Students
Research Topic
Language: English
This is a research topic created to provide authors with a place to attach new problem publications.
Research problems linked to this topic
- What are the likely effects of measures to increase quality in HE on applicant perceptions and graduate labour market outcomes?
- How effective have T-levels been in increasing student and business involvement in technical education? Which factors increase student uptake and business recruitment of people with T-levels?
- What are the key demographic and market dynamics in HE? For example, what are the trends and impacts of franchises in terms of student participation, local growth, and student outcomes?
- What is the impact of under-attainment for disadvantaged students on future skills needs and participation in HE?
- How can we best support and promote mental health and wellbeing in schools, colleges and higher education?
- How do device ratios impact students and teachers?
- How can the impact of digital technology be robustly measured, and implemented in a way that supports teachers and learners?
- How has the increased accessibility of generative AI influenced HE and FE providers and students?
- What are the potential impacts of AI, and how can new technologies be used safely and effectively within education?
- How do we create a SEND and AP system that better meets the needs of children and their families? Building on the SEND and AP improvement plan, we would like to better understand local delivery, partnership working in the system, cost and financial stability. What does good provision look like and how can we share best practice?
- How can children and young people with SEND and in AP be best supported in important transitions, including into post-16 education and adulthood?
- How can we improve the education experiences and outcomes for children and young people with SEND or in AP? How do we best identify needs and level of need, what are the benefits of early intervention, and what are appropriate outcomes to measure for this group?
- How can we best support children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) and those who attend Alternative Provision (AP)?
- How effective have whole school/college approaches to improving student mental health and wellbeing been? What factors underpin the most effective whole school/college approaches? How can schools/colleges effectively measure the impact of these approaches?
- How can we best support children and young people with developing resilience and mental health through their schooling? What programmes and approaches are most effective and why?
- What is the impact of children’s access to nature from an educational and wellbeing perspective?
- What are the different ways that outdoor learning can affect young people and how can they be measured?
- What impact does accountability and inspection have on key outcomes for the education system, including internationally?
- Which school-wide (or school trust-wide) systems, processes, and interventions improve pupil attainment and narrow disadvantage attainment gaps? Applied research might explore, for instance, how leaders use behaviour systems, pupil setting, the length of the school day, and whole-school enrichment interventions.
- How do schools use in-school units such as SEN Units, Resourced Provision and in-school Alternative Provision to improve pupil outcomes?
- What are the features of high-quality tutoring? Applied research might demonstrate how schools can use tutoring across phases and subjects to help pupils who are behind, or to stretch pupils.
- What are the barriers to learning experienced by pupils with SEND, and what strategies are effective in helping them overcome these barriers?
- How can we improve outcomes for all pupils, especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds and those with SEND?
- What are the drivers of pupils not attending school and what factors influence pupils being at risk of becoming persistently absent?
- How can schools effectively support pupils to improve attendance?
- How effective are attendance interventions in improving outcomes for pupils?
- What works to reintegrate pupils who are persistently or severely absent?
- How can schools and local partners work together effectively to reduce persistent and severe absence?
- What are the drivers of pupil attendance and absence?
- What works to reduce persistent and severe absence and why?
- What are the most valid and reliable assessment methods, and how are these used effectively in schools to support and assess pupil learning? Which ways of representing and sequencing curricula are most effective in supporting pupil learning and why?
- What teaching approaches are most effective in helping pupils to pay attention, grasp new ideas, develop skill (such as writing), retain knowledge, transfer knowledge, and be motivated to learn? Why are these approaches most effective? Applied research might include, for example: how various forms of retrieval practice can help pupils retain knowledge for longer periods, or how teacher instruction, teacher questioning, and in-class reading can be used to enhance understanding, and how these effects vary across different phases or subjects.
- What does evidence from the natural and cognitive sciences suggest about how schools might influence pupil motivation, behaviour, and learning? How can this be translated into teaching practices that reliably improve pupil attainment?
- How can we assess teaching quality and support schools in making valid and proportionate assessments of quality (e.g. comparing novice and expert practice; monitoring impact on pupil outcomes)?
- What works in improving youth outcomes?
- What works in improving the skills, employability and wellbeing of young people?
- What are the impacts of lack of skills, employability and wellbeing among young people?
- How do wages of creative Higher Education graduates progress over time and what factors determine short and long-term wages? For example what factors can explain why arts and design graduates have some of the lowest earnings one and five years after graduation?
- What is the social and developmental impact of culture and creative education at schools and higher education?
- How has the Lifelong Learning Entitlement (LLE) influenced the behaviour of students, providers and employers? To what extent has LLE promoted increased fluidity of study pathways between FE and HE?
- What are the drivers of UK and foreign students’ decisions about pathways into and out of HE, including impact of funding, finance and experience?
