Consideration will be given to some of the reasons why young people find themselves in AP. It will highlight the ways in which AP can serve to further marginalise young people who are already alienated by the education system. However, it will also draw on data from English AP sites to demonstrate how such sites can work to ensure that young people excluded from mainstream schools are retained in education. The choice is sometimes not between AP and the mainstream, but AP or no education. In some AP sites young people suggest that they are far happier than they were in the mainstream and, when it is provided can be engaged in meaningful learning. The presentation will consider why that it is and whether or not there are lessons to be learned from the AP sector which can help to make mainstream schools more inclusive. Throughout the presentation the voices of teachers and students in AP will be foregrounded. There will also be some discussion of international approaches to AP.
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This seminar reports on the ongoing work of the multi-disciplinary and multi-site Excluded Lives Group whose work has led to the ESRC funds project The Political Economies of School Exclusion and their Consequences. There are great differences in the rates of permanent school exclusion in different parts of the UK with numbers rising rapidly in England but remaining relatively low or falling in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. For example, in the last available figures there were 7,900 permanent exclusions in England in 2017/18 compared to just three in Scotland in 2018/19. However, these figures do not account for many informal and illegal forms of exclusion. This seminar will report on the ongoing work of the multi-disciplinary (criminology, disability studies, economics, education, human geography, law, psychiatry, sociology) and multi-site (Oxford, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Belfast, LSE) Excluded Lives group established in 2014. This work has led to the ESRC funded project The Political Economies of School Exclusion and their Consequences (PolESE). In this research, home international comparisons of historical and current policy, practice and legal frameworks relating to school exclusion will be conducted for the first time. Previous research and official statistics show that school exclusions are far more likely to affect pupils with special needs, from low income families, and particular ethnic backgrounds. Exclusions have long and short-term consequences in terms of academic achievement, well-being, mental health, and future economic and employment prospects. PolESE is designed to highlight ways in which fairer and more productive outcomes can be achieved for pupils, their families, and professionals by comparing the ways in which policy and practice around exclusions differ in the four jurisdictions.
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Released in May 2019, the Augar report was a result of a 6 person panel chaired by Philip Augar and was the first in England to have a remit for the whole of tertiary education. Parry argues whether its features are the nature of expert panels. The use of expert panels to advise governments is a favoured form of policy inquiry process. In higher education, especially in the UK, they have replaced committees of inquiry in the tradition of Robbins and Dearing. In further education, there were no such independent inquiries in the first place. Although sitting inside a government-led review and observing its no-go areas, the six-person panel chaired by Philip Augar (which reported in May) was the first, at least in England, to have a remit for the whole of tertiary education. In assessing the system of higher and further education in England, and making recommendations about how it might be strengthened, the panel needed to assemble and generate evidence on a wide front. The scope of the task was worthy of a larger and longer inquiry. The result was a report short on policy history and lesson-drawing but with data and analysis marshalled in support of its core contentions. Most of its recommendations were financial and regulatory. None were structural. The present architecture of tertiary education was deemed fit for purpose. Here also was an inquiry process aligned to existing government policy for a two-type system of academic and technical education. That policy was the creation of another government-convened panel (chaired by David Sainsbury). Two of its members subsequently served on the Augar team. Such features, it will be argued, are of the nature of expert panels. The work they accomplish should be judged accordingly.
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Drawing upon three large studies in Australian higher education, this presentation sets out a case for the kinds of curriculum practices, as well as a range of pedagogic practices that can be enacted prior to, during and after students’ work placements. Increasingly, tertiary education institutions are providing workplace experiences for their students to achieve goals associated with occupational preparation and work readiness. However, without considering how best these experiences might be organised, enacted and augmented the full benefits of these learning experiences may not be fully realised. Drawing upon three large studies in Australian higher education, this presentation sets out a case for the kinds of curriculum practices (i.e. intended, enacted and experienced), as well as a range of pedagogic practices that can be enacted prior to, during and after students’ work placements, and the kinds of personal practices of students likely to support the effective integration and reconciliation of experiences in both the workplace and educational setting as directed towards developing robust occupational knowledge.
