Unpacking ‘disadvantage’ and ‘potential’ in the context of fair access policies in England

Policy makers internationally are increasingly preoccupied with the need for education systems to be developed in ways that mitigate unfairness. What is more contestable is what might need to change. In England this emphasis has informed the development of fair access policies that aim to improve the representation of ‘disadvantaged’ young people of high ‘potential’ at high status universities. Drawing on research conducted at the inception of one fair access intervention, this paper provides original insights into a process of policy translation that requires multiple encodings and decodings of two constructs that defy ready definition, with their intersection being a particular point of difficulty. Behind the apparent objectivity of commonly used selection criteria sits a process of situated decision-making that incorporates not only the particularities of institutional context and the understandings of key actors, but also macro level pressures that reinforce the need for changes in understandings of fairness at the top

Deploying teaching assistants to support learning: from models to typologies

The deployment of Teaching Assistants (TAs) to support learning has been the subject of much critical debate, including the particular concern that TAs too often becomes a less skilled replacement for the teacher rather than acting as an additional source of support. Despite efforts to encapsulate the TAs contribution to learning within specific models of deployment, wide variations in practices make the role and its contribution to learning difficult to define. Drawing on data gathered in four secondary schools in England, this paper explores TA deployment practices through six typologies: The Island; The Container; The Separate Entity; The Conduit for Learning; The Partner and The Expert. Illustrated graphically, these bring key elements together in a more contextualised and dynamic way. The paper concludes that the spatial and relational dimensions of deployment warrant more nuanced treatment and that more emphasis on partnership and mutuality and rather less on difference and hierarchy might be productiv

Evaluation of the Villiers Park Scholars Programme

An evaluation of the Villiers Park Scholars Programme was carried out by Louise Gazeley, Judy Sebba, Sarah Aynsley and Angela Jacklin from the Department of Education at the University of Sussex between 2009 and 2011. The Villiers Park Scholars Programme identified young people from less advantaged backgrounds who displayed high academic potential and sought to improve their chances of gaining entry to 'centres of excellence at leading universities'. The evaluating team focused on tracking the impact of the programme on its first cohorts of scholars over a two year period. A multi-site case study approach was adopted for which data was collected in three phases for each of the 10 participating institutions. The main impact at school level related to improvements in the identification of high potential. Analysis of the quantitaive data showed Year 11 scholars in three schools performing favourably at GCSE level in relation to the top 25 per cent of their peer group. Feedback from the scholars themselves indicated that the mentoring they had received had contributed to changes in their academic and study skills that contributed to improved attainment. Staff, parents and scholars all felt that changes in the performance of identified scholars was seen in their motivation, self-esteem and confidence in particular. Greater impact was seen in relation to Year 11 scholars and those without a parent who had been to university. Staff and scholars also considered that the programme had improved scholars' knowledge of higher education. Analysis of the destinations data for Year 13 scholars revealed that around half of those for whom data was available took up places in 'leading' universities. Scholars who did not have a parent who went to university were found to be more likely to say that their involvement in the programme had changed their future plane

The Higher Education Champions programme for Looked after children: building capacity through collaboration for mutual benefit

No description supplie

Reducing inequalities in school exclusion: learning from good practice

The research reported here was commissioned by the Office of the Children’s Commissioner’s to inform the second year of their on-going School Exclusions Inquiry. The first year of the inquiry culminated in the publication of the report They Never Give Up On You which included an analysis of recent national data on recorded exclusions from school that provided stark evidence of inequality for particular groups. Concerns about the disproportionate impact of school exclusion on specific groups of young people are not new and there have previously been attempts at policy level to reduce inequalities. However, the relationship between exclusion and other educational and social processes is complex and these inequalities persist. The over-arching objective of the research was therefore to identify characteristics of good practice in addressing inequalities in school exclusions, with particular attention to the following factors: Free School Meals; gender; ethnicity; and Special Educational Needs (SEN)

Problematising flagship ‘disadvantage’ policies in English schools: agenda setting and incoherence in the absence of an over-arching theory of change

This paper draws on research conducted in four state schools with sixth forms to problematise two flagship ‘disadvantage’ policy agendas in the English context: the Pupil Premium (focusing on the narrowing of attainment gaps) and widening participation (focusing on fairer university access). While such ‘priority’ policies necessarily incorporate the promise of change, it argues that multiple forms of incoherence militate against this, including: their relative agenda-setting power in a highly marketised system; the contested, constitutive power of different proxy indicators; competing policy preferences that under-attend to the intersections between educational opportunities and material disadvantage. In contrast, interviews with school staff highlighted the transformative potential of lived experiences of disadvantage and reinforced the importance of adopting a wider lens than that of the school. The paper concludes that the absence of an over-arching theory of change is part of ‘the problem’ and it suggests where the mapping of one might begin

Under-tapped potential: practitioner research as a vehicle for widening participation

Practitioners working to widen participation to universities in England are an increasingly important and professionally diverse group but surprisingly absent from the academic literature and lacking in access to bespoke professional development pathways in HE. In England current approaches within policy and research also tend to position them as gatherers of evidence with a mission to inform change rather than developing their capacity to be(come) agents of change in their own right. Drawing on the perspectives of three widening participation practitioners who had recently completed a research-based MA, this paper explores the opportunity that this provided to illuminate the complexities encountered in routine practice, contributing to positive change. Rather than being methodologically inferior, practitioner research emerged as highly complementary and in the case of WP its transformative potential is currently hugely under-tapped

Reducing the disciplinary exclusion of Black pupils: and exploration of perceptions and practices within initial Teacher Training programmes

This resource is a research paper that outlines the findings of a small-scale qualitative study that was commissioned by Multiverse and the TDA to explore how policy level concerns about the need to reduce disproportionate rates of disciplinary exclusion amongst Black pupils were being addressed within ITE. It draws on the perspectives of both ITE tutors and ITE students. For a discussion of these policy level concerns see the publication DfES (2006) Priority Review Exclusion of Black Pupils: ‘Getting It. Getting It Right’. The research paper begins with a summary of some of the relevant literature to provide a context for the study. This is organised under two headings: 1.Disciplinary exclusion 2.Experiences of Black pupils in the English educational system A brief summary of the research design is followed by a discussion of the research findings under three headings: 1.Coverage and understandings of high rates of Black exclusion 2.Teaching about disciplinary exclusion 3.Promoting understanding of race equality The paper concludes with some suggestions about how a stronger focus on these issues might be developed in ITE

Evaluation of the Alternative Provision Innovation Fund (APIF): learning from set-up and early implementation

No description supplie