Education (Taught)

The MA Education is founded on a philosophical principle that educational work is an intellectual activity, and, as such, educators are entitled to an autonomous academic voice. Much of our activity focuses on enriching that voice, and supporting it so that it might operate in a more assertive and substantiated way. We encourage our students to complicate and problematise practice, to actively resist those pressures that might seek to otherwise offer reduced and simplified accounts of learning. We intend to bring to the fore your ethical sensibilities and intellectual capacities. We are committed to a sense that in doing so, we enable the kinds of creative and considered practices which make real differences to the experiences of learners. A second core principle holds that 'practice' should be central to our exploration and analysis. Throughout your study, you will be encouraged to apply new ideas and thinking in practice, and to evaluate and explore their efficacy. Practice is a form of expertise, and it - alongside any form of more conventionally 'academic' material - can be a generator of new thinking and understanding. As such, you will be encouraged to bring your practice in to sessions, in order to generate new discussion and to nuance, enrich and even challenge 'big theory'.