Looking for evidence


With public funding in short supply, learning providers are under increasing pressure to demonstrate the effectiveness of their programmes. Practitioner researcher SARAH HOUSDEN considers some of the challenges facing this kind of research


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n a climate of fiscal constraint and cuts to public spending, it is more important than ever to demonstrate the effectiveness of learning programmes. I recently carried


out an action research project within Norfolk County Council’s adult community learning service, where I work as a tutor, with the aim of increasing the impact of reminiscence training for care workers. The research threw up a number of challenges, from applying for funding to getting colleagues on board. In this article I want to explore a few of them. In his 2006 book Evidence-Based Teaching,


Geoff Petty encourages his readers to move away from doing things in a certain way because ‘we’ve always done it like that’, and to move instead towards the application of research evidence in our teaching. As a health professional who has moved into teaching in the learning and skills sector over the past 10 years, I was aware of the need for evidence to back up my instinctive feeling that post-course workplace mentoring would boost students’ confidence in putting their new skills into practice. I needed more than instinct to convince our course funders that it was worthwhile paying mentors to support students in the workplace. Thus, with funding from a Research Development Fellowship sponsored by the Learning and Skills Improvement Service (LSIS) and the Institute for Learning (IfL), I embarked upon a research project to explore whether students’ application of skills in the workplace increased when they had four visits from a subject specialist mentor. The courses attended by participants in the study aimed to equip students with the necessary practical skills and theoretical knowledge to run reminiscence groups with older people and people with learning disabilities attending day services or living in care homes. Within weeks of discussing with my colleagues the need to explore the potential effects of post-course reminiscence mentoring, but facing uncertainty as to how this could be achieved without funding, I became aware of the possibility of applying for an LSIS-IfL Research Development Fellowship grant. The process of submitting a written application


28 ADULTS LEARNING JANUARY 2011


was relatively straightforward, but it took several hours to complete the form. Thus, the first challenge for any research project is to find a person willing to devote substantial amounts of time to making applications for funding, including attending any face-to-face interviews associated with the application. Ideally, every organisation providing learning opportunities for adults would recognise the importance of evidence-based practice and, as a result, would have funding set aside to support staff in making such applications – especially where specialist knowledge of


is to find ways of increasing the number of teachers and trainers who are qualified to Master’s and doctoral level, and are able to carry out research competently in their own subject areas. A third challenge is to ensure that coll-


eagues understand the aims of the research, and can see why it is necessary and worthwhile. Apart from ensuring support in the workplace, this also means that colleagues can play a part in the research. My fellow teachers took the role of mentors in this research, and so it was important that they understood the need for


“Research needs to be carried out by practitioners if it is to be effective in answering practical questions which are of real interest and benefit to students and teachers”


the area to be researched is necessary to complete the application, and no general fundraiser could be expected to have such knowledge. This raises a second challenge – the need


for a project leader who has some awareness of research methods and ethics, and who can write a research proposal and carry through the practical research, as well as analyse results and draw sound conclusions. While it is not essential for all these skills to reside in one person, the research team as a whole needs to be made up of people who together combine these skills. In our reminiscence mentoring research, I was fortunate to be supported by a team manager who has a PhD, and was therefore able to understand the issues which arose both in the application process and in carrying out the research. The challenge to the learning and skills sector


an unusual amount of record keeping in the form of mentoring diaries, as well as sharing the vision for what flexible person-centred mentoring could achieve. Students and mentors were spread through-


out the county and this presented a practical challenge in terms of communication and carrying out research interviews. Whereas a mainstream learning provider, such as a further education college, might expect all research participants to have a common base at the college, I needed to stay in touch with people over an area of more than 60 square miles. This was achieved through having mentors and mentees keep research diaries which were sent to me each week by e-mail, and by carrying out final interviews over the telephone. There are arguments for and against using telephone interviews as opposed to meeting participants face-to-face.


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