Inaugural lecture with Becky Allen: ‘The Hidden lives of Teachers’

The University of Brighton’s public lecture series returns this spring with a wide-ranging programme of inspiring and educational talks from leading academics.

Delivered by newly appointed professors, the lectures will delve into the ground-breaking research Brighton academics are carrying out to address some of the biggest challenges facing people and communities here in Brighton, across the UK and around the world.

We thought the following lecture would be of particular interest to our staff and students:

The hidden lives of teachers: Seeking best practice in a diverse world
Professor Becky Allen

Wednesday 1 March, Elm House from 6.30pm.

Teachers are unusual professionals, carrying out much of their work in a classroom where they are isolated from others in the profession. This facilitates ‘professional looseness’ whereby a wide variety of classroom practices can emerge and persist, both across schools and across classrooms within a school.

Drawing on her experience of asking around 8,000 teachers three questions a day since 2017, Becky takes the 40 million responses to over 4,000 unique questions to describe the enormous diversity we observe in the daily lives, beliefs and practices of teachers in the classroom.

She will reflect on why ‘scientific best practice’ is unlikely to ever materially constrain this diversity, and on why diversity in practice presents a challenge for school leaders and policymakers seeking to improve the system.

This lecture is free to attend – book your place.