Research Interests
Three key research areas of interest...
1. Evaluating impact in education – My work originates in the area of evaluating the impact of researcher development. I take a realist approach. I have also applied principles more broadly to doctoral education and evaluating the impact of research. I was lead author of the UK sector impact framework for researcher development charged with evaluating the circa £20M annual investment by UK Research Councils during what came to be known as the ‘Roberts Money’ era after the author of the initiating government report. I collated and analysed information from UK universities writing a number of reports on behalf of the sector for the UK Research Councils
2. Developing underpinning theory of professional development– Building from my realist evaluation work I introduced the concept of static and dynamic components of disposition and situation as an alternative approach to the concept of ‘skills’. I have developed the ideas with a steering group of colleagues from other UK universities as the Dynamic Development Model. The model is now at the stage of being introduced in to Universities in the steering group and publicised more widely.
3. Pedagogical development – I am currently implementing pedagogical changes to researcher development provision as a result of the Dynamic Development work. A key themes is personal ownership of professional development alongside an active dynamic approach. I previously developed the ‘Speed PhD’ two-day doctoral induction workshop used at a number of UK universities.