Doing research or being researched? Debates on ‘Close-to-Practice’ research from the perspective of the Further, Adult and Vocational Education (FAVE) sector

This chapter offers a view on the issues raised in the British Educational Research Association (BERA) Journal Special Section on Close-to-Practice Research (ed Biesta & Aldridge, 2021) from the perspective of Further Adult and Vocational Education (FAVE) in England. Its authors all either work at present in this sector or have worked substantially in the sector in the past and draw on diverse international knowledge and experiences; our belief is that the interesting and important debate initiated by the BERA editors will be enriched by a contribution from a specifically FAVE perspective and is poorer without it. Although the paper has arisen from our experience of the specific context of the English FAVE sector, we believe its arguments have validity and relevance in principle for any context of pedagogical research and practice.
We contribute to the debate by advocating for a broader multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary, and methodologically diverse approach to research, including practitioner-based research, in order to generate valuable insights for practitioners in the FAVE sector, as well as to contribute to and enrich the broader research landscape. Drawing upon Stenhouse's concept of research as “systematic self-critical enquiry” (Stenhouse, 1981, p. 103) and Dewey's notion of “intelligent” action (Dewey, 1916, 1966 ed), we argue that practitioner–researchers not only have the capacity to produce high-quality research but also may, at times, be the best researchers due to their experience of practice and their understanding of key issues in the field. Furthermore, we assert that researchers need be accountable to practitioners, rather than the other way around, and that concerns regarding bias are equally applicable to both researchers and professional practitioners.
It seems to us that all the contributions to the debate agree that there are inherent strengths and weaknesses in both “insider” (practice-based) and “outsider” (including close-to-practice) research. Most teachers and researchers would probably also agree that in principle, education needs both kinds of research, and indeed hybrid models too. The issue is therefore less one in which we need to decide on the true nature of practice, or on the “correct” relationship between research and practice, and even less on correct methodologies for research. It is more an issue of access: to opportunities for educational practitioners, who are “practice insiders,” to initiate, lead, conduct, publish, and disseminate research, and to participate fully in critical epistemological debates about the nature of research. Because of barriers to access, published work from “insider” researchers is relatively rare and has lower status. This situation contributes to a skewed picture in the research literature of education as a professional discipline, one in which key voices and perspectives are underrepresented or missing, due to the unevenness of the professional playing field in relation to participation in, and particularly in originating and leading, valid research activity. We suggest that evening up this playing field would both help to improve the quality of teaching in the FAVE sector and address the relative paucity of “insider” research, thereby increasing the range, scope, and quality of educational research literature available to practitioners, researchers, and other stakeholders, including policymakers.
Highlighting the issue of access to opportunities to initiate and engage in research for FAVE sector teachers is by no means a new idea: virtually identical arguments have been made periodically over the past three decades (eg Elliott, 1996; Solvason & Elliott, 2013). Lloyd and Jones (2018) provide a detailed, theoretically-informed practitioner-based account of undertaking postgraduate research while working in the further education (FE) sector, highlighting some of the barriers they faced in establishing themselves as researchers within their college. Solvason and Elliott reference philosophers of practice (eg, Carr & Kemmis, 1986; Pring, 2007; Whitehead, 1962), as well as Ball's (2006) argument against reducing education to “What Works”:
Ethical reflection is rendered obsolete in the process for goal attainment, performance management and budget maximisations….Value replaces values, except where it can be shown that values add value.
(Ball, 2006, p. 11)
Solvason and Elliott also highlight the significant proportion of UK higher education (HE) programs that have always taken place within FAVE settings and have been taught by FAVE teachers: in 2017, 10% of undergraduate students were being taught in FE colleges, a figure that had been more or less static for the previous three years (ETF, 2017, p. 5). Furthermore, these students are more likely to be economically disadvantaged than those being taught in higher education institutions (HEIs) (Avis & Orr, 2016)—which highlights the inconsistency of the UK HE sector in terms of the expectations it has of different groups of teachers leading its programs (Sutton, 2023), and the professional and career development it provides for them. This inequity is less likely to be found in systems with more consistency between the professional standards and expectations for teachers working in different parts of the education system, and in particular between the academic and vocational, that is, the HE and FAVE (or equivalent depending on the national context) sectors (see, for example, Lloyd & Payne, 2011).
Our objective in this chapter is to show how and in what ways barriers are encountered by UK practitioners committed to practice-based research, so as to contribute to strategies for overcoming such barriers in any national context, and thereby enriching the range and scope of research on education, as well as at the same time enhancing the quality of teaching and teachers. This serves as a catalyst for advancing practice-based educational research, improving teaching quality, and fostering further insights for the sector within and beyond the UK context.
We start with two accounts by individual FAVE teachers about their efforts to engage in research while employed as teachers in the sector. These accounts highlight some of the barriers they had to overcome and some of the sources of support they were able to find. We then broaden the focus of the discussion by referencing the literature on learning in workplaces, where valuable new knowledge often emerges through practice, and where learning and research are generally informal and embedded in day-to-day work, as it is to a great extent in teaching. Before concluding, we examine in turn the different ways in which research activity, research outputs, research impact and quality, and research leadership are viewed and valued from the perspective of the FAVE sector.