ABSTRACT
In this chapter, concerns are expressed around teachers in urban schools in England having to focus attention on ‘raising achievement’ and ‘narrowing the gap’. Philpott and Poultney’s (2018) chapter on translational research and knowledge mobilisation is utilised to grapple with teacher learning about poverty and disadvantage, which can be construed by governments as a problem for schools to fix. This negates adequate space or opportunity for teachers to conceptualise complexities or build contextual understanding in order to challenge those policy discourses that have become canonical.
Here, an alternative model is presented. The archetypal ‘Leading Learning’ CPD programme, continuous for three years, is explored as a site to consider the ways in which teachers and academic partners can work together in a sustained way. That teachers should become ‘research-active’ in order to challenge canonical policy discourses and directions around working with students in poverty is developed as an argument. This links to more democratic forms of teachers’ professional knowledge building work and is a direct challenge to current paradigms of teachers’ professional development. The chapter concludes with a call to bring critical scholarship to the fore for teachers and teacher educators.
