Designing Refillable Packaging: A Qualitative Approach

In recognition of the fact that current packaging design fails to address the resource reductions needed to support the sustainability agenda (INCPEN, 2001; Environmental Services Association, 2004), a 2 year collaborative research project between Loughborough University and The Boots Company, funded by DEFRA, was set up to investigate the feasibility of developing refillable packaging systems which appeal to the consumer whilst reducing the overall sustainability impact. The overall aim of the project – ‘Refillable Packaging Systems’, reported on in this paper was to develop a refillable packaging system for a ‘body wash’ product and to investigate its feasibility with respect to consumer acceptance (female customers, aged 21-40) and sustainability improvements. In order to achieve the project aim a broad range of qualitative methods were used. This paper details the methods used to collate background understanding, develop design concepts and test the viability of the design solutions. It reflects on why they were used, how effective they were and on the benefits of combining these different methods at different stages. The paper concludes that combining together an array of design related qualitative methods, of the nature described, can produce rich and valuable outcomes. The project demonstrates that this approach can lead to the development of a more detailed understanding of the topic under investigation and open up discussion by creating demonstrator products which can be handled, critiqued and examined. Keywords: Packaging; Design Methods; Questionnaire; Visual Templates; Prototyping; Consumer Workshops</p

Presenting the SCL model: adding value to business strategy through UCD principles

This paper presents the Sustainable Consumption Leveraging (SCL) Model and its toolkit, which was developed to help businesses examine their potential for enabling sustainable consumption whilst identifying areas of opportunity to improve their business model and value proposition. The paper begins by establishing the contribution of business towards sustainable consumption and sets out user-centred design (UCD) principles as a valuable approach to leverage sustainable consumption. The relationship between UCD principles and sustainable consumption in a business context was studied through qualitative research. The findings of in-depth interviews with experts, a focus group and a document analysis led to the construction of a theoretical framework, which was used to develop the SCL Model and its toolkit

Creativity and Enquiry in Action: a case study of cross-curricular approaches in teacher education

The current Key Stage 3 National Curriculum for England orders that our education foster determination, adaptability, confidence, risk-taking, enterprise, creativity and enjoyment in a cross-curricular context in pupils. To appreciate these dimensions student teachers need to have multiple opportunities to experience such a curriculum for themselves. However, initial teacher education is an intense and demanding experience; student teachers veer between phases of basic survival and personal innovation as they develop their individual pedagogy and personal philosophy. For new secondary teachers their own subject specialism forms a core feature of their emerging professional identity and can act as a barrier to collaborative practice beyond that specialism. This paper discusses one example of a cross-curricular approach in which Art and Geography PGCE students reflect on their experiences of a collaborative event designed to break down subject barriers while exploiting the potential of subject specialism. Data collected from semi-structured interviews conducted with a sample of students during the two-day event is discussed. Data revealed that critical outcomes of the event included the practice and development of genuine collaboration, negotiation, teamwork, and leadership

Teachers’ Learning Matters: Exploring lessons from research and practice

Teachers are responsible for learning; they inspire, teach, support and assess their students on a daily basis while also being subject to numerous expectations from parents, society, employers, government and their students. To engage with these challenges, teachers need to be enabled and motivated to continue to learn while operating within busy workplaces and a culture of performativity, and in the context of politicised and volatile teacher ‘training’ spaces. In this lecture, I will draw on my research in the contexts of both initial and continuing teacher professional learning and practice development, exploring potential lessons for school leaders, training providers, policymakers and teachers themselves. The research that informs my lecture represents a variety of lived experiences of educational practice – either my own or teachers’. My research does not neatly fit into one paradigm or another; sometimes I adopt an interpretive paradigm and at other times an action research paradigm. I will reflect on research-based evidence of teacher learning, both to illustrate and to analyse professional practices from which knowledge can be gained. My research reveals the tensions for teacher educators, mentors, coaches, school leaders and teachers at all stages of their careers. Their professional and personal need for learning and development coincides with a time when schools are dealing with ever-increasing demands to ‘perform’ in relation to pupil attainment, and a growing sense that they are covering cracks in a period of austerity. This backdrop creates new dependencies; for example, raising the demands on those within and joining the teaching profession to create a ‘self-improving school-led system’. It opens up opportunities for professional learning but also creates contradictions as activity systems collide. I can’t do all of these themes full justice in the time that I have but I do hope to help you to engage with them

Engaging in educational research and development through teacher practitioner enquiry; a pragmatic or naïve approach?

Practitioner enquiry is variously associated with school improvement, teachers’ professional development and educational innovation. It can encourage teachers to reflect on their classroom practice, to gather evidence of students’ learning and engagement and to design pedagogical experiments and test their efficacy. For some teachers it is very much a practical approach to practice review or development; in simple terms, it builds on the ‘plan, do, review’ cycle. For others it becomes more of a conceptual stance; becoming more critically reflective and developing a sense of theorised practice. At one extreme it can ensure that CPD is a bespoke offer which puts teachers in the driving seat, encouraging them to engage intelligently with evidence from multiple sources and enabling creative responses to recognised needs. At another extreme it can become part of a managed system of data driven school improvement, or a response to meeting new and emerging agendas of schools as self-improving systems. At its heart, practitioner enquiry rests on the proposition that those in practice are able to take informed intentional actions, explore their effects and form judgements of their value. This paper will outline principles of practitioner enquiry and consider how it can support the development of teaching and relate to constructs of professionalism and professional learning, alongside evidence of its challenge to school systems which are often perceived to demand convergence of practice and narrowly constructed conceptions of school improvement