We think, therefore we aim. Professional enquiry targets transformations to practice in further education.
In this post, Allan Blake (Teaching Fellow in Education at The University of Strathclyde) and Ailie Gunn (Lecturer in Marketing at City of Glasgow College) reflect on the role of professional enquiry in the Leading Learning and Transformative Practice in Colleges course.
Professional enquiry is a key feature of the Strathclyde Institute of Education’s innovative Leading Learning and Transformative Practice in Colleges course, perhaps most conspicuously in the module that supports college lecturers to inform their professional learning with evidence.
In this element of the course, known as Transforming Practice Through Enquiry, participants are tasked with designing and executing a small-scale professional enquiry project in their educational environment. The chief aim of this project is to disrupt habitual or previously uninformed assumptions about teaching and learning, leading to innovations in practice that are intended to enhance the further education experience.
Methodologically speaking, enquiry projects most often take the form of practitioner research, an approach which involves identifying a focus for research that can be investigated in the real-world context of the teaching space through methods and data to which professionals have access ordinarily, and which fit within the naturalistic learning environment.
The methods and results of projects are assessed through a presentation made to module tutors and peers on the course. This method of assessment is intended to foster leadership of learning through informed dialogue between colleagues, in fulfilling one of the main aims of the course: to uncover evidence and communicate factors that impact upon the FE student journey.
The presentation of results in this manner is consistent with the practice of enquiry, which places an emphasis on carrying out and communicating findings that are relevant, useful, and potentially reformative of the status quo.
The array of enquiry topics addressed thus far has been expansive in terms of their usefulness and creativity, ranging from studies about the effectiveness of industry engagement in enhancing the learning experience in architecture, to assessing the contribution of virtual reality to students’ clinical nursing placement, to an investigation entitled “AI Think, Therefore I Am: Exploring How Large Language Models can enhance Creative Marketing Learning in Scottish Further Education.”
This latter study, especially, embodied the properties expected of worthwhile research in education by responding to necessary professional change. It addressed a problem that many educators are grappling with presently – namely, the evolving role of AI in education. But rather than position AI as a source of Cartesian anxiety (or a bitter pill to be swallowed[i]), the project explored how AI might be used to contribute to college students’ creative marketing capacities, in bridging the gap between practice in education and the real experience of working in an industry that is embracing the new technology to maintain competitive advantage. The intention of the study was thus to open informed professional dialogue between the fields of education and marketing.
In a presentation that combined empirical evidence, theoretical deliberation, and science fictional playfulness, the audience was guided through a rich matrix[ii] of dialogue and discussion which revealed that marketing students’ capacities for creative pitch writing were indeed enhanced using AI. Through a subsequent stage of practical theorising, the findings from the empirical work were formulated into an innovative, transferable, research-informed model – The Model for Responsible AI Adoption in Teaching – which mapped evidence generated from professional enquiry into the interstices of the GTCS’ Professional Standards, in suggesting, like Morpheus[iii], that there is a necessary reciprocal relationship “between knowing the path and walking the path”.
In further evidence of the imprint made possible by this kind of professional enquiry project, the study was a runner-up in the category of Research Project of the Year at the College Development Network Awards – awards which recognise the innovation and success of Scotland’s colleges. Richly deserved recognition of a study which speaks from within creative, innovative practice in a deeply informed and useful manner. This is an aim worth sharing, we think.
For more information about the course, which is led by Robert Collins[iv], follow this link: https://www.strath.ac.uk/courses/postgraduatetaught/leadinglearningtransformativepracticeincolleges/
References
[i] Did they just reference The Matrix?
[ii] They only did!
[iii] Still mining that rabbit hole, then.
[iv] Who doesn’t know Kung Fu!
Published 09/02/2025
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