2016 IPDA Conference

International Conference 2016

The IPDA International Conference 2016 took place on 25-26 November 2016 at the Stirling Court Hotel, University of Stirling. 

For more details you can download the 2016 conference programme.

Learning Across the Professions

The theme of our 2016 International Conference is Learning Across the professions. This is broken down into the following sub-themes:

  • Approaches to researching professional practice
  • Professional learning through practice
  • Impact of professional learning on practice

Keynote speakers

Jan Vermunt

Professor Jan Vermunt, University of Cambridge

Keynote: A psychological perspective on professional learning and development in different disciplines

Jan Vermunt is a Professor of Education at the University of Cambridge, United Kingdom, and a Fellow of Wolfson College. The study of human learning has fascinated him since he started his studies in the Psychology of learning and education. Current research interests include, among others: how people integrate knowledge from different sources into a unified theory of practice; how people differ in their pathways to growth and development; and how learning environments can be created that are able to realize high quality learning processes. His scientific work has been published in journals such as Learning and Instruction, British Journal of Educational Psychology, Teaching and Teacher Education, Teachers College Record, Higher Education, Studies in Higher Education, Academic Medicine, Medical Education, and Vocations and Learning. Jan serves on the Editorial Boards of Educational Research Review and Empirical Research in Vocational Education and Training. He has, since January 2014, been the elected Editor-in-Chief of Learning and Instruction, one of the leading journals in the world in the fields of Educational Research and Educational Psychology.

Alison Fuller

Alison Fuller, University College London Institute of Education

Keynote: Apprenticeship as a model of learning across the professions

Alison Fuller is Pro-Director (Research and Development) at University College London Institute of Education and Professor of Vocational Education and Work. She has been researching, and publishing in the field of, education – work transitions, apprenticeship,  workplace learning, vocational education and training (VET), and widening participation in higher education for 25 years. Alison’s current research includes directing an ESRC funded project looking at ‘employee-driven innovation’ and learning in the healthcare sector. She has recently completed a study of older apprentices for the Nuffield Foundation. Alison is regularly consulted by policy-makers on vocational education and apprenticeship policy and was previously (with Lorna Unwin) specialist advisor to the House of Commons Select Committee scrutinising the Apprenticeship Bill.

Jan Vermunt

Dr Steve J Hothersall, Edge Hill University

Keynote: Co-constructing professional knowledge: Epistemology, social work, nursing and John Dewey

Steve J Hothersall is the Head of Social Work Education at Edge Hill University, United Kingdom, and a qualified and registered social worker and a qualified nurse. He has written on social work practice with children, young people and their families, mental health, social need, social policy and professional knowledge. Steve has also served on the Editorial Board of the British Journal of Social Work and undertakes reviews for a range of academic journals. His academic interests relate to the uses of methodology, the development of ‘practical’ philosophy to inform both teaching and professional practice(s) and recently, empirical and theoretical research focusing on the development and use of professional knowledge, drawing on underpinning epistemic principles, and considering their role and application in knowledge communities. He is currently working on developing a pragmatic model of professional knowledge development in practice settings with a particular focus on inter-professional learning, and the practical applications of the three modes of inference: deductive, inductive and abductive reasoning, utilising Aristotle’s notion of ‘phronesis’ as a theoretical mechanism.

Awards

IPDA Prize

The 2016 IPDA Prize was awarded to Samantha Jones for her dissertation for an MSc in Learning and Teaching at the University of Oxford entitled ‘How and how far to identities and pedagogies affect the impact of Continuous Professional Development in a Further Education College?’

IPDA Fellowship

An IPDA Fellowship was awarded to Dr Balwant Singh.

Dr Balwant Singh

PDiE Best Paper Award

The PDiE best paper award at the 2016 IPDA conference has been made to Professor Linda Evans, University of Manchester, for:

‘Implicit’ and informal professional development: what it ‘looks like’, how it occurs, and why we need to research it.

PDiE Best Article Award