Policy Scotland was delighted to welcome Professor Mel Ainscow to give a lunchtime seminar as part of his new role with Policy Scotland at University of Glasgow.
Professor Ainscow is also Emeritus Professor at the University of Manchester and Adjunct Professor at Queensland University of Technology. A long-term consultant to UNESCO, he is internationally recognized as an authority on the promotion of inclusion and equity in education.
His seminar presentation considered how researchers can contribute to educational change in relation to equity, a challenge facing education systems throughout the world. He shared examples of three different collaborative research projects and discussed the lessons from them.
Drawing on the evidence from a series of studies carried out with networks of schools over the last 20 years, he argued that this requires the coming together of different perspectives in a process of social learning and knowledge creation within particular settings.
He concluded with an explanation of a strategic framework that has proved to be helpful in creating working relationships within which practitioners and researchers can collaborate effectively.
Professor Ainscow will be working with Policy Scotland over the next three years.
More resources
- Using research to promote equity within education systems: Possibilities and barriers Free access article in the British Educational Research Journal by Professor Chris Chapman, University of Glasgow and Policy Scotland, and Emeritus Professor Mel Ainscow
- Changing Education Systems: A Research-based Approach by Mel Ainscow, University of Manchester; Christopher Chapman, University of Glasgow; and Mark Hadfield, Cardiff University.
- Struggles for equity in education: the selected works of Mel Ainscow (Routledge World Library of Educationalists series).