Developing a project within a school-university partnership: factors that influence effective partnership working

ABSTRACT

This paper advances the discourse on school-university partnerships by considering the challenges of implementing a project to support the professional development of teachers through the use of video-mediated lesson observation within such a partnership network. The project discussed here was initially established by teacher-educators and located in the secondary sector of a school-university partnership in England. It offers an interpretive framework for analysing school-university partnerships. The impact of this project was limited due to asymmetric power relations. The effectiveness of partnership working is discussed by considering the degree of congruence between the perspectives of and division of labour between both school-based mentors and teacher-educators and those factors identified in literature as supporting effective partnership working. The findings point to effectiveness being compromised when power and control are located within one community resulting in school-based mentor disengagement and the project aims only being partly fulfilled.

KEYWORDS:

• School-university partnership
• communities of practice
• collaborative working
• power
• teacher development
• discourse

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. The Post-Graduate Certificate of Education (PGCE) is a one-year programme leading to a professional teaching qualification and qualified teacher status. In this programme beginning teachers spend one-third of their time within the university and two-thirds of their time on school-placement.

2. Minutes of the meetings between teacher-educators and school-based mentors.

3. Source: Notes and minutes of the mentor steering meetings throughout the project.

4. I attended all of the Mentor Steering Group meetings. There was goodwill regarding the welfare and development of the beginning teachers. However, there was no sense of reciprocity regarding the benefits accruing from the project. The lack of pedagogical training regarding using the technology coupled to mentors not being able to use the technology for recording lessons of their beginnings led to mentor frustration.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Brian Marsh

Brian Marsh is a Principal Lecturer in Education at the University of Brighton. Having extensive experience in schools, he now teaches on the ITE Science, MA and doctoral programmes. He also chairs the ethics committee in the School of Education.