The Road less Travelled? THE CASE FOR RESEARCH or, The Road less Travelled? Pauline McDonald, AGCAS and Jane Artess, HECSU

Albert Einstein “The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them”.

Our Greatest Challenge- how to create Learning Organizations Peter Senge, “A learning organization is a place where people continually expand their capacity to create the results they truly desire, where new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, where collective aspiration is set free, and where people are continually learning how to learn together”.

Follow the Yellow Brick Road….

Research- the life blood of a Learning Organization Research is intrinsic to learning, as it helps clarify practice issues whilst challenging conventional thinking. And it keeps the curious engaged!

Practitioner led Guidance that ‘unifies and energises’. Through the Agcas ‘virtual and actual’ community of practice. Finally through PROP, leading the way in facilitating practitioner research.

Our Greatest Challenge?

To fire the imagination and to inspire creativity and learning for the 21st Century. We need to re-discover awe and wonder.

“There are only two ways to live your life “There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle”. Albert Einstein, (again).

PROP To create a forum for practitioners and researchers to collaborate on the development and dissemination of practice in careers education and guidance in higher education in the UK.

Objectives To assist practitioners to consider how research informs practice To assist researchers to develop questions and themes relevant to practice To develop innovative approaches to practice issues To coordinate with other relevant initiatives To disseminate activities openly To contribute to policy formulation

Outcomes anticipated Networked learning community Range of careers education and guidance materials available electronically Short, accessible publications such as the HECSU research notes series

Criteria for projects Projects should contribute to: the advancement of education of students and graduates the career development and progression of students and graduates the professional practices of careers advisory and other staff in HE and HE in FE developing innovative ways of working the creation of knowledge about student/graduate career development learning

Phillip Pullman, author of ‘Northern Lights’ Creativity is hard "Writer's block…a lot of howling nonsense would be avoided if, in every sentence containing the word WRITER, that word was taken out and the word PLUMBER substituted; and the result examined for the sense it makes. Do plumbers get plumber's block? What would you think of a plumber who used that as an excuse not to do any work that day? The fact is that writing is hard work, and sometimes you don't want to do it, and you can't think of what to write next, and you're fed up with the whole damn business. Do you think plumbers don't feel like that about their work from time to time? Of course there will be days when the stuff is not flowing freely. What you do then is MAKE IT UP. I like the reply of the composer Shostakovich to a student who complained that he couldn't find a theme for his second movement. “Never mind the theme! Just write the movement!” he said” Phillip Pullman, author of ‘Northern Lights’

Thank you Contact information: Pauline McDonald 01792 602196 p.mcdonald@swansea.ac.uk Jane Artess 0161 277 5208 j.artess@prospects.ac.uk