My academic background is as a historian, and much of my research falls within the history of education and childhood. I have focused predominantly on the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, examining moral education and citizenship, and local studies of education and welfare. My publications cover both my funded research and historical projects. A monograph - Morality and Citizenship in English Schools. Secular Approaches, 1897-1944 was published by Palgrave Macmillan earlier in 2017 and in 2020 was awarded the History of Education Society's Kevin Brehony Prize for the best sole-authored first monograph published in the English language between 2017 and 2019. Current research projects focus on young people, war and peace, both historically through research into organisations that promoted peace among young people from the 1920s to the 1960s, and in the present day through research into remembrance in schools.
Research group membership
I served on the executive committee of the History of Education Society from 2003 to 2010, and 2018 onwards; in January 2020 I was appointed ecretary. From 2007 to end of 2013 co-edited the History of Education Researcher, and from 2014 to 2019 co-edited History of Education - I continue as an editorial board member. I am also a member of the International Standing Conference for the History of Education, the British Educational Research Association, the Social History Society and the Society for Educational Studies.
Research grants and awards
Externally funded research and consultancy projects
- 2004-06: Nuffield Review of 14-19 Education and Training (funded by the Nuffield Foundation).
- 2006-07: The Student Learning Experience in Higher Education (funded by the Higher Education Academy).
- 2007-08: 14-19 education and training: establishing a baseline of evidence (funded by the Qualifications and Curriculum Development Authority)
Research projects
Current research projects:
- Remembrance in Schools (2013-19). I am working with colleagues in the School of Education and at Brunel University as part of a multi-disciplinary team investigating remembrance events on or around 11 November in schools in Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire. To date we have conducted two online surveys and interviews with teachers, and are now embarking on observations of remembrance events, and questionnaires with pupils to run in November 2017 and 2018.
- Peaceful Youth. I am engaged in a new monograph project which will examine - through documentary research and oral histories - organisations that promoted peace among young people from the 1920s to the 1960s.
Further information
Humanistic Perspectives research group website
Remembrance in Schools project website