In many countries, there is a renewed call for publicly-funded education to be supported by evidence, particularly evidence from educational research (Cain, Wieser & Livingston 2016). Two theoretical models are commonly used to understand the use of research by teachers. The first is a supply and demand model (e.g. Behrstock, Drill & Miller 2009) which assumes that research is akin to a product which is bought in a marketplace. The second emanates from policy research, and suggests that research can be used ‘instrumentally’, ‘conceptually’ or ‘strategically’ (e.g. Nutley et al. 2007). Neither model adequately explains why teachers might use research and neither provides any detail about how research utilisation might improve educational practice. In the absence of better models, it is therefore important to consider what theoretical tools might help us to understand research utilization by teachers. Drawing on empirical studies (Kennedy 1997; Wiliam et al. 2004; Cain 2015), this presentation explores research utilization as a process in which teachers are not so much consumers of research (the supply and demand model) nor users (the instrumental, conceptual and strategic model) but are primarily learners of research-generated knowledge (Wieser 2016). From this perspective teachers, a) encounter research-generated knowledge, b) bring it into relationship with their existing knowledge in order to understand it and c) think about whether it might imply improvements to their teaching. The three aspects of this process are necessary, and occasionally sufficient, components of research use, although there are further possibilities as teachers use their learning to change their practice and evaluate the changes. This perspective implies that teachers’ learning about research is influenced both by their understandings of, attitudes to, and intentions for research, and also by their understandings of, attitudes to, and intentions for teaching and what might count as improved teaching. What they learn is governed, at least in part, by what they know already. For example, if teachers see research as generating facts with a rigorous methodology that ensures the validity of the facts, they will likely expect to find warranted propositions in educational research. If they see research as exploring a range of ideas from differing perspectives, they might expect research to generate complex layers of meaning. This paper will elaborate a theory of research utilization as learning, exploring the support for such a theory from empirical studies. By so doing, it will contribute to a better theorization of research utilization in education.

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