As Bourdieu (1993) outlines, academia situates itself as a ‘field’ with its own set of mechanisms that reproduce social inequality, and exerts forms of power that can inhibit innovation, as the capital that academics possess, and the ways in which they are encouraged to enact membership of the field (e.g. through the production of academic papers), can serve to elevate intellectual capital, at the expense of valuing knowledge generated or experienced in different fields (or sectors). This theorisation of course assumes that the primary motivation for academics is to enhance their position in the Higher Education field. I would argue, however, that for many researchers, including myself, the motivation to make a difference to society and generate impact from research takes primacy, resulting in a lack of consensus in the field. This lack of consensus creates a space in which it is possible to counter the negative effects of exerting academic status through particular methodologies and pedagogies (Naidoo 2004). I argue that this space enables the development of new practices in educational research that consider and facilitate the academic as relationally situated within the social context in which the relationships are enacted and necessitates a deeper examination of the processes of research practice partnerships in different contexts.

I suggest that mediating knowledge in this way and promoting equity within research can be pursued by adopting an ‘active pedagogy’, in other words, a process that can enable learning, requiring change in both the learners and the facilitators of that learning. Freire (2001) enables a conceptualisation of an active pedagogy as the dialogic discovery of new knowledge which leads to reflection and effective action. In this way, pedagogy is seen as instrumental in creating impact or change, and co-creation (or co-production) provides a space in which dialogue, criticality and reflection can be nurtured. Any form of pedagogical practice values some forms of knowing above others, so members of a partnership need to explore and adopt reflexivity about their own ideological, political, socio-economic and organisational baggage, value positions and ethical stance.

Activist research involves being open to a change in what Beach and Vigo-Arrazda (2021) term our ‘habitus of organic intellectualism’. By this they mean that by working with others in co-constructing knowledge, researchers develop new embodied understandings about their responsibilities in enacting social justice. Drawing on a body of research undertaken during the last five years, I will present a conceptual model of co-learning for research practice partnerships that are working together to enact change and draws on theory to examine the ‘practice’ of research as pedagogy, i.e. a process of co-learning (rather than a process of teaching or knowledge transfer) that is multi-modal and multi-dimensional. This model is one that considers the context of research practice partnerships and has relevance for such partnerships across Europe.

I developed a new methodology which I have termed an ‘auto-meta-ethnography’ to develop the model, which drew on the principles of meta-ethnography to examine my own body of research undertaken since 2015 to expose new knowledge about co-learning for research practice partnerships. This body of research comprised five separate research programmes utilising mixed methods and approaches including a research secondment; a residential research trip with young women; co-production of research with young people; embedded research approaches and qualitative studies examining young people’s views of fairness. Seven research papers and book chapters formed the data for the application of meta-ethnography, in a lines-of-argument synthesis, looking at the papers both alongside and across each other following the principles of meta-ethnography outlined by Noblit and Hare (1988). Nine major themes were produced, seven of which were utilised to develop the conceptual model, and the remaining two to describe how the model could be practically enacted. All studies included in the synthesis, and the synthesis itself have received ethical approval from Newcastle University Ethics Committee.

This synthesis covers a body of my own research on research partnerships that aimed to enact social justice and encourage educational just practice. Nine themes were uncovered which form both a conceptual model for researchers wishing to develop their partnership approach and a description of how this model can be practically applied. The nine themes were: respect for difference; dialogue; relationships; flexibility; collaboration; relational, justice-driven ethics; frameworks and tools; embracing complexity; and reciprocity. The presentation will describe the process of synthesis, before presenting the model and discussing the themes generated within it, and further eliciting a discussion with delegates about the implications for future research practice partnerships.

Beach, D and Vigo-Arrazda, M.B. (2021) ‘Critical Ethnographies of Education and for Social and Educational Transformation: A Meta-Ethnography’, Qualitative Enquiry, 27(6): 677-88. Bourdieu, P. (1993) The Field of Cultural Production, Cambridge: Polity Press. Freire, P. (2001) Pedagogy of the Oppressed, London: Continuum International Publishing Ltd. Naidoo, R. (2004) ‘Fields and institutional strategy: Bourdieu on the relationship between higher education, inequality and society’, British Journal of Sociology of Education, 25(4): 457-71. Noblit, G.W. and Hare, R.D. (1988) Meta-Ethnography: Synthesizing Qualitative studies, Newbury Park: Sage Publications.