The sub‐culture of music and ICT in the classroom

In this paper the authors utilise findings from the Economic and Social Research Council‐funded InterActive Education project to present a characterisation of the sub‐culture of school music with Information and Communications Technology (ICT) in England. They consider the opportunities and challenges ICT presents to the teaching of primary (ages 4–11) and secondary (ages 11–18) classroom music through an investigation of the perceptions, personal philosophies and pedagogical styles of seven teachers with whom they worked over a period of three years. Their work is underpinned by Goodson and Mangan’s definition of subject sub‐culture and they draw on Shulman’s notion of ‘knowledge bases’ in order to categorise and discuss the data. Through the identification and elaboration of key themes, the authors provide a snapshot of the emerging sub‐culture of music and ICT in schools.     

Problematising the ‘Career Academic’ in UK construction and engineering education: does the system want what the system gets?

‘Career Academics’ are principally research-led, entering academia with limited or no industrial or practical experience. UK Higher Education Institutions welcome them for their potential to attain research grant funding and publish world-leading journal papers, ultimately enhancing institutional reputation. This polemical paper problematises the Career Academic around three areas: their institutional appeal; their impact on the student experience, team dynamics and broader academic functions; and current strategic policy to employ them. We also argue that recent UK Government teaching-focused initiatives will not address needs to employ practical academics, or ‘Pracademics’ in predominantly vocational Construction and Engineering Education. We generate questions for policy-makers, institutions and those implementing strategy. We argue that research is key, but partial rebalancing will achieve a diverse academic skill base to achieve contextualised construction and engineering education. In wider European contexts, the paper resonates with issues of academic ‘drift’ and provides reflection for others on the UK context.