4 of that twenty eight were known to me personally

4

Of that twenty, eight were known to me personally, either through having worked with them;
or through conference circuits. I had no reasons for excluding any of them. One was a part
time colleague at the University where I teach. I worked with a sample of eight, which
included the managing directors of the two major companies, one of which I would hope to
study in a school context. My sample made some allowance for withdrawal and non
participation, - a range of people who included individuals who had experience as national
policy makers; who made the move from the private to the public sector; who have made the
move from the public to the private – and some of them have moved between the two.
Newman and Clarke (2009: 107) call people who do that “boundary blurrers”.
Anonymity issues:
The issue of anonymity is a complicated topic in such research. Whereas it is my intention to
make anonymous the views and experiences of participants, as expressed in interviews –
and in my subsequent analyses, the websites that advertise the “for profit” companies’ aims
(and costs!) are in the public domain. One interesting issue which I will needed to address
was the possible diversity between views and aspirations expressed in the “public”
presentations (in websites; in published newspaper interviews) and those expressed in
interviews. This is a methodological issue discussed by Ozga and Gewirtz (1994) and by
Moss, who had to address such concerns during her discussions with politicians (Moss,
2008; personal communication). The work of Neal (1995) and of Penney (2001) has been
helpful in planning my interviews with, and interpretations of the viewpoints of, potentially
powerful players in the field of policy. My position in relation to interviewing powerful policy
players needed to be carefully thought through.
The selected sample is presented as Appendix One of the paper (page 5) below.
Research methods:
i) Library-based/archive work on texts; documents; records; literatures;
ii) Extensive interviews with between consultants representing the range of people
currently working in the literacy field: independent consultants; representatives of
“for profit” companies; people who have made a move from the public to the
private; people who still work in the public sector.
iii) From the group represented in (ii) above, l selected four companies/individuals
who were involved in effecting policy change within schools, two doing “external”
events with larger groups of practitioners; two within individual schools.
Ethnographic field work took place in each of these schools over the period of the
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training events and was followed by interviews with the consultants and the
heads/teachers; observations; document study and analysis.
For the purposes of this observation, a typology was constructed of consultants’ activities
with practitioners, in and out of schools, represented as Table One (below)
TYPOLOGY: consultants’ activities with practitioners
External
(out of school) events
Product as “process” (teaching approach)