Are you a policy maker or practitioner taking decisions in education?

Would you like help in finding and using research to help solve a policy issue or problem?

Our Research Advisory Service can help you use research to inform your decisions. We can work with you to:

• Clarify the issue or question under concern and how best you might address it.
• Understand whether and in what ways research might be useful to you.
• Find out what research is available about a topic or issue and what it says.
• Use research and development to identify and deliver key school improvement priorities.
• Develop systems and processes to enable greater use of research within your network or organisation such as: training courses on finding, understanding and applying research to school improvement issues – or databases of action research projects completed by staff within your network.
• Scale up interventions to your context.
• Monitor or evaluate your own practice and its effectiveness.
• Contribute to your own research projects.
• Connect you with others with knowledge or experience in the areas you’re interested in.
• Assist with funding applications.

Our service starts with your issues and questions, the reasons for your interest and what outcome/s you are hoping for. It is only once we have clarified your needs that we will explore with you whether, and in what ways, research might help you to address this issue or question. Underpinning our work is a commitment to robust, good quality research such as systematic reviews.

We already have a successful track record in working with the education sector across Europe to undertake research-informed school improvement projects, including:

• Effectively closing gaps in educational achievement for children and young people with multiple vulnerabilities (poverty, special educational needs and living in care)
• Developing new methods of assessment that put students at the heart of their own evaluation and ensuring that teachers understand and are comfortable using these new methods.
• Understanding the impact of parental involvement on children’s attainment and how best to engage parents in their children’s education

If you are interested in receiving this service, please contact us.