Education policy and practice PhD

Becky is happy to hear from prospective students who are interested in studying research areas that are aligned with her own interests, particularly if they plan to conduct some quantitative analysis as part of their studies.

Alison’s supervisory interests include learning and teaching in primary schools and in particular, mathematics pedagogy and learning, including the role of affect and emotions. She is interested in supervising studies in these areas and those adopting intervention or action research methodologies.

My research interests and supervisory interests include: Science education, formative assessment, classroom assessment, teacher assessment literacy. Science teaching and learning: including the nervous system, learning about the brain, microscopes in the classroom and moss.  organisms. Science teachers, teacher well-being, teacher recruitment and retention, emotional needs of teachers.

I currently supervise doctoral students (PhD and EdD), and am interested in supervising new doctoral students, in the following areas:

Professionalism/professional identities/professional development and learning;

Higher Education pedagogy and policy;

Diversity and inclusion in Higher Education;

The development of learning and professional knowledge through postgraduate study.

I am a critical realist and welcome supporting research from that perspective. 

Students drawn to studying with me are generally people with a commitment to social change. All of them share my passion for researching resilience-related topics and most of their studies involve some form of co-production with communities, policymakers or practitioners. Many of them also volunteer for our social enterprise Boingboing and there are loads of opportunities in our CRSJ for students to get involved in some fabulous personal development activities, for example attending conferences on behalf of our Centre, being on the Management Group, staffing a stand at international events, etc.

Prospective supervisory topics I get excited about include:Co-productive and resilience-based approaches to tackling social and environmental issues including:Child, family and adult mental healthPractitioner stress and burnoutSchools practicesHigher Education community-university partnership practices.

Peter is interested in supervising PhD and EdD students on a broad range of topics in the fields of sociology of education, childhood/youth and religion. He has particular expertise in the following areas:

• Religion/spirtuality and education (including faith schools, collective worship and mindfulness)
• Children's and young people's (non-) religious lives and identities
• Schools, citizenship and diversity (in relation to religion or more broadly)

If you are interested in undertaking doctoral study with Peter, please feel free to get in touch, preferably with a CV and a 1-2 page proposal outlining your ideas.

Peter has previously supervised the following doctoral candidates to successful completion, and has contributed to a range of other supervisory teams:

• Amber Fensham-Smith: Online networks in home schooling (2012-17)
• Elena Hailwood: Mindfulness in schools (2016-20)

He has examined a number of doctoral theses, including in an internal and external capacity.

Andy is interested to work with applicants seeking to conduct research relating to the professional learning, development and/or well-being of teachers and other professionals. Specific foci include but are not restricted to studies of:

• Teachers’ early professional learning
• Teacher well-being
• Mentoring for early career teachers / professionals
• Mentoring across professions
• Judgementoring
• ONSIDE Mentoring

My supervisory interests include teaching and learning in primary schools, particularly in primary and early years mathematics. I am also interested in the social context of schooling, policy and assessment, including interests related to ability-grouping and equity issues. I am interested in supervising projects involving mixed methods approaches as well as large-scale literature reviews including meta-analyses.

Tom is interested in a range of topics within the field of primary and secondary education but has particular expertise in the following areas: Citizenship Education; Collective Worship; Faith Schools; Fundamental British Values; Personal, Social, Health and Economic Education; Religious Education; Relationships and Sex Education; Spiritual, Moral, Social and Cultural Development / Education.

I am working with PhD and EdD students within the field of Early Years and I welcome enquiries from prospective candidates who are interested in my specific areas of specialism which include:

• 'Professional Love'
• Infants, toddlers & children under 3 years of age
• Attachment based relationships -  Love, Care and Intimacy
• Theory, policy and practices with infants and toddlers
• Quality and learning/ policy, practice and pedagogy
• The Rights of babies and young children
• Professional adult roles – e.g primary caregiving/key person approach
• Parent roles

I have supervised seven students to successful completion of their doctorates and examined 17 full doctoral theses.

Soo is registered to supervise doctoral students and welcomes enquiries. She regularly supervise students on the Doctorate and MA programmes, both in the UK and in partnership with the Mauritius Institute of Education. She is involved in progression panels on the PhD. She also works with PG and UG students on extended projects at both level 6 and 7. 

Her particular interests are in critical policy research, primary and secondary education, insider research and primary English education.