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Teacher recruitment and retention in England: a Foucauldian analysis of disempowerment
Full text linkPersistent under-recruitment and poor retention threaten the sustainability of England’s education system, with shortages acute among early career teachers. Using Michel Foucault’s ideas of power, discipline, and governmentality, this paper argues that these issues stem not only from workload or pay but from systemic disempowerment. Successive reforms have enabled the Department for Education to centralise control over curriculum, pedagogy, and teacher education, embedding surveillance, accountability, and performativity that constrain autonomy. Teachers are cast as implementers of state-mandated practices—such as systematic synthetic phonics—validated through prescribed “evidence-based” methods. This disciplinary regime produces self-regulating, compliant teachers, eroding agency, identity, morale, and long-term commitment. From a Foucauldian view, such disempowerment is structural to neoliberal governmentality, where marketised systems operate through data and compliance. England’s experience reflects global trends, as organisations like the OECD promote policy convergence and performative accountability that reshape teaching worldwide into regulated, data-driven labour. Addressing England’s teacher crisis requires more than financial incentives: it demands restoring trust, autonomy, and intellectual freedom, reimagining teachers as critical professionals. Universities offering initial and continuing teacher education can lead this re-empowerment through reflective practice, research engagement, and democratic involvement in policymaking
Social influence across conversational contexts: a new taxonomy of social influence techniques and public understanding of the characteristics of persuasion, manipulation, and coercion in interpersonal dialogue
No full textWe propose a taxonomy of seven social influence strategies and 42 techniques for interpersonal dialogue across diverse settings. Perceptions of these techniques, gathered from 164 UK participants, show persuasive techniques as low-harm and covert, while manipulative-coercive techniques are high-harm and overt. Ambiguities exist where some techniques fit both categories, highlighting significant variability in individual perceptions. We highlight that even benign techniques like humour or friendliness can covertly bypass defences, hiding the speaker's true intentions. This work underscores the importance of understanding receiver perceptions of social influence techniques across a range of settings, including interactions with large language models (LLMs), which may employ such techniques. By offering a universal taxonomy of social influence techniques and associated public perceptions, we aim to enhance understanding of social influence in varied conversational contexts
Social Care Wales: Have Your Say 2025. Final report
No full textThis report contains the findings of the 2025 ‘Have Your Say’ workforce survey, which asked social care workers about things like their health and well-being, pay and conditions, and what they like about working in the sector
Before race: a literature review on de/colonial habits in play within early childhood
Full text linkIn this article, we consider the academic literature regarding how racial discrimination is prefigured in societal norms and habits in early learning and childcare in Scotland and England. Specifically, we outline what we see as a salient opportunity to strengthen the existing knowledge base, namely how race and racism are understood in young children’s relational habits and play prior to explicit acts. Leaning on the work of Jones and Okun, the article signals how a broader understanding of coloniality may inform earlier intervention in childhood practice. We conclude by introducing our interest in resurgent Froebelian pedagogies, especially in Scotland where they intersect strongly with national frameworks. We consider their potential affordances for understanding and intervening in childhood colonialities and strengthening childhood decolonialities
Reimagining online teacher education: combining self-directed learning with peer feedback for interaction and engagement
Full text linkPurpose:-
There has been an unprecedented increase in online learning worldwide, including in teacher education. However, student lurking can be a common issue, leading to a non-interactive learning environment.
Design/methodology/approach:-
The authors employed a qualitative case study with thematic analysis to examine a novel “self-directed” pre-service teacher online degree module that engaged students in regular peer-feedback, which intended to promote student engagement and interactivity. The research questions were as follows: To what extent did the seminar series represent the principles of self-directed learning and were learning outcomes effective from the process? And, how effective was the use of peer feedback?
Findings:-
The thematic analysis revealed that student progression and course completion was successful, and it represented some principles of self-directed learning; but (a) it cannot be presumed that pre-service teachers are competent in giving (peer) feedback and (b) pre-service teachers may need specific guidance and training for providing competent feedback.
Originality/value:-
This paper is highly original in respect of its combination of the self-directed learning framework with use of peer feedback, to engage students in an interactive learning environment. The present paper identifies that peer feedback is a powerful tool in online learning; peer feedback can supplement self- and teacher-assessment; but it should not be assumed that pre-service teachers are competent in providing (peer) feedback – pre-service teachers may need specific training in providing feedback
Postdigital citizen science: mapping the field
Full text linkThis paper provides a brief overview of citizen science, attending to its tensions and possibilities. We acknowledge the creative potential of citizen science for expanding and diversifying public participation in knowledge production and dissemination, and we also draw attention to its contradictions. We point to emerging postdigital tensions as new technologies and vast public databases are increasingly becoming cornerstones of citizen science. We discuss how postdigital citizen science operates in the context of knowledge capitalism while aiming at its transformation and highlight three key challenges for postdigital citizen science: the challenge of technology, the challenge of political economy, and the challenge of participation. Different postdigital challenges cannot be separated from each other, so we call for a deep reimagination and reconfiguration of citizen science in and for the postdigital condition. We start this reimagination by asking three questions: What is postdigital citizen science? Who (or what!) is the postdigital citizen scientist? How to conduct postdigital citizen science
Are certain noun labelling preferences in early childhood innate, or is it influenced by environmental factors? An exploration into the visual-auditory and psychological processes of object naming in child language and literacy development
No full textEcologies of collective imagination
Full text linkEcologies of collective imagination involve creating and sharing imagination practice. This modest piece of research engaged 10 artists, environmentalists, and educators to think together about how nature can be a source and a driver of the imagination and sense of possibility for individuals and communities. Together we focused on the concept of re-imagining learning, inside and outside, researching the space of imagination and possibility, nature and well-being for future generations. We explored how collective forms of imagination can engage individuals in actions related to environmental awareness and reparative justice, including ways of widening participation by engaging people who may have been excluded from the power of ecological learning and imagination, ultimately building aspiration and responding to change to build hope for the future. The premise of this project is that human lives are lived in the realm of the possible as much as they are in the here-and-now of immediate experience of the more-than-human world. In this project, we are interested in understanding how we imagine our lives as part of nature, focusing on the question “how can we cultivate an awareness of ‘possible lives’ in ways that respect nature and lead to more hopeful futures?” Our methodology will include opening up spaces for dialogue as a method for the construction of new theoretical and creative methodological tools and processes. This article will consider ecological imagination in the context of art and design education, and creative and eco-pedagogies through a multimodal approach, and a combination of visuals, poetry, and narrative