- • How effective are trauma and resilience theory informed inputs for staff? Can teacher training about brain development, the stress response, co-regulation strategies and how to teach self-regulation improve student's behaviour in class and help children achieve and thrive?
- • How can we support all children by removing barriers to opportunity, balancing high standards for all with support for those who need it most, including the most disadvantaged children?
- • Which approaches to school leadership, management and governance help create the right environment for all children to learn, and how can they be more widely embedded?
- • How can schools best work with parents and carers to help their children to arrive each day ready to learn, to get the most from each school day and support their learning outside school?
- • Are there different developmental trajectories of cognitive, emotional, and social skills for different types of SEND, and if so, what does this mean for classroom pedagogical practice?
- • What are the barriers to learning experienced by children with SEND, and what universal and targeted strategies and interventions are effective in helping them overcome these barriers? How do they vary depending on type of SEND?
- What works best to ensure high levels of school attendance, when, where, with whom and why?
- • What (individual, school and wider) factors contribute to different types of absences (low-level, persistent, and severe)? Are there significant differences in the root causes of these various types, or differences by age?
- • What factors influence parental attitudes to school attendance and what can we do to address them?
- How do improved mental and physical health and wellbeing support improved behaviour, attendance, and attainment, and what works best to improve health and wellbeing across our sectors?
- How do improved mental and physical health and wellbeing support improved behaviour, attendance, and attainment, and what works best to improve health and wellbeing across our sectors?
- • What impact do educational settings and practices have on longer-term health (including dental health)?
- • How effective have whole school/college approaches to improving student mental health and wellbeing been? What factors underpin the most effective whole school/college approaches? How can they effectively measure the impact of these approaches?
- • What works best in mitigating the adverse impacts of serious or prolonged ill-health (including long-covid) on educational achievement? What educational support is offered to children who have serious or long-term ill-health and how effective is that support?
- • What works to support transitions (including to primary school, to secondary school, within secondary e.g. from year 7 to year 8) for different groups, including children with SEND (including transitioning between different types of settings)? (See also 'Every child achieving and thriving’).
- "• What are the most cost-effective school and classroom practices to help children develop positive relationships and pro-social behaviour at school and increase school attendance – especially for those children with challenging behaviour? How do these vary for different groups (and for those students with SEND, for different types of need)? "
- How do we design and implement systems that promote understanding, and support the best decisions, by learners (of all ages) and parents (where appropriate) regarding the options and pathways available?
- • How are different careers portrayed to children? What careers advice is available, who engages with it, and what difference does the best possible careers advice make to the career paths they choose? How does this vary for different groups (such as by age and background)?
- How can careers advice have maximum impact in signposting people from disadvantaged backgrounds into further and higher education (including apprenticeships and T levels) and more rewarding careers? What is the optimum mode of delivery of information, advice, and guidance for disadvantaged groups and at what age should this start?
- • How can we maximise the benefits of work experience for those students who lack social capital?
- • What are the drivers of UK and foreign students’ decisions about pathways into and out of Higher Education (HE)? How do perceptions of the UK student experience affect decisions to study in the UK?
- • What is the impact of funding and understanding of student finance on decisions to study, course type and mode of study (both for UK and foreign students? How are the debt, cost and value of student finance understood and experienced, by different social groups?
- What works to get disadvantaged students onto the pathways that are proven to lead to upwards mobility and to stay on those pathways (including helping those who are not in education, employment, or training - NEET) and raising ambition where needed? At what age are interventions most effective?
- How can the skills system best support disadvantaged students into sustainable employment?
- • What works best in the skills system to support underrepresented groups into higher-paid occupations, sectors, and levels of seniority?
- • How do local availability of courses and transport infrastructure impact on disadvantaged groups’ opportunities and choices, and what works to improve them?
- • What works in driving successful HE participation and positive destinations post HE, for disadvantaged groups (including care experienced students), and other groups such as those with SEND?
- • How can the wider benefits (of HE and FE) be more effectively conveyed to different groups early on in education to raise aspirations?
- • What development opportunities are available for our workforces, how well do they meet our needs, and how attractive and accessible are they? Given the importance of professional development to retention, what are the best ways to ensure there are sufficient attractive and accessible development opportunities which engage the right people?
- What can we learn from other parts of the public sector, other sectors, and other programmes (e.g. NHS, parenting programmes) about professional training to develop knowledge and skills (e.g. about child development, on behaviour management, on how to improve leadership skills, how to improve workforce wellbeing, and how to use evidence)?
- • How do device ratios impact students and teachers? What is the minimum effective ratio of devices to students? How does this vary according to student characteristics including age?
- • How can staff best be supported in dealing with challenging behaviour, in ways that reliably reduce disruption to peers, improve pupil wellbeing, behaviour and attainment, and aid staff retention?