You are a researcher employed by a Government’s Department for Education and Skills. The Minister for Education and Skills has requested a RESEARCH BRIEFING to inform the Government’s policy on:

What are the advantages and disadvantages of “the marketisation of education” upon the post-compulsory education and training (PCET) sector?

This is a RESEARCH BRIEFING and should be presented as such: subheadings, bullet points, tables and diagrams (where appropriate) are encouraged.

There should be a short Executive Summary/Statement at the beginning – this will outline your main findings. You might want to offer brief Recommendations at the end, but this is not compulsory.

ASSESSMENT GUIDANCE

The main body of the RESEARCH BRIEFING should address the specific question

you choose, but to help with focusing your reading and thinking you might consider

the following questions:

o What changes to the PCET landscape have occurred over the last decade? To what extend have these been a result of changing policy and funding systems?

Who are the stakeholders? Who has a voice? What are the main drivers? What

improvements might be made?

o What impact has the “marketisation of education” had upon the PCET sector?

You may wish to think about alterations to structure, provision, staffing and

student bodies.

o How are colleges responding to the skills problems in Wales and/ or England?

How does this shape provision, curriculum and working practices?

o You might comment on where Wales and/or England (i.e. the Welsh and/ or UK

Government), are currently doing well or poorly with regard to dealing with

widening participation, progression routes to employment and training,

addressing skills deficits and where improvements (in policy and practice) might

be made.

o What concepts or theories of national/cultural identity or citizenship have been

used in developing the Curriculum Cymreig, and how beneficial are these

elements in implementing the policy?

o What historical, social, economic and cultural factors have led to the development of the Curriculum Cymreig and how has the policy attempted to respond to these issues?

o What factors led to the development of the Common Core Standards Initiative,

what claims to proponents and opponents of the initiative make in regard to its

effectiveness, what are the advantages of this approach to curriculum development and implementation? Is such an approach suitable for Wales?

ASSESSMENT SPECIFICATION

The RESEARCH BRIEFING should be no more than 2000 words in length. Please

note that this word count does not include the bibliography & cover sheet.

Research briefings provide a concise summary of research knowledge on a particular topic.

They summarise research evidence in an accessible form to a varied audience, including service users, students, policy makers, education workers, and managers.

Unlike a systematic review, a research briefing is not a definitive synthesis of all research knowledge on a topic. Instead it is intended as a useful introductory summary of the main findings in a field.

Some keys to success

• STRUCTURE -use headings and subheadings when necessary

• There should be an Executive Summary, bullet pointed and approximately 100 words (3-4 Key points; take-home messages).

• INTRODUCTION: set out aims of research briefing and its structure (how you will tackle the issue you address) –sets out the limits of the assignment

WHAT IS THE PROBLEM?

WHAT IS THE EVIDENCE?

• BE SPECIFIC -when you make your arguments: what geographical base? (UK, Wales?) What time period?

• CRITICAL ARGUMENT –move beyond description to present a critical voice in your argumentation and analysis (you can also look at controversies in the literature, or where articles or theories disagree or have a different focus –for example human capital and VoC on the importance of institutions-).

• Building an argument means going beyond an annotated list of resources

• EVIDENCE to back-up assertions (what do we know/ understand?). Breadth of reading.

• RELEVANCE –is your assignment addressing the question? Make sure that the conclusion is focussed on answering the question posed.

• ONE INTEGRATED WHOLE –the assignment needs to “flow”, signposting can help. Conclusions/ recommendations go back to the question.

Avoid

Descriptive, no analysis – little or no engagement with any of the key ideas/concepts!

Lack of critical analysis

Executive Summaries that were introductions

Assertions – making claims, but with no evidence in support

Some assignments spent far too long describing context rather than reviewing the evidence

Limited references/poorly referenced

Not using the word limit