Education Research Group/ Management, Leadership and Administration

The group is exploring a range of related research interests in management, leadership and administration including: school attendance and truancy; subject leadership; the management and professional development of para-professionals; and Continuing Professional Development (CPD).

Professor Reid has published very extensively in the field of school attendance and truancy and is acknowledged to be a leading authority on this subject. In recent years, Professor Reid has undertaken sponsored research for the Welsh Assembly Government WAG (in conjunction with NfER Wales) on the Effectiveness of the Education Welfare Service in Wales. He has undertaken three sponsored research projects for Sefton, Walsall and Cardiff LEAs on the management of school attendance. He acted as the evaluator for the Mountain Ash Partnership Out-of-School-Hours Learning Project which was supported by the New Opportunities Fund (£198,000).
Dr Turner has published widely in the area of subject leadership in secondary schools. Professor Parkinson has focused on the management and leadership of secondary science.

D r Turner has also carried out research on specific aspects of CPD particularly in connection with the more implicit aspects of informal learning whose influence is often overlooked when discussing policy and practice in relation to the professional development of teachers. Dr Lyle has published in has investigated the impact of a CPD programme on practitioners. She also makes an original contribution to our understanding of the impact of professional development on para-professionals, which now make up 50% of the school workforce. Dr Lyle has also researched the impact of discourse based and dialogical approaches on the development of higher order thinking in parallel with the current focus of the other two research groups in the Centre. Dr Morgan's research focuses on issues of the employment, supervision and professional development of paraprofessional staff (Teaching Assistants) and she has published very extensively in this field.

One common area of interest within this group is CPD. Future research plans are focused on teachers' professional development in Wales, which is likely to be a more distinctive and unique pathway compared to other areas of the United Kingdom. A pilot project, directed by an Ann Birch begins in September 2007 with funding from the Welsh Assembly.

The group aims to recruit at least four PhD students in the coming year.

Staff participating in this research group include:

Professor Ken Reid
Dr. Chris Turner
Dr Sue Lyle
Dr Jill Morgan
Ann Birch
Ken Jones