In Ireland as elsewhere, the value of putting evidence and scientific advice at the centre of public policy-making, has rarely been more evident. The prominence of the science-policy interface has renewed interest in the prospects for evidence based policy (EBP) in education. Notwithstanding the political rhetoric around EBP in education, little…

Education researchers often encounter scenarios where an abrupt policy change occurs within or across jurisdictions or populations that affect key student outcomes. Difference-in-differences is a research design analysts can use to estimate causal effects of these "natural experiments." This article introduces education researchers to…

This article uses meta-ethnography to identify the challenges of working in solidarity with the experiences and interests of marginalised and exploited social groups. It focuses on what the main challenges seem to be, and on how to overcome them in struggles to change education in just directions by means of educational research. It is therefore a…

The emerging literature on research-practice partnerships in education explains the conditions under which these partnerships operate to achieve the desired impact. This study adds to that literature base by exploring variation in the perceived impacts across three partnerships whose goal was improving achievement for multilingual learner…

In England, the development of teachers' curriculum design capabilities has been identified as a 'challenge remaining' (Department for Education [DfE]. (2022). "Opportunity for all: Strong schools with great teachers for your child."…

This paper seeks to raise awareness among educational researchers and practitioners of some significant weaknesses and internal contradictions of randomised control trials (RCTs). Although critiques throughout the years from education scholars have pointed to the detrimental effects of this experimental approach on education practice and values,…

This paper focuses on the movement known as 'teachers as researchers', which has become an international phenomenon, and posits that it may be compatible with the policy of the 'New General Education Curriculum' of Vietnam. In order to examine teachers' perceptions of their ability to undertake such research the methodology employed was…

Dr Mahmoud M. S. Abdallah's article, "The New Territory of Educational Research in TESOL/TEFL: What Novice Researchers Should Know", provides a comprehensive guide for novice researchers in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) and Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL). It emphasises the importance of research…

In its pursuit of global university rankings, Indonesia introduced a series of higher education policies, one in 2014 to grant autonomy to a select group of universities, and another in 2017 to tie financial and promotional incentives to scientific publications for all researchers. To examine scientific productivity surrounding these policies, we…

Globally, the issue of research impact has grown as governments articulate policies around research as a contributor to economic and societal development, often through an econometric justification. This has triggered much discussion amongst humanities scholars in public formally-reasoned peer-reviewed texts that are rarely empirically-based. This…

This study explores how policy discourses on academic career are articulated in Swedish higher education. Discourses on academic career are often expressing meritocracy and the necessity of competition, but also include demands for flexibility and global participation. Recent decades of higher education policy have also stressed the importance of…

Purpose: Globalization, and more specifically international organizations, has had a major effect upon national education systems worldwide. Understandably, the academic literature covering this phenomenon has expanded at a prolific rate. This study contributes to this body of knowledge by examining how the international organizations affect…

Purpose: This study aims to explore the range of sustainability-related discourses by the stakeholders within a particular Finnish Higher Education Institution (HEI); interaction between the discourses and the context of the HEI; and the extent to which different understandings of sustainability cause challenges for the implementation of the…

Teachers' engagement in critical intellectual and research work in England has been challenged in recent years under hegemonic policies and practices in teacher education. Since 2019, centralisation, standardisation and accountability in teacher education have intensified, along with explicit criticism of university involvement. Some describe…

It was fundamental to Martin Thrupp's politics that he would work with teacher unions and assist them in their struggles against government policies that were anti-teacher and educationally unsound. I made contact with Martin even before he had arrived back in New Zealand to ask him to do a piece of work for PPTA and NZEI on standards for…