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This lecture explores the different types of artificial intelligence systems in common use in education, before relating this to the covert use of algorithms in influencing educational journeys. The introduction of artificial intelligence in schools is likely to have a profound impact on relationships between teachers and their students. This lecture explores the different types of artificial intelligence systems in common use in education, before relating this to the covert use of algorithms in influencing educational journeys. This in turn is used to highlight data privacy rights issues for children and young people, particularly in relation to the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) introduced in 2018. The lecture then analyses the uncritical adoption of artificial intelligence systems in schools, discussing how this might inform future education policies. Achieving a balance between individual pedagogic rights, data privacy rights and effective use of data is a difficult challenge, and one not easily supported by current regulation. The lecture concludes by proposing a new framework for artificial intelligence use in schools.
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With the rising interest in GCE, understanding the current research landscape could be useful for policy-makers, educators and scholars who seek to build upon the existing body of knowledge and develop it in new directions. The global increase of the incorporation of Global Citizenship Education (GCE) related contents in education systems in recent decades has generated a vast body of scholarship, both empirical and theoretical. An explanation for the rise in GCE internationally is often described as a response to economic, social and political changes that have made countries more interconnected through enhanced international mobility and financial interdependency. Globalization is claimed to lead to more diverse societies that require engagement with broader, more inclusive conceptions of citizenship, thus leading to the need of incorporation GCE into national curricula to various extents. As scholarship in this field had developed accordingly, there is a need for a systematic analysis of the topics and sub-fields that emerged and examined within this broad concept.
We performed a systematic review of research dealing with Global Citizenship Education (GCE) between 2006-2017 using Natural Language Processing (NLP) followed by network analysis to record and interpret the development of this field of research and highlight the trajectories of the current academic scholarship within teachers’ education. The analysis showed how studies surrounding GCE being discussed in the scholarship, forming intricate, and encompassing distinct areas such as education for sustainable development and critical thinking. We also highlight some notable omissions in the contemporary research, topics that appear to be under-represented in the research on GCE. Considering the rising interest in GCE, understanding the current research landscape could be useful for policy-makers, educators and scholars who seek to build upon the existing body of knowledge and develop it in new directions. -
Naomi Eisenstadt presents evidence that low income itself reduces the chances of good outcomes for children and causes stress in families which exacerbates the risk. Much of the current discussion on children’s outcomes has focused on educational attainment, schools, and parental behaviours. This lecture will provide evidence that low income itself reduces the chances of good outcomes for children and that the stress caused in families by low income exacerbates the risk. While supportive and engaged parents, good early childhood education and good schools all reduce the risk of poor outcomes, money makes at least as much difference as parents and teachers.
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This 2019 Oxford University Centre for Educational Assessment lecture is delivered by Professor Nancy Perry. She is the Dorothy Lam Chair in Special Education and Professor of Educational and Counselling Psychology and Special Education at the University of British Columbia (UBC), Canada. The talk is followed by a discussion led by OUCEA Director Associate Professor Therese N. Hopfenbeck. Self-regulated Learning (SRL) describes proactive and productive approaches to learning that enable learners to respond flexibly and adaptively to meet personal and social learning goals. Efforts to support students' SRL pair well with 21st Century learning goals and 'assessment for learning' (AfL) goals. In this talk, Prof Perry describes research that both advances knowledge and improves practice concerning SRL. Specifically, she discusses collaborations with primary school teachers to design and implement curriculum-linked, formative assessments that prompt and assess children's use of SRL processes.
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This public seminar series considers teacher education reforms around the world in order to tease out future directions and possibilities for the relationships between teacher education policy, research and practice. The series marks 100 years since the passing of a statute creating what was known in 1919 as the University Department for the Training of Teachers. Join us this term as we mark the Oxford University Department of Education’s 100th anniversary through this series of public events that pay particular tribute to our contributions in the field of teacher education today.
Teacher competencies have been discussed relatively extensively in the literature, often linked in educational policy discourses, teacher standards, or even intended outcomes of teacher education. But what do teacher competencies actually mean, how they are related to the core of teacher’s work, teacher knowledge and action, and teacher learning in teacher education. This presentation will elaborate teacher competencies by focusing on teaching as a thinking practice (cf. Lampert, 1998), and teacher knowledge, behavior, and agency. Through this, the aim is to understand the complexity of teacher competencies both theoretically and empirically. By leaning on the empirical evidence, the presentation will try to answer to the question: what kinds of characteristics of teacher education cultivate student teacher learning in becoming competent and agentic teachers? And why should we be interested in them? -
Seminar 8 of 8 on teacher education reforms. Alis unpacks the notion of 'capacity' through a historiography of initiatives and a review of attempts at conceptual development. Much has been written about the alleged lack of integration between research and practice in teacher education and also about the perceived fragmentation of teacher education research. The answer to the conundrum is often 'building research capacity': the UK has a decades-long history of publicly-funded initiatives to build capacity to engage with and in research in initial and continuing teacher education and in teaching practice. But questions lurk behind the soundbite: what capacity, whose, and built how, by, and for whom? In this talk, Alis will aim to unpack the notion of 'capacity' through a historiography of initiatives and a review of attempts at conceptual development. She will then use insights from two recent national initiatives, in Wales (see Oancea, Childs, Fancourt, Robson and Thompson, 2018) and in Norway, to sketch out a framework and agenda for a more holistic, equitable, research-informed and practice-oriented notion of capacity building for research in teacher education.
Alis Oancea is Professor of Philosophy of Education and Research Policy and Director of Research at the Department of Education. She specialises in studies of research policy and governance and in philosophy of research – including work on research assessment, impact and knowledge exchange, research funding, research quality, evaluation, open knowledge practices, research ethics, capacity, publication practices, and the cultural value of research in the arts and the humanities. This strand of work is complemented with a strong interest in teacher education research, innovation in teacher education policy and practice, knowledge and values in the teaching profession, and the role of research in teacher education. She has two PhDs, one in policy and governance for research (from the University of Oxford), and one in epistemology and research. -
This seminar examines the alignments and tensions between teacher education research, policy and practice. This is the sixth seminar in a series of eight public seminars on 'Future directions in teacher education research, practice and policy'. The seminar series is organised by the Department of Education.
Diane will analyse the ways in which teacher education has been conceptualised at various points in time during the past 50 years highlighting the related knowledge bases for teaching and the policies driving accountability regimes during that time. Then she will go on to focus on the current policy moment which is positioning teacher education as a policy problem requiring a national solution and large-scale reform agendas. Diane will also consider future opportunities for teacher education researchers in terms of research in, on and for teacher education. -
This lecture explores why efforts to improve teaching too often fail and outlines new research on pedagogy and teacher development, which has been achieving promising signs of real change.
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Seminar five of eight in series "Future directions in teacher education research, practice and policy". The significance of teacher education has increased globally over recent decades. From international reports through to political manifestoes in many countries, teacher education is seen as crucial in the development of successful education systems. Within a globalized world, therefore, teacher education has become a key plank of economic and social development. The character and worth of teacher education nevertheless are contested in some contexts resulting in significant variations in how global influences have interacted with specific trajectories in different nation states. Comparative research on teacher education reveals important paradoxes. While the importance of preparing highly qualified teachers is widely recognized, lack of common definitions and prevailing assumptions about what it means to learn to teach affect in significant ways the structure, the curriculum and the pedagogy of teacher education globally. Views on the knowledge, skills and dispositions that teachers need to be effective and how to acquire them are highly variable and result in significant differences in their ability to teach an increasingly complex curriculum to diverse learners. As many nations attempt to increase the supply of qualified teachers as a prerequisite to accomplish UNESCO’s Sustainable Development Goals, engagement in comparative education research may help to re-imagine the teacher education project and to reconstruct a fragmented professional field.
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This public seminar series considers teacher education reforms around the world in order to tease out future directions and possibilities for the relationships between teacher education policy, research and practice. In Wales there is a growing appetite for the country to set out a new and fundamentally different vision for what education is and should be; a vision that puts young people and their learning needs at the centre. What links many of the proposed changes is a fundamentally different conception of what it is to be a teacher in Wales. This in turn has major implications for initial teacher education (ITE). Over the last five years John Furlong has worked closely with the Welsh Government in order to help re-vision the country’s ITE provision. In this seminar he will outline the research underlying the reforms that are taking place and discuss the role of ITE in making change happen.
John Furlong, OBE is an Emeritus Professor of Education at the University of Oxford’s Department of Education. He was Director of the department from 2003-2009. A former President of the British Educational Research Association, he is currently Chair of the Teacher Education Accreditation Board for Wales. His book, ‘Education – an anatomy of the discipline’, was awarded first prize by the British Society for Educational Studies for the best educational research of 2015 and his most recent book ‘Knowledge and the Study of Education – an international exploration’ was published 2017. John was awarded the OBE for services to research in education in 2017.
This seminar is number four in an eight-part public seminar series on ‘Future directions in teacher education research, practice and policy’, led by the Department of Education and convened by Diane Mayer (Professor of Education (Teacher Education)) and Alis Oancea (Professor of Philosophy of Education and Research Policy and Director of Research). -
Seminar two of eight in series "Future directions in teacher education research, practice and policy". This seminar is based on a recent book, which aims to help researchers and practitioners understand how and why interventions can be successful or not. Seminar Abstract: This seminar is based on a recent book, titled ‘Classroom-based Interventions Across Subject Areas’, jointly authored by members of the department’s Subject Pedagogy Research Group and other affiliated researchers and practitioners. Taking as its basis research which has been conducted in actual classrooms with close collaboration between researchers and practitioners, the book aims to help researchers and practitioners understand how and why interventions can be successful or not. The text further considers the broad theoretical and practical issues that derive from intervention studies, including ways of adapting effective classroom-based interventions for use in different contexts. The seminar will start with a brief introduction to the topic of classroom-based interventions, followed by four examples of classroom-based interventions in English, mathematics, science, and history. It will conclude with a commentary drawing across the presentations with a particular focus on implications for teacher education.
About the Series: This public seminar series considers teacher education reforms around the world in order to tease out future directions and possibilities for the relationships between teacher education policy, research and practice. The series marks 100 years since the passing of a statute creating what was known in 1919 as the University Department for the Training of Teachers. Join us this term as we mark the Oxford University Department of Education’s 100th anniversary through this series of public events that pay particular tribute to our contributions in the field of teacher education today. -
Seminar led by a panel of heads of colleges and senior tutors to discuss Oxford's student selection process At the University of Oxford first degree student selection is not ultimately determined by central admissions but is handled by the colleges, though the process of application is standardised across the colleges and prospective students must meet the academic requirements for their intended courses. All Oxford colleges are closely committed to student learning and development but there are various policies and procedures concerning selection, with implications for the student mix. The seminar will be led by a panel of heads of college, and senior tutors. After short presentations from each member of the panel and the respondent there will be open discussion.
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The ethical case for reducing entry requirements for disadvantaged learners Vikki Boliver:
UK universities are increasingly being called upon to reduce academic entry requirements for disadvantaged applicants as a vital means of promoting fairer access to higher education. This contextualised approach to university admission recognises that the school attainment of disadvantaged learners does not necessarily do justice to their academic potential, and that standard entry requirements typically exceed the minimum needed to succeed at degree level. In this lecture, I lay out the ethical case for reducing entry requirements for disadvantaged learners, arguing that fairness is best conceptualised in terms of distributive rather than procedural justice. Drawing on the findings of research projects funded by the Scottish Funding Council, the ESRC and the Nuffield Foundation, I show that entry requirements could be reduced significantly for disadvantaged learners without ‘setting them up to fail’, but that universities are often conflicted about reducing entry requirements given the prestige attached to admitting only high achievers who can be expected to succeed at university as a matter of course. I also discuss the scope for radical reductions in entry requirements, in conjunction with more active support for students’ learning whilst at university. Finally, I argue that contextualised admissions policies must be targeted accurately if they are to be effective, which means using administratively verified individual-level measures of contextual disadvantage, rather than area level measures such as the POLAR measure of low HE participation areas. - Show